The family of a Colorado teenager filed a lawsuit Thursday accusing an off-duty corrections officer of using deadly force "recklessly" and "without warning" when he fatally shot the teen in his backyard as a group of friends were fleeing the scene of a home break-in.
The case has fueled protests in Denver against racial injustice and calls to "defund the police.".
A second teen whom Manning shot in the leg is also a plaintiff in the lawsuit.
Alexis Mendez-Perez was fatally shot by an off-duty corrections officer in northeast Denver on April 23, 2020.
The family said in their lawsuit that the friends knew no one was living there and were looking to party.
Manning, waiting with his pistol, turned on his porch light and fired five times as Mendez-Perez and Munoz ran away, according to the lawsuit.
He said that while they might have been criminally trespassing, their actions didn't justify being shot at and one of them killed. »