Follow-Up: Former Dallas Officer Amber Guyger Released on Parole After Seven Years for Killing Neighbor Botham Jean
Amber Guyger, the former Dallas police officer convicted of murder for fatally shooting her neighbor in 2018 after entering the wrong apartment, was released on parole on Friday, October 16. CBS News and Dallas station WFAA reported that the Texas Department of Criminal Justice confirmed her release that day from the Christina Melton Crain Unit in Gatesville. She had served about seven years of her 10-year sentence; the remainder will be served under community supervision until the sentence expires in September 2029.
The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles approved her parole on October 1, a decision GSM reported on October 6, citing her satisfactory institutional adjustment, participation in programs aimed at improving employment prospects, and the absence of a documented pattern of violent or assaultive arrests or convictions. Her parole conditions were reported to include regular check-ins, travel restrictions, home visits and employment requirements; she is barred from living in Dallas County, from contacting the victim's family or Dallas police officers, and from leaving Texas without approval. Her attorney, Robert Rogers, told WFAA that she has a place to live and a job lined up and that she remains remorseful.
The family of Botham Jean opposed the release. In a statement shared through the Botham Jean Foundation, the family said they had just marked what would have been Jean's birthday and asked for privacy. The family's attorney, Lee Merritt, said he was deeply disappointed by the decision.
The shooting occurred on the night of September 6, 2018. Guyger, then 30 and coming off a long shift, went to the wrong floor at the South Side Flats apartments in Dallas and entered the fourth-floor home of Botham Jean, who lived one floor above her. She said she believed the apartment was her own and that Jean was an intruder, and she shot him. Jean, a 26-year-old accountant from St. Lucia, was sitting on his couch eating ice cream; he was taken to a hospital and died. On October 1, 2019, a Dallas County jury convicted Guyger of murder and she was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Her first parole request was denied in 2024. In November 2024, a civil jury ordered her to pay about $98.65 million to Jean's family in a wrongful-death lawsuit.
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：达拉斯 South Side Flats 公寓，2018年案发地。Danazar 摄，CC BY-SA 4.0，取自维基共享资源。Photo: The South Side Flats apartments in Dallas, where the 2018 shooting occurred. By Danazar, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
- 2026-10-06Texas: Ex-Dallas Officer Amber Guyger, Who Fatally Shot Her Neighbor in 2018, Granted Parole
- 2026-10-17Follow-Up: Former Dallas Officer Amber Guyger Released on Parole After Seven Years for Killing Neighbor Botham JeanThis story
