Update 9/28: 

A legal settlement has been reached in the case of the man who was killed by Prince George’s County police while handcuffed in January, 2020.

A spokesperson for County Executive Angela Alsobrooks announced the settlement in a statement on Sunday. Alsobrooks will be holding a press conference to discuss details of the agreement on Monday, where she will be joined with the victim’s attorney and family members.

Original:

The Prince George’s County Police Department has charged one of its officers with second-degree murder in connection with the fatal shooting of a handcuffed man in Temple Hills on Monday night.

The department identified the victim as William Green at a news conference Tuesday night and said Corporal Michael Owen shot him while he was handcuffed in the front passenger’s seat of the patrol car.

Owen also was charged with voluntary and involuntary manslaughter, first-degree assault, and use of a firearm in the commission of a crime of violence before completion of an investigation.

“I am unable to come to our community this evening and offer you a reasonable explanation for the events that occurred last night. I have concluded that what happened last night is a crime,” Prince George’s County Chief of Police Henry Stawinski said at a Tuesday press conference. Stawinski said that Owen, a 10-year veteran of the police department, has a history of prior incidents, but did not go into details.

The shooting occurred on Winston Street, at the intersection with St. Barnabas Road. A department spokesperson told reporters Monday night that officers were responding to a 911 call about a driver who had struck several vehicles. The suspect was apprehended at the scene.

Department spokesperson Christina Cotterman, briefing reporters at the scene on Monday, said Green was handcuffed and wearing a seat belt in the front passenger’s seat of the car. The officer was sitting in the driver’s seat when he fired his weapon, she said.

Two independent witnesses told investigators they noticed a struggle and heard loud bangs coming from the police car, Cotterman continued. Green was reportedly shot multiple times by the police officer. Officers attempted “life-saving measures” on him before he died at a local hospital, according to Cotterman. Cotterman told reporters it is typical for suspects in the county to be transported in the front seat of police cars.

Owen was not wearing a body camera during the incident, leaving no footage to examine. Stawinski said the department believes seven shots were fired, but it is still investigating the incident; that information did, however, contribute to the department’s decision to preemptively charge Owen. Owen was placed on administrative leave prior to being charged, which is standard procedure for the department.

“While I am confident of the evidence and the probable cause that substantiates those charges, we do not have a thorough and complete accounting of every single detail,” he said. “The fundamental details, however, are the basis of the probable cause for which we’re using to place these charges this evening.”

The police department initially reported that Green may have been under the influence of PCP, a drug that has been linked to aggression. But Stawinski said Tuesday that the department does not believe the drug was involved. He added that the department does not have independent witnesses who could corroborate reports of a struggle prior to the shooting, and officials do not know for certain that Green was wearing a seatbelt.

State’s Attorney Aisha Braveboy promised a thorough investigation would be carried out, telling The Washington Post that a grand jury will be convened in the case.

“Any in-custody death is problematic,” she said.

The incident comes during the Prince George’s County Police Department’s body camera pilot program. In the county, one squad per police district has body cameras.

County Executive Angela Alsobrooks said the department has set aside funds in this year’s upcoming budget that will give every officer within the bureau of patrol a body camera (a move Police Chief Stawinski said he has always favored). Gina Ford, a spokesperson for Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks, tells WAMU via email that “the procurement process for those body cameras has already begun.”

A spokesperson for county executive Angela Alsobrooks told NBC Washington in October that she supports expanding the program and is planning to phase in body cameras “over the next few budget cycles.”

Activists are in support of the move, though they say they know body cameras are not an end all solution.

“We understand that body-worn cameras are not going to stop all unnecessary instances of force,” said Jay Jimenez, a member of the legal team for the ACLU of Maryland. “We saw Eric Garner get killed on camera. We saw Robert White, a black man in Montgomery County, get killed on camera.”

But what body-worn cameras do add, Jimenez said, is a level of accountability and transparency.

“What we want from body-worn cameras is the ability for officers who use unnecessary force to be held accountable for their actions,” Jimenez said.

This story first appeared on WAMU. This story has been updated with information about the settlement.