The mother of a 23-year-old British woman shot dead by her father in Texas is seeking a fresh investigation into her daughter’s death after a US grand jury ruled the shooting accidental.Jane Coates is travelling from England to Texas to ask the Collin County District Attorney’s Office to reconsider the case involving her daughter, Lucy Harrison, who was killed on January 10 last year.Lucy had travelled from the UK with her boyfriend, Sam Littler, to visit her father, Kris Harrison, and her two younger half-sisters.Hours before the shooting, Lucy and her father had a heated argument about President Donald Trump, who was due to be inaugurated for a second term, The New York Post reported.Harrison, 52, told police that his Glock 9mm pistol discharged accidentally when he took it from a box after Lucy asked whether he had a gun.“It just went off as she stood there, like as I pulled it out it went off,” Harrison said in a police video provided to a UK inquest into Lucy’s death.A grand jury later declined to bring manslaughter or criminally negligent homicide charges against Harrison after determining that Lucy’s death was accidental.Coates is now questioning that conclusion and wants investigators to examine evidence presented by independent experts.“I simply want the truth about what happened,” Coates told The Post. “I want the people responsible for investigating her death to sit down with us and listen to what we have been told by independent experts.”
Questions over how Lucy was killed
Craig Miller, a retired Dallas deputy chief and former homicide detective with more than 30 years of experience, has disputed Harrison’s account after reviewing bodycam footage, police reports and Lucy’s autopsy findings.“Guns just don’t go off,” Miller told the outlet. “The only person who could have fired the gun is the dad. He may not have been familiar with the gun but there was a bullet in the chamber.”Miller also questioned the direction of the bullet and the circumstances described by Harrison.“If that was true, why didn’t the bullet come in through the side? It entered directly through the center of the chest,” he said.“It was fired at a downward trajectory and that is not consistent … this does not add up.”Miller also raised questions about the police investigation, including whether Harrison underwent a gunshot residue test and whether investigators examined the phones belonging to Harrison and Lucy.“I don’t think the officers checked that, which I think is key,” Miller said. “[That] would have made it simpler and better for everybody else to look at the case properly.”The grand jury’s notes remain sealed, making it unclear what evidence was presented to the panel.Miller said investigators should have considered Harrison’s account alongside evidence about his condition at the time of the shooting.“If the facts didn’t include that he was intoxicated and the forensics did not match up with how he said the gun went off, then the grand jury should be made aware,” he said.
UK inquest reached different conclusion
A separate inquest in the UK also raised questions about the circumstances surrounding Lucy’s death.Jacqueline Devonish, senior coroner for Cheshire, described Harrison as a “functioning alcoholic” and disputed his account of the shooting.“To shoot her through the chest whilst she was standing would have required him to have been pointing the gun at his daughter, without checking for bullets, and pulling the trigger,” Devonish told the inquest.She concluded that Lucy had been “unlawfully killed” and said her father’s actions amounted to gross negligence manslaughter.The UK coroner’s finding does not have binding effect in US courts.Miller also pointed to bodycam footage showing Harrison initially denying to an officer that he had been drinking. It later emerged that he had consumed a 17-ounce carton of white wine that day, according to the report.“The dad lied to the police in the very first question asked,” Miller said. “When a person lies and is inconsistent with their testimony, those are important facts for the police to look at and consider.”Harrison previously said through his lawyer that he “fully accepted” the consequences of his actions and that “there isn’t a day I don’t feel the weight of that loss, a weight I will carry for the rest of my life.”Coates said her focus was on ensuring her daughter was remembered beyond the circumstances of her death.“There isn’t a day that goes by when I don’t think about Lucy and everything she should have had in front of her,” she told The Post. “I want people to see her as a person, not just as a case. She was funny, kind, loving and full of life. She had dreams. She had people who loved her deeply. She deserved a future.”Prosper Police have confirmed that the department will not reopen the investigation.A spokesperson for the Town of Prosper said: “We have great empathy for Lucy’s family and recognize that the loss of a child is an unimaginable tragedy.”