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data saved to Officer Pitterson’s taser concerning each pull of the taser’s trigger. He then opined
that based on the data he analyzed, the taser’s trigger had been pulled six times. Officer O’Berry
also identified, from his analysis of the officer’s body worn camera, the exact time when each of the
six trigger pulls occurred. Counsel for Pearson then asked Officer O’Berry if he had been able to
determine “the point in time when Mr. Berry got possession of the Taser?” The Commonwealth
immediately objected to the line of inquiry, and the trial court sustained the Commonwealth’s
objection, stating that the testimony solicited “invades the province of the jury. They can see the
video. They can see who has it and who does not have it. He’s not an expert in that area.” To
preserve his objection to the trial court’s ruling, Pearson later proffered to the trial court the
testimony he sought to elicit from Officer O’Berry. The proffered evidence included a graph
correlating the timing of certain actions recorded in the body camera footage with the timing of the
taser trigger pulls. Pearson sought to use the graph in conjunction with O’Berry’s testimony to
discuss the timing of the taser trigger pulls in relation to other events depicted in the body camera
recordings.
Pearson testified in his own defense. He stated that he shot Berry when Berry “raised [the
taser] towards Officer Alexander’s face.” He explained that shooting Berry was “the only option
that I had to stop” Berry from using the taser on the officers. Pearson subsequently rested before
renewing his motion to strike. The trial court also denied his renewed motion.
The trial court then reviewed jury instructions submitted by both the Commonwealth and
Pearson. Pearson objected to the following instructions given to the jury by the trial court:
Instruction 19: An officer may not enter a home or the curtilage of
the home to arrest someone without a warrant.
Instruction 19.1: The police are prohibited from making a
warrantless and nonconsensual entry into a person’s home in order to
make an arrest. Jump to an indexed page (18 of 18)