One month after federal prosecutors announced that they would not pursue charges in the 2017 Park Police shooting of an unarmed driver, local prosecutors have attempted to take up the case.

Bijan Ghaisar, a 25-year-old accountant, was shot by two Park Police officers after he left the scene of a minor fender bender on November 17, 2017. In the months that followed, Ghaisar’s family vocally protested the lack of information from officials about what exactly happened that night and the lack of charges against the officers involved, Alejandro Amaya and Lucas Vinyard.

Several days before the two year anniversary of the shooting, federal prosecutors announced they didn’t have enough evidence to “disprove a claim of self-defense or defense of others by the officers.”

But outgoing Fairfax Commonwealth’s Attorney Raymond F. Morrogh tried to bring the case before a grand jury this week, according to Roy Austin, a lawyer for the family. He tells DCist that a representative from Morrogh’s office “who felt it was his duty to keep the family informed” called and said they had intended to present the case to the grand jury, but the U.S. Attorney’s Office in D.C. did not approve an FBI agent to testify in time.

The Washington Post was the first report on the development.

It’s not clear if Morrogh’s successor, Steve Descanso, will pick up the case when he takes office next month.

Austin says that the attempt to indict the officers does provide the family some hope that there will be criminal charges despite the federal government’s decision not to pursue the case.

“We believe that there should be a criminal investigation by the state,” Austin says. “Any movement in that direction is positive in my mind.”

A number of local officials—including Reps. Don Beyer, Jennifer Wexton, and Eleanor Holmes Norton—have expressed support for the family. “The Justice Department failed our community for two years by withholding answers about why police killed Bijan Ghaisar, but this final failure [to indict] is the worst of all,” Beyer said in a statement last month.

Much of what is publicly known came from a video released by Fairfax police. It shows that Ghaisar stopped driving and then pulled away after officers approached with guns drawn on two occasions. During the third stop, when the car began to move again, an officer fired multiple shots within seconds. A second officer approached and fired a second round of shots, and another two shots were fired as the vehicle rolled down an embankment. Ghaisar died ten days later at a nearby hospital.

Previously:
Family Of Va. Man Killed By Park Police Officers Files $25 Million Lawsuit