A Dallas County grand jury on Tuesday declined to indict a Dallas police canine officer who had been accused of using inappropriate force after striking a fleeing robbery suspect with his patrol vehicle last spring.
By declining to indict him, the grand jury effectively ended the current criminal case against Senior Cpl. Scott Jay. The decision comes nearly a year after an investigation began into the 28-year officer’s actions during an early morning pursuit through an east Oak Cliff neighborhood last March. That investigation culminated in Jay’s arrest in late July.
Grand jury proceedings are carried out in secret, where jurors determine if the evidence collected by investigators and prosecutors is sufficient to bring criminal charges. Claire Crouch, a district attorney’s office spokesperson, confirmed the outcome in a statement Thursday.
Sr. Cpl. Scott Jay and his dog, Figor, were wounded while searching for a man suspected of a shooting in 2023.
Provided by Dallas police
Sean Pease, president of the Dallas Police Association, the city’s largest police union, celebrated the outcome. He said the grand jury’s decision “affirms what many in law enforcement already understood — that Corporal Jay was doing his job while attempting to apprehend an armed, fleeing suspect during a dangerous call.”
The man Jay struck was a suspect in a robbery and had a pocket knife, according to internal affairs records reviewed by The Dallas Morning News. The man had reportedly dropped the knife and was fleeing officers on foot when Jay hit him in his patrol vehicle.
Jay, 50, had faced a charge of aggravated assault, a second-degree felony punishable by two to 20 years in prison.
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After his arrest, Jay’s attorney, Robert Rogers, argued the maneuver was in line with department policy and intended to “bump” the man off balance to prevent the encounter from escalating into deadly force.
The man “experienced pain and minor injury” after Jay hit him with the patrol vehicle, an officer wrote in an incident report.
Whether the man was arrested or charged in connection with the alleged robbery is unclear. An incident report portal managed by the department lists the case as “suspended.” Attempts to reach him for comment were unsuccessful.
Jay joined the department in 1997 and is assigned to the Canine Unit. He was placed on restricted duty on Wednesday, meaning he was reassigned to a limited-duty post without his normal field responsibilities.
In 2023, he was honored by Gov. Greg Abbott after he and his dog, Figor, were wounded in a deadly shootout in Pleasant Grove while tracking a man suspected of an earlier shooting.
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