WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court is wrestling with the topic of police shootings in a case where a California sheriff’s deputies shot a couple during their search for a wanted man.
The justices Wednesday heard arguments in a 2010 shooting involving Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies. The deputies were searching for a wanted parolee when they entered a shack at the back of a home in the city of Lancaster, north of Los Angeles. Seeing a man with a gun, they fired. But the man wasn’t the suspect they were searching for and they struck him and his girlfriend. The gun was a BB gun.
Lower courts ruled that the deputies, who didn’t have a warrant, provoked the confrontation. The couple was awarded $4 million.
