AVONDALE, AZ — Avondale Police Officer Cardenas-Duarte will not be charged after shooting and killing 17-year-old Amarion Hope.
The officer-involved shooting happened in February 2023. Police believed that Hope was a shoplifting suspect.
When Officer Cardenas-Duarte approached Hope, body camera footage shows a struggle between the officer and Hope before Hope is shot while running away.
Larnell Farmer, President of West Valley NAACP said, “This was a child. He was 17 years old, and he did not deserve to die like this."
Farmer, who was a police officer for over two decades, doesn’t believe Hope was a threat to Officer Cardenas-Duarte.
“They use the narrative that he was, and they always do, when it comes to us: He was strong, he had that dead glare in his eyes, like he was looking through me,” Farmer explained. “It's this thing to make us seem that we are more animalistic than we are human, and that same narrative was pushed in the police report."
Hope's mother, Keitha Tucker, spoke with ABC15 in September 2023. She said, “I just want the prosecutor to do what's right. Hold the hold the cop accountable for his actions."
RELATED: Woman seeks $25 million in damages over teen son's shooting death by Avondale PD
The Maricopa County Attorney's Office says two independent expert reports and their own review of the shooting found the actions of Officer Cardenas-Duarte were justified.
ABC15 spoke to Lon Bartel, one of the independent experts assigned to this case.
"We have to make sure that there is a high level of scrutiny, as absolutely required to ensure that the outcome of that is justified,” Bartel said. “It doesn't mean that anybody likes it, it means that legally based on the totality of the circumstances that it was justified."
While Bartel couldn't specifically comment on the investigation, he provided insight on circumstances reviewed in officer-involved shootings.
"You can kill somebody with your bare hands and if I have somebody that's making that attempt, who's trying to do that, I have to be able to stop them. And the question becomes 'What quality of force will immediately and decisively stop that behavior?'," Bartel explained
The Hope family's attorney, Benjamin Taylor says they are devastated by the Maricopa County Attorney’s decision.
“This is a sad incident that the county attorney won't bring charges against an officer who clearly is in violation by shooting an unarmed man who is running and shoots him in the back,” Taylor said.
Hope's family is still seeking $25 million in damages. Meanwhile, the Avondale Police Department is still reviewing their internal investigation. The department told ABC15 that the officer was placed on administrative leave after the shooting and has remained on administrative leave since.
