MARYSVILLE — Marysville Police Officer Derek Carlile will not be retried by the Snohomish County Prosecutor’s Office, but he remains on administrative leave with the Marysville Police Department.
“It is necessary for a departmental administrative review to take place, and we will continue to move forward with our established internal process,” said Marysville Police Cmdr. Robb Lamoureux, who added that Carlile’s status with the Marysville Police Department is unchanged.
Joan Cavagnaro, chief criminal deputy prosecutor for Snohomish County, explained that the Prosecutor’s Office chose to dismiss second-degree manslaughter charges against Carlile after considering the case they made during his first trial, which ended in a mistrial on Nov. 13, with seven jurors who wanted to acquit Carlile, four who wanted to convict him and a remaining juror who was undecided.
“Some of the jurors shared their thoughts with the prosecutors and defense attorneys after the trial,” Cavagnaro said. “They gave us some insights on how they viewed the case. It wasn’t an uneven split. Both sides were very sure of their decisions. They just weren’t unanimous.”
After consulting with investigators, Cavagnaro explained that prosecutors were satisfied with how they’d presented the evidence, to the point that they didn’t anticipate any significant changes in how they would have presented it in a second trial.
“Sometimes new evidence comes out of trying a case like this, but that wasn’t the case with this case,” Cavagnaro said. “We’d be in much the same position going into a second trial, so it’s unlikely that we’d get a different result.”
Carlile’s 7-year-old daughter died on March 10 after being shot by her 3-year-old brother with a .38-caliber revolver that Carlile had left unsecured in their family van. According to Cavagnaro, the goal of the trial was to determine whether Carlile’s action or inaction constituted criminal negligence in the death of his daughter.
“Obviously, this is a very sad case in which a child died,” Cavagnaro said. “I would urge those who have guns to be extra-careful with them around children.”
