Washington D.C.- An attorney for one of six Baltimore police officers charged in connection with the death of Freddie Gray has requested in court permission to examine a knife that police say they found on Gray after they pursued him April 12.
In court papers, police who arrested Gray stated that he was found with a “spring-loaded switchblade” in his right-front pants pocket. Under Maryland law, that switchblade is illegal. Officers say they found the knife after Gray made eye contact with one of the officers and began running. Officers chased him down and while taking him into custody say they found the knife.
When State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby announced the charges against all six of the officers involved in Gray’s arrest, she stated that the knife found on Gray was not a switchblade and that it was in fact, a legal knife. She described the arrest as illegal.
The officer’s defense attorney, Marc L. Zayon, says in the filing in state District Court that he thinks the knife “was not lawful” and that a charge placed against Gray was appropriate.
Meanwhile, the attorney for the Gray family, Jason Downs has also requested to see the knife in question. In an interview with Ben Swann, Downs says that the family has a number of questions about the knife, if Gray even had it on him and what kind of knife it was. Downs says that his team has not been allowed to even see the evidence of the knife’s existence.
