Former SAPD officer who fatally shot unarmed Black man in 2016 dies

A former San Antonio police officer who shot and killed an unarmed Black man during a 2016 arrest at a North Side apartment complex died early Friday.

John David Lee, 41, was pronounced dead at 12:48 a.m., according to the Bexar County Medical Examiner’s Office. His cause and manner of death are listed as pending, investigators said.

Lee, who had been with SAPD since February 2004, left the department on Feb. 13, according to Texas Commission on Law Enforcement records. He was an 11-year veteran at the time of his encounter with 36-year-old Antronie Scott.

On Feb. 4, 2016, Scott who was wanted on two felony warrants, was being followed by undercover officers with the Repeat Offenders Program. They watched as Scott drove to the Wood Hollow Apartments, 10362 Sahara St., at about 6:45 p.m. and called for a uniformed officer to approach him, SAPD Chief William McManus said at the time.

Lee arrived at the complex and pulled up to Scott. As Scott was exiting a white Mercedes sedan, Lee approached him and said to Scott, “Let me see your hands.”

Scott spun around quickly and Lee almost immediately fired his service weapon because the officer feared for his life, McManus said.

Scott, who was shot in the upper torso, died at the scene as his wife sat in the passenger seat of their Mercedes.

McManus placed Lee on administrative leave and issued a contemplated indefinite suspension immediately after the shooting. In March 2016, the chief instead decided to provide Lee with more training.

According to McManus, Lee had put his vehicle too closely to Scott’s during the traffic stop, putting him in a tactically poor situation.

The chief also considered that Lee was following instructions from undercover detectives.

The case brought attention to SAPD’s tactics and use of force for a time that year. McManus’ decisions in the case led to a vote of no-confidence from the San Antonio Police Officers Association.

Mike Helle, president of the association, said then that use of force was not rampant in the department.

Officers also reportedly felt McManus was folding to community pressure while ignoring how Lee had been trying to arrest Scott for outstanding felonies that included possession of a firearm.

At the time of the shooting, Lee had four incidents on his resume, and two of them were accidents.

After the shooting, Scott’s wife and mother filed civil rights lawsuits against Lee and the city seeking damages arising from his death.

The amended complaint also names current and former city leaders including McManus, former City Manager Sheryl Sculley, and former Mayor Ivy Taylor. It alleges that they failed to properly supervise, screen, discipline, transfer, counsel or otherwise control officers known to engage in the use of excessive force, including officers repeatedly accused of such acts.

The suits have since been consolidated and were reset on March 18 under the “exigent circumstances” created by the pandemic, according to court records.

When Lawyer Thomas J. Henry filed a civil rights lawsuit on behalf of Scott’s wife in 2016, he said he was not alleging that race played a part in the shooting.

Recent Black Lives Matter protests in the wake of George Floyd’s death have brought new attention to incidents in which Black men, including Scott, were killed by police in San Antonio.

On June 14, Scott’s son, Antronie Scott Jr., was among the protesters at the “Roll For Peace” protest in San Antonio. Scott held up his iPhone to the crowd, tears streaming down his face as he talked about his father’s death four years ago.

“Dad died because cops shot him in the heart after thinking his iPhone 4 was a gun,” the young man said.

In June, several protest groups and advocates called on Bexar County District Attorney Joe Gonzales to re-examine the cases of Scott, Marquise Jones and Charles Roundtree.

Gonzales has since said there was no new evidence to reopen the cases.

An SAPD spokesperson said Friday afternoon a statement on Lee’s death would not be made because the results of his autopsy had not been released.

Staff writers Laura Garcia and John Tedesco contributed to this story.