Former Nashville police officer Andrew Delke pled guilty to voluntary manslaughter in the death of Daniel Hambrick, a Black man he shot during a foot chase in 2018.
The Tennessean reports that 27-year-old Delke accepted a three-year plea deal on Friday, which elicited intense emotional responses from Hambrick’s mother in the courtroom. “I hate you,” Hambrick’s mother, Vickie Hambrick, said. At one point, she reportedly attempted to knock over the table of the prosecution, and as a result, she was briefly removed from the room. The Hambrick family expressed their disagreement with a plea deal before Friday, but Judge Monte Watkins accepted the deal anyway.
The family claim they were not contacted or consulted before the hearing on Friday, and they didn’t know about the plea deal until it happened. "I have contempt for this system. I have contempt for this plea. I have contempt for the (Fraternal Order of Police). And I have a special contempt for Andrew Delke. May you all rot in hell," said attorney Joy Kimbrough, who read Vickie Hambrick's statement in court.
Delke was scheduled to go to trial, but the plea deal was reached just days before. This marks the first time a Nashville police officer has ever been charged with murder in a shooting that took place while they were on duty. “The reality is tonight for the first time ever a Nashville officer is going to bed in jail for killing a Black man," District Attorney General Glenn Funk said. "Nashville officers now know they will be held accountable for their actions."
"She's very upset — it's like losing Daniel all over again," said Hambrick family attorney Joy Kimbrough.
The shooting of 25-year-old Daniel Hambrick happened on July 26, 2018 and was caught on video, showing Delke chasing and then shooting Hambrick as he fled. Investigators said in 2018 that Delke was working with a task force focused on recovering stolen vehicles when he ran the license of a white Chevrolet Impala, and even though it didn’t come up as stolen, he continued to follow the car “to see if he could develop a reason to stop the Impala.”
After losing the car when the driver turned onto a highway, Delke later misidentified a white sedan in a parking lot as the Chevrolet Impala. A man at the scene, later identified as Hambrick, fled when Delke pulled up into the parking lot, leading the former officer to chase him on foot because he believed the man “may have been connected to the white car that Officer Delke misidentified as the target vehicle.” He claimed to see a weapon in Hambrick’s hand, and ordered to drop it. The Nashville Fraternal Order of Police later stated Hambrick was carrying a 9mm pistol when he was shot and killed.
“When Mr. Hambrick continued to run away and did not drop the gun, Officer Delke decided to use deadly force," read the warrant for Delke's arrest in 2018. He fired four shots, hitting Hambrick twice in the back and once in the back of his head.
