Justice

A Big Decision Was Just Made in the Sandra Bland Case

December 22nd 2015

More than five months after 28-year-old Sandra Bland was found dead in a Texas jail cell, a grand jury has determined that nobody related to the case should be indicted.

RELATED: Sandra Bland Was Arrested Because She Failed the “Attitude Test”

Bland's death prompted outcry over the summer, after dash cam video showed a Texas trooper pull her over for an improper lane change and then arrest her on July 10. The scene escalated quickly when Bland refused to put out her cigarette and officer Brian Encinia forcibly removed her from the car.


After her arrest, Bland was unable to make bail and was found hanged in a Waller County jail cell three days later. Family and friends raised questions about the death, arguing that Bland was not suicidal and had recently moved to Texas to start a new job. The case quickly gained national attention.

On Monday, just hours after Bland's family held a press conference about the proceedings, a special prosecutor told ABC Eyewitness News that the grand jury had declined to indict anyone involved in the case, including the officers who arrested Bland and the Waller County Jail employees.

"Right now, the biggest problem for me is the entire process," Bland's mother Geneva Read-Veal said Monday morning. "I simply can't have faith in a system that's not inclusive of my family that's supposed to have the investigation."

RELATED: Sandra Bland's Death Highlights the Outrageous Truth About Bail

"We are not going to allow what they have done in a limited, secret capacity to prevent us from doing what we need to do to get answers for the family," Bland's family attorney Cannon Lambert said.

The prosecutor said that the grand jurors will reconvene on January 6, 2016 in order to decide upon other misdemeanor matters related to the case, ABC 13 reports.

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