By

Paulina Villegas

November 24, 2020 at 5:12 p.m. EST

A former police officer was charged with manslaughter by the San Francisco district attorney’s office Monday, three years after he fatally shot Kita O’Neil during an alleged carjacking incident.

 

District Attorney Chesa Boudin announced that his office had filed homicide charges against former San Francisco Police Department officer Christopher Samayoa, a decision that appears to be the city’s first homicide prosecution against a law enforcement officer who has killed someone while on duty.

 

Samayoa faces charges of voluntary manslaughter, involuntary manslaughter, assault with a semiautomatic weapon, assault by a police officer and discharge of a firearm with gross negligence, the district attorney’s office said Monday.

Boudin, a liberal former public defender, was elected last year on a platform of criminal justice reform and promised a tougher stance on law enforcement accountability.