The conviction comes greater than three years after the white Fort Worth officer shot the 28-year-old Black girl whereas responding to a name about an open entrance door.
Dean, 38, faces as much as 20 years in jail on the manslaughter conviction.
The sentencing part of his trial is ready to start on Friday.
Dean had confronted as much as life in jail if convicted of homicide.
The Tarrant County jury deliberated for greater than 13 hours over two days earlier than returning the decision.
The main dispute in the course of the six days of testimony and arguments was whether or not Dean knew Jefferson was armed when he shot her.
Dean testified that he noticed her weapon; prosecutors alleged the proof confirmed in any other case.
Lesa Pamplin, an legal professional and good friend of the Jefferson household, mentioned she was glad that jurors took their time.
“These folks gave a good, hard look at the evidence and they didn’t rush it. And I’m happy, not pleased, but I’m happy that they got the manslaughter,” mentioned Pamplin.
Another good friend of the Jefferson household, Cliff Sparks, advised The Dallas Morning News that he thinks the decision will give different officers the message that they “can shoot and kill somebody in his own backyard and get the lesser charge.”
“It’s not right,” Sparks mentioned.
Dean shot Jefferson on October 12, 2019 after a neighbour referred to as a non-emergency police line to report that the entrance door to Jefferson’s house was open.
She had been enjoying video video games that evening together with her nephew and it emerged at trial that they left the doorways open to vent smoke from hamburgers the boy burned.
The case was uncommon for the relative pace with which, amid public outrage, the Fort Worth Police Department launched video of the taking pictures and arrested Dean.
He’d accomplished the police academy the yr earlier than and stop the drive with out talking to investigators.
Since then, the case had been repeatedly postponed amid lawyerly wrangling, the terminal sickness of Dean’s lead legal professional and the COVID-19 pandemic.
Body digicam footage confirmed that Dean and a second officer who responded to the decision did not establish themselves as police on the home.
Dean and Officer Carol Darch testified that they thought the home may need been burglarised and quietly moved into the fenced-off yard searching for indicators of pressured entry.
There, Dean, whose gun was drawn, fired a single shot by means of the window a split-second after shouting at Jefferson, who was inside, to indicate her palms.
Dean testified that he had no selection however to shoot when he noticed Jefferson pointing the barrel of a gun instantly at him.
But beneath questioning from prosecutors he acknowledged quite a few errors, repeatedly conceding that actions he took earlier than and after the taking pictures had been “more bad police work”.
Darch’s again was to the window when Dean shot, however she testified that he by no means talked about seeing a gun earlier than he pulled the set off and did not say something in regards to the weapon as they rushed in to look the home.
Dean acknowledged on the witness stand that he solely mentioned one thing in regards to the gun after seeing it on the ground inside the home and that he by no means gave Jefferson first support.
Jefferson’s eight-year-old nephew, Zion Carr, was within the room along with his aunt when she was shot.
Zion testified that Jefferson took out her gun believing there was an intruder within the yard, however he supplied contradictory accounts on whether or not she pointed the pistol out the window.
On the trial’s opening day, the now-11-year-old Zion testified that Jefferson at all times had the gun pointed down, however in an interview that was recorded quickly after the taking pictures and performed in courtroom, he mentioned she had pointed the weapon on the window.
