UPDATE at 3:35 p.m. CST on Nov. 10, 2023: The jury found former Milwaukee police officer Michael Mattioli not guilty of first-degree reckless homicide for the 2020 death of Joel Acevedo.
MILWAUKEE — The jury has deadlocked in the trial of former Milwaukee police officer Michael Mattioli, who is facing a first-degree reckless homicide charge for the death of Joel Acevedo. Judge David Swanson received this notification from the jury around 2pm this afternoon.
After the jury returned to the courtroom, the judge informed them that “it is your duty to make an honest and sincere attempt to arrive at a verdict” before having them return to the jury room to deliberate. The court then recessed.
This is a developing story. Once further details are revealed, an update and/or follow-up will be issued.
Court records show Acevedo was at a party in Mattioli’s home in April 2020. The following morning near the end of the party, Mattioli and Acevedo got into an argument and Mattioli restrained Acevedo for several minutes.
Prosecutors say Acevedo was unable to breathe under Mattioli’s weight. Acevedo died six days later in the hospital.
Mattioli was officially charged in May 2020, but pandemic-related delays, medical records requests, numerous pre-trial postponements, and the unexpected retirement of the former medical examiner Brian Peterson, delayed the start of the trial until November 6, 2023.
Mattioli officially entered his not-guilty plea in September 2020, the same month he resigned from MPD. From 2021 through the end of 2022, the trial was handed off to numerous judges, and Peterson never provided availability for the trial despite multiple subpoenas being sent out.
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