Legal Updates Around the Country (Dec. 11, 2015)

Baltimore Police Officer William Porter The trial of Baltimore police officer William Porter enters its tenth day today. The State presented 16 witnesses in the first seven days. Porter’s defense began Wednesday and continues today. In addition to testifying in his own defense, Porter has called three other officers who were present the day Freddie Gray was arrested and injured in the back of a police van. Two of those officers, who did not testify for the State, had been given immunity by the prosecution. Porter’s defense team also called its own forensic pathologist and a former Baltimore officer who became chief of the Charlottesville, VA police department, Timothy Longo. Longo testified that Porter’s conduct that day was reasonable in light of all the circumstances. The experts do not agree about the immediate consequences of the spinal injury Freddie Gray…