DA Ends Probe Into Tosa Cops Who Shot Teen When Car Mistaken As Stolen

MILWAUKEE, WI — Two Wauwatosa police officers who shot a teen this spring after his car was mistaken as stolen because it was not yet reported recovered will not face criminal charges, the Milwaukee County District Attorney's Office announced.

The shooting happened in an alley in the 9100 block of West Congress Street in Milwaukee on the evening of April 5. On Monday, Wauwatosa Police Chief James MacGillis posted a narrative of what led up to the shooting alongside body camera footage. The teen survived, but as MacGillis explained with the body camera footage, police shot him because he did not comply after an officer spotted his gun.

Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm closed the investigation, telling MacGillis in a letter dated Aug. 15 that the use of force was legally privileged. But attorneys for Damiso Lee, the teen who was shot, said they are looking into a civil lawsuit, FOX6 reported.

"The officers were investigating a stolen automobile complaint," Chisholm wrote in his decision, "they recognized they were dealing with an armed operator of the vehicle, they ordered him to comply and not to arm himself, he refused and in the course of fleeing from the officers retrieved the firearm. Under such circumstances, an objectively reasonable officer could believe they faced a threat of death or great bodily harm."

It started when Wauwatosa Officer Evan Olson got a hit on his squad's automated license plate reader when a gray Pontiac sedan passed by, driven by the teen who would later be shot, MacGillis explained. The car was previously reported stolen out of Milwaukee, and dispatchers confirmed its stolen status to Olson, but the owner had not told police that the car was recovered, according to MacGillis.

The Pontiac sedan parked in an alley nearby, and Olson cornered it against a building with his squad car and lights on as Officer Dexter Schleis arrives in his squad, the video shows and MacGillis explained.

The teen then gets out of the car, and Olson yells at him to stop and show his hands, the video showed. Then, according to MacGillis, Olson noticed a gun, and he yells at the teen "do not reach for that gun."

Then the video appears to show the teen darting around the front of the sedan as Olson yells "gun" to his colleague nearby. The teen comes around from the front of the car and trips in front of the officers in the middle of the alley and dropped a handgun, according to MacGillis.

Then, MacGillis said the teen reached for the gun and the volley of shots came from both officers.

"When an officer involved shooting occurs, there is trauma to the injured subject, the subject’s family, the officers involved, the police department and the community as a whole," the city wrote in a statement to Facebook announcing the news. "This decision is one of many steps in the healing process."