Police in Washington, DC say they have not found enough evidence to charge the Capitol Police officer who shot and killed a rioters in the building on Jan. 6, according to multiple reports.
However, authorities warned that investigations into the incident are ongoing and no recommendation has been made to prosecutors on whether or not to press charges against the unidentified prosecutor.
Ashli Babbitt, 35, died after being shot by the officer when she climbed through a broken window to the speaker’s lobby in the Capitol during the siege. The incident was videotaped and widely circulated.
A spokesman for the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington, DC, said it would be “premature” if the department “made any comment that a conclusion had been reached,” according to The New York Times.
The United States Department of Justice said opening the investigation into Babbitt’s death was standard procedure in cases where agents use lethal force against a member of the public, The Wall Street Journal reported.
The officer has been placed on leave pending the investigation.
Babbitt served in the Air Force and Air National Guard for more than a decade, the Times reported, wearing a Trump 2020 flag as a cape in videos shot before her death.
She was one of several people who died as a result of the Capitol uprising on Jan. 6, including two Capitol Police officers and others who witnessed medical events near the mass demonstration.
Authorities have arrested and charged dozens of other suspects in the riot and are still looking for a suspect who they believe planted live pipe bombs outside the headquarters of the Republican and Democratic National Committees the night before the siege.