Former South Carolina police officer Michael Slager was sentenced to 20 years in prison on Thursday after being found to have committed second-degree murder for fatally shooting an unarmed black man after a traffic stop in 2015. He was fired from the force after the shooting and pleaded guilty in May to federal civil rights charges for shooting Walter Scott in the back five times as he ran away. State murder charges were dropped as part of the plea deal. Slager’s attorneys argued that he shot the 50-year-old in self-defense after Scott reached for Slager’s stun gun.
