Baltimore County police officer sued for shooting fleeing suspect

The family of Brian McCourry, who was killed by Baltimore County police last year while trying to flee, filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the county on Thursday.

Officers in unmarked vehicles surrounded McCourry, who was wanted for arrest in connection with two non-fatal shootings, at a Royal Farms in White Marsh early one morning in January 2023. One officer rammed his car into the passenger side of McCourry’s Kia, and McCourry attempted to escape through a gap between a vehicle and a pillar, causing damage to another police car.

As he was escaping, officer Jonathan Trenary shot him in the neck, and he was instantly paralyzed, the complaint states. Unable to control his car, it collided with another car at an intersection. McCourry died about a month later at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center.

“Brian McCourry was unarmed,” the complaint states. “He did not brandish a weapon or threaten officers or civilians. Evading arrest is wrong, but our society rightfully requires more to justify the use of deadly force, especially when the use of deadly force — here firing at a vehicle driving away into a busy street — endangered many lives.”

The suit against Trenary and Baltimore County was filed Thursday in U.S. District Court by McCourry’s parents, Gina VanCamp and Brian McCourry Sr., as well as three women. Two of them had children with McCourry; he was separated from, but still legally married to, the third.

The complaint alleges wrongful death, excessive force, gross negligence and common law battery.

The plaintiffs are represented by the law firm Keilty Bonadio, as well as Jay Miller and Raphael Santini.

The Baltimore County State’s Attorney’s Office did not charge Trenary. In October 2023, the Maryland Attorney General’s Office gained the authority to prosecute police for deadly incidents.

The complaint alleges that a few days before the incident, officers followed but were unable to apprehend McCourry. It argues that the officers should have used non-lethal methods or simply let him get away again, rather than shooting him.

The complaint also brings attention to the conduct of the Baltimore County Police Department’s Criminal Apprehension Support Team, or CAST. It says CAST officers did not have to wear body cameras and were subject to less accountability to other officers. It likens CAST to the Baltimore Police Department’s Gun Trace Task Force and similar specialized units in other cities, including the Memphis Police Department unit that killed Tyre Nichols in January 2023, the same month McCourry was shot.

“In each case, the units engaged in rampant violation of constitutional rights and caused hundreds of overturned convictions along with untold civil monetary damages,” the complaint argues.

Baltimore County and its police department did not respond to requests for comment.

The complaint begins with a citation of a U.S. Supreme Court decision from 1985, in which the court ruled that police can’t kill people unless they believe their own lives or safety are at risk.

“The use of deadly force to prevent the escape of all felony suspects, whatever the circumstances, is constitutionally unreasonable. It is not better that all felony suspects die than that they escape,” Justice Byron White wrote.

“It is no doubt unfortunate when a suspect who is in sight escapes, but the fact that the police arrive a little late or are a little slower afoot does not always justify killing the suspect. A police officer may not seize an unarmed, nondangerous suspect by shooting him dead.”