ATLANTA — A federal judge ruled that a former Atlanta police officer acted in self-defense when he shot and killed an unarmed man six years ago.
A Fulton County grand jury indicted Officer Sung Kim in the death of Jimmy Atchison. The 21-year-old was killed after investigators say he ran from officers of a FBI task force in January 2019.
In his ruling on Tuesday, Judge Michael Brown wrote that Kim’s actions were “textbook self-defense.”
“Indeed, the evidence for self-defense is so overwhelming it is hard to understand how Georgia could have brought these charges in the first place, much less continued with them over the two and a half years since,” Brown wrote.
The judge dismissed the involuntary manslaughter and violation of oath charges against Kim.
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On Jan. 22, 2019, Kim worked with the FBI’s Atlanta Metropolitan Major Offender Task Force that tried to arrest Atchison on an armed robbery warrant.
Investigators said Atchison ran from the scene and officers eventually found him hiding in an apartment’s closet.
Kim testified that he thought Atchison had a gun that he was going to shoot and that is when he fired a single shot that killed Atchison.
Family members said that Atchison had his hands in the air and was attempting to surrender when he was shot in the face.
Investigators say no weapon was ever found at the scene.
Kim was not wearing a body camera because a FBI policy did not allow agents and task force members to wear them at the time. Kim retired from the Atlanta Police Department several months after the shooting.
Kim’s attorney, Don Samuel, sent Channel 2 Action News the following statement about Tuesday’s ruling.
“It is hard to celebrate when a young man died; but there is no doubt that the decision of the Fulton County DA’s office to compound the tragedy by prosecuting Sung Kim was an inexcusable abuse of prosecutorial discretion. Judge Brown’s decision was unambiguous: Sung Kim’s acted in self-defense. In fact, the prosecution’s expert witness testified that Sung Kim acted legitimately in self-defense.”
Channel 2 Action News has reached out to the Fulton DA’s office for a statement.
Atchison’s family filed a lawsuit seeking $20 million in damages.
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