Maine's top prosecutor has ruled that two Portland police officers were legally justified when they fatally shot a 26-year-old Sudanese immigrant.
Attorney General Janet Mills said Friday that Benjamin Roper and Joshua Wiseman acted in self-defense when David Okot (OH'-kut) pulled a handgun from the waistband of his pants on the night of April 25.
Police were responding to a report of a drunk man showing off a weapon. Mills says Okot refused to obey the officers' orders and was shot after he pointed a .22-caliber pistol at Wiseman.
The shooting spurred hard feelings and unrest within Portland's Sudanese community and led to a policy of officers being sent in pairs to certain neighborhoods.
