A former Balch Springs officer who is accused of killing a teenager returned to court Friday for day two of his murder trial.
Police said Roy Oliver opened fire into a moving car with five teenagers inside in April 2017, killing 15-year-old high school freshman Jordan Edwards.
On day two, prosecutors called witnesses to the stand to testify about what they saw and heard during the shooting.
Maxwell Everette, who was in the car with Edwards, began to cry as he described the chaos when he saw Edwards was injured.
"At first, since he had bought that red drink from the store, I thought that he spilled his drink," said Everette. "But, he didn't spill his drink. That's what I really thought for real."
Everette began to cry on the stand. The prosecutor asked if he was crying because he's upset about testifying or because he saw one of his best friends get shot. Everette responded he was crying for his friend.
Two other witnesses who were at the same house party with Edwards and were parked down the street in the parking lot of a nursing home described seeing the original shooting that brought officers outside the party.
Jeremy Seaton testified he and his friend, Eric Knight, ran to his truck after police arrived to break up the house party. They decided to stay in the truck rather than drive away with police on the scene. Seaton said Knight explained they hadn't done anything wrong and driving away could draw attention to them.
Seaton said as the friends waited for the scene to clear, another SUV drove into the nursing home parking lot. Seaton said a large group of people got out, began shouting about their gang and fired guns into the air. He recognized one man with a gun as a guy who went by the street name "2 Pac."
Seaton testified the group left the parking lot before officers ran up the street.
Seaton told the jury it did not appear the car Edwards was in tried to hit an officer. Seaton said he and his friend left the scene that night without speaking to officers but that they reached out to the Dallas County Sheriff's Office after hearing the Balch Springs police chief initially claim the vehicle was trying to hit an officer.
"The statement that came out about the shooting that happened, we felt that it wasn't completely true," said Seaton. "And wasn't true to what really happened."
Knight said he told his parents what he saw and his mother went to the Balch Springs Police Department the following Monday. That's where someone at the police department gave her a card to contact a detective with Dallas County, which was investigating the shooting.
When a prosecutor asked Knight if he was in fear of his life that night, he said he was not. But, looking back on the events Knight realized he could have been in danger.
"As I look at everything as a whole, I feel like it could have easily been me or Jeremy that night," said Knight. "Especially if we would have left or maybe we were pulling out."
Judge Brandon Birmingham dismissed the jury shortly before three on Friday afternoon. Testimony for the third day of the trail is set to resume Monday morning.
