Prosecutor claims police misconduct derailed 2023 murder trial, enabling later officer killing

Larry Krasner, Philadelphia’s district attorney, asserted in a video that police actions sabotaged the 2023 murder trial of Eric Lewis, who had been charged with killing Christopher Williams in 2019. According to Krasner, an officer who was dating Lewis’s sister fabricated false testimony and another officer’s misconduct amounted to criminal behavior, prompting the judge, J. Scott O’Keefe, to acquit Lewis. Krasner linked this botched prosecution to Lewis’s later fatal shooting of Officer Shane Seiber and a gunfire incident that injured ten people.

The judge’s concerns about the investigation led him to involve the police department’s Internal Affairs Unit, a rare step in his career. Krasner did not identify the officers and has not indicated if an obstruction of justice probe will follow. The comments intensify existing friction between the reform-focused DA’s office and the Philadelphia Police Department, which has long criticized Krasner’s handling of police-related cases.