MINNEAPOLIS — In a new court filing in the murder case involving Minnesota State Patrol Trooper Ryan Londregan, a firearms trainer cited in the criminal complaint now says prosecutors are lying by omission.
Sgt. Jason Halvorson, use-of-force coordinator for the Minnesota State Patrol Training and Development Section, is referred to as “Trainer A” in the criminal complaint charging Londregan with second-degree murder in the shooting death of Ricky Cobb. The complaint details a portion of an interview Sgt. Halvorson gave during the investigation in which he was asked whether a reasonable officer would believe believe pointing a gun at a fleeing driver would cause the driver to stop.
“No,” Sgt. Halvorson responded, according to the complaint. The complaint goes on to say that under State Patrol policy, members shall not shoot from or at a moving vehicle, except when deadly force was authorized.
But documents recently entered into the record make it clear Halvorson feels his position has been misrepresented by the Hennepin County Attorney's Office. “Trooper Londregan acted in accordance with his training,” said Sgt. Halvorson in a signed declaration filed in the case.
In his declaration, Halverson says his statement used in the complaint was part of a hypothetical scenario posed to him by Senior Assistant County Attorney Josh Larson and Deputy Hennepin County Attorney Mark Osler, one that had nothing to do with the facts from the actual Londregan case.
“The author of the complaint (signed by Osler) has cherry-picked one sentence from a 37-page interview transcript and excluded critical facts and context thereby purposefully misleading the reader of the complaint,” Sgt. Halvorson wrote in the court filing.
Sgt Halvorson said he offered to perform a complete use-of-force review of Trooper Londregan’s officer-involved shooting. In the declaration he offers that in his opinion, Londregan followed training and did not violate the State Patrol’s general orders and use-of-force policy.
The trainer’s declaration is likely to be used by defense attorney Chris Madel in arguments to be made at a motions hearing Thursday morning.
The Hennepin County Attorney's Office issued a statement:
"Unfortunately, the defense continues to inappropriately use the court process to file baseless press releases. Now, they have introduced false accusations against Deputy County Attorney Mark Osler. There is significant evidence that supports the charges in this case. The complaint is accurate and lays out the evidence to establish probable cause.
The affidavit filed by the defense notably doesn’t reference evidence revealed during the Grand Jury, during which Sergeant Halverson testified. As the defense knows, the law prevents us from revealing Grand Jury evidence at this stage of the proceedings, and also prevented this information from being included in the complaint. We will address the voluminous defense filings and litigate the case in court, and not in the press."
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