Police deputy acquitted of manslaughter over shooting of 17-year-old

Former deputy Michael Davis is escorted into court by Arkansas state troopers (Thomas Metthe/The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette via AP)

A former Arkansas deputy has been found guilty of negligent homicide but acquitted of the more serious offence of manslaughter in the fatal shooting of a white teenager whose death had drawn the attention of national civil rights leaders and activists.

On Friday, jurors found Michael Davis, a former sergeant with the Lonoke County sheriff’s office, guilty in the shooting death last year of 17-year-old Hunter Brittain during a traffic stop outside Cabot, a city of about 26,000 people roughly 30 miles northeast of Little Rock.