Travis County District Attorney José Garza on Wednesday clarified that he plans to take no action against the three Austin police officers who opened fire early Sunday on a mass shooter who killed three people and injured 13 others on a bar-lined stretch of West Sixth Street. Ndiaga Diagne, the suspected gunman, was mid-rampage when the officers fatally shot him.
In a one-page letter to Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis, Garza said his office’s Civil Rights Unit conducted a “thorough review of the evidence,” including video, a walk-through of the scene and coordination with the Austin Police Department’s Special Investigations Unit.
“After the review, it is clear and indisputable that at the time the officers were responding to an active shooting in a mass casualty situation, and that the subject of the shooting was in the act of using unlawful deadly force,” Garza wrote. “For these reasons and based on the facts now known to us, we are closing our review and no action will be taken.”
The letter follows two days of social media buzz from Garza’s critics over whether he would present the officers’ actions to a grand jury, as he often does in cases involving police use of force, or instead exercise his discretion to close the matter.
Since taking office five years ago, Garza has made police accountability a central focus, securing indictments against more than two dozen officers. That record prompted scrutiny online over how he would handle the shooting of a suspect described by officials as actively firing on bystanders.
The claims were amplified by several top Texas Republicans, including Gov. Greg Abbott, a frequent critic of Garza, and Texas House Speaker Dustin Burrows.
Garza responded Tuesday with a statement calling the officers “heroes” and saying his office would not seek charges. The statement, however, did not explicitly address whether the case would be presented to a grand jury.
His letter Wednesday made clear that it will not.