Prosecutors Focus on Dallas Cop's Texts the Night She Fatally Shot Neighbor

Amber Guyger was exchanging sexually explicit messages with partner all day: prosecutors
By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff
Posted Sep 24, 2019 3:29 PM CDT
Former Dallas Cop Texted Lover as Neighbor Lay Dying: Prosecutors
In this Sept. 13, 2019 file photo, fired Dallas police Officer Amber Guyger, right, arrives for jury selection in her murder trial at the Frank Crowley Courthouse in downtown Dallas.   (Tom Fox/The Dallas Morning News via AP File)

The former Dallas police officer who allegedly shot and killed a man after entering the wrong apartment texted her partner as the man lay dying, according to testimony presented on the first day of her murder trial Monday. Amber Guyger and Officer Martin Rivera were in a sexual relationship at the time, and prosecutors said that on the night Guyger entered Botham Jean's apartment, mistaking it for her own, she had been sending sexually explicit messages to Rivera, including one sent at 9:30pm just as she finished her 13.5-hour shift. The two then spoke on the phone for 16 minutes, until Guyger, 31, arrived at her apartment building's parking garage, two blocks from work, just before 10pm. She parked on the wrong floor and entered Jean's apartment. At 10:02pm and 10:03pm, prosecutors said, she texted Rivera "I need you. Hurry," and "I f---ed up."

Prosecutors say the texts were sent while she was on the line with 911, NBC News reports. "Should you be giving 100% of attention to the person dying in front of you?" the lead prosecutor asked Rivera, who took the stand at the end of the day. "Should you be sending text messages?" Guyger's defense team argues she was tired after a long shift when she mistook Jean for a burglar in her own home, but prosecutors say she was distracted by her conversation with Rivera, who they say she was trying to meet up with that night, per the Washington Post. They also revealed both Guyger and Rivera deleted the text messages between them the day after the shooting; the messages were later recovered. Meanwhile, Guyger's defense team said other tenants had similarly parked on the wrong floor or ended up at the wrong apartment due to numbering problems at the building. (More Amber Guyger stories.)

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