Former Columbus police officer Adam Coy took the stand in his own defense Monday after the prosecution rested its case.
Monday started the second week of Coy's trial on charges of murder, reckless homicide and felonious assault. He shot and killed Andre Hill, an unarmed Black man, at a home on Oberlin Drive in December of 2020.
Coy's defense attorney Mark Collins started by asking Coy about his family, training and time teaching other officers when and how to use guns while interacting with the public.
Below includes excerpts taken from Coy's testimony during his murder trial on Oct. 28, 2024.
Collins: How are you trained to shoot at a perceived deadly threat.
Coy: Center mass, sir.
Collins: When do you stop shooting?
Coy: When the threat is stopped.
Collins: Are you trained to shoot at an extremity or injure them? Coy: absolutely not, sir.
Collins then moved to questions about the night Coy killed Hill. Coy said he thought he saw Hill raising a revolver toward him. Coy cried as he described the shooting.
Collins: And when you saw that, what did you think was going to happen out there?
Coy: I thought I was going to die.
Collins: What did you do in response to that item?
Coy: I drew my gun. I yelled 'gun, gun.' And I fired four shots.
Hill was holding his keys.
Franklin County Assistant Prosecutor Anthony Pierson tried to get Coy to say he'd done things that night that were not part of standard protocol, but Coy testified his only error was mistaking the metal on the key ring for the metal of a gun.
Pierson: Outside of that mistaking the keys for a deadly weapon. You would agree that you made other mistakes at night, too. Correct?
Coy: No, sir.
Coy testified on the stand that Hill showed him his phone to prove he was there to meet someone, but Coy couldn't actually read the message.
Pierson: So it's your contention, Mr. Coy, that on Dec. 22, 2020, you had something wrong with your vision?
Coy: I've worn contacts and glasses for years sir. My vision has gotten worse since the cancer. (Coy began undergoing chemotherapy treatment for Hodgkin’s lymphoma last year, which led to the postponement of the trial's beginning.)
Coy testified that he started to worry that Hill was in the neighborhood to burglarize a home. Coy said he felt something was off. Pierson accused Coy of making up the fear that Hill was there to break into a home, which Coy refuted.
Before Coy took the stand, the defense's use of force expert Kevin Davis testified. Coy's defense attorney Kaitlyn Stephens asked the retired Ohio police officer how officers are trained to respond to a perceived deadly threat.
Davis: That deadly force is appropriate. A variety of other options could be used, for instance, moving. But if the officer perceives that his life's in danger, then that deadly force is justified.
Stephens: The fact that he actually did not possess a weapon, does that come into your analysis?
Davis: Only in that we know that in hindsight, in other words, after the shooting transpired. This when Officer Coy saw the keys up until that point in time. Officer Coy, in my belief, reasonably believed that Mr. Hill was armed with a gun.
Based on Coy's statements, Davis said he thinks that Coy "reasonably believed that Mr. Hill presented the threat of death or serious bodily harm and that the use of deadly force was within the standards of law enforcement."
Stephens: Even though he was mistaken?
Davis: Even though he was mistaken tragically. But even though he was mistaken.
Pierson questioned Davis' credentials.
Pierson: You're not a legal expert, are you?
Davis: No, I'm an expert on the use of force investigations.
Pierson: Okay. And you've never gone to law school, correct?
Davis: No.
Pierson: Not an attorney, correct?
Davis: That's correct.
