No criminal charges will be filed in the fatal January shooting of a BART police sergeant by one of his fellow officers, according to an official report released Friday.
The shooting was described as a tragic mistake that occurred partly due to a failure of the two officers to communicate with one another in an apartment with an unusual layout.
Alameda County District Attorney Nancy O'Malley wrote that the evidence surrounding the Jan. 21 shooting death of Sgt. Thomas Smith Jr. by Officer Michael Maes does not justify criminal charges against Maes.
Smith, 42, was shot by Maes during a probation search of a small unit at the Park Sierra Apartments on Dougherty Road near Park Sierra in Dublin. They were seeking a robbery suspect named John Henry Lee, who had already been arrested for the robbery and was in custody in Santa Rita Jail at the time they searched his apartment.
The team of seven BART officers and one Dublin police officer were seeking stolen items, including a laptop computer.