Trooper Jacob Gordon Thompson, 27, was charged by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation with felony murder and aggravated assault three hours before the start of the vigil for Lewis, a 60-year-old carpenter who was characterized by loved ones as a “great caring man.”
The president of Georgia's NAACP chapter called the slaying of Lewis another chilling example of a Black man being killed unlawfully by a white law enforcement officer. An attorney for Lewis' family said the trooper initiated the traffic stop over a burned-out tail light and Lewis was shot in the face almost immediately after the trooper forced his car into a ditch.