AUGUSTA (NEWS CENTER Maine) – A heated exchange in Augusta Monday between a handful of protesters and Attorney General Janet Mills ended in a pizza party.
The group was there to protest the officer-involved shooting of Chance Baker in February 2017.
Protesters say Chance is another black man taken by police violence, but the Attorney General says the shooting was justified.
“He was a young, black man. He was 22 years old. He was homeless,” said organizer Iris Sangiovanni. “He was suffering from mental health crisis. He's black. Those are no reasons to be dead.”
None of the protesters knew Chance Baker personally, but say they're disappointed that Attorney General Janet Mills found the use of deadly force justified.
On February 18, 2017, Chance Baker, homeless at the time, bought a pellet rifle at a pawn shop.
Police say he stumbled out of the shop with a blood alcohol level 3 times the legal limit and walked around the shopping plaza carrying the air rifle.
Three different witnesses called 911 in two minutes' time - the last one telling dispatchers that Baker was definitely carrying a BB gun.
According to records obtained by the Portland Press Herald, when Portland Police Sergeant Nicholas Goodman was told this by a dispatcher, he said, “We’re not going to start guessing now.”
Two minutes and 35 seconds after arriving on scene, the sergeant fired one fatal shot to Chance’s head.
This shooting was determined justified because the officer believed Chance was a threat to the public.
AG Janet Mills says investigations into officer-involved shootings have a narrow focus. “All we are looking at is whether the officer should be criminally charged, whether or not there is reasonable believe they acted in self-defense or defense of others,” she explained.
The protesters made their way to Mills’ office, demanding a conversation. When she came out moments later and offered to talk with them, they refused conversation, instead chanting, “We call bulls***” and “black lives matter” until AG Mills walked back into her office.
“I'm happy to have a conversation, but I'm not going to engage in a screaming match with anybody,” AG Mills told NEWS CENTER Maine.
Maine Attorneys General have never found an officer-involved shooting to be unjustified in the state’s history.
Janet Mills recently announced a new task force designed to investigate an increase in officer-involved shootings in Maine.
Protesters say they were there on behalf of Chance’s family, who lives in the Midwest. While the protesters say this shooting was racially motivated, Chance’s family told the Portland Press Herald they do not believe race was a factor in his death.
After the altercation with the AG, the protestors stayed in the lobby to her office and ordered pizza.
They left around 3 PM.