Former Dallas Officer Amber Guyger Granted Parole in Killing of Botham Jean

Amber Guyger, a former Dallas police officer, has been granted parole after serving seven years of a 10-year sentence for the murder of her neighbor, Botham Jean. Guyger was convicted in October 2019 for the killing of Jean, a 26-year-old accountant, who was shot in his apartment on September 6, 2018.

At the time of the shooting, Guyger, who was off-duty but in uniform, claimed she mistook Jean's apartment for her own and believed he was an intruder. She fired her service weapon twice, fatally striking Jean. Guyger lived on the third floor of the apartment complex, while Jean lived on the fourth floor.

She was fired from the Dallas Police Department weeks after the incident and initially charged with manslaughter. A grand jury later indicted her on murder charges. During the trial, Guyger's defense argued that her belief she was in her own apartment should have qualified the shooting as an act of self-defense.

It remains unclear when Guyger, now 38, will be formally released from the Patrick L. O'Daniel unit in Gatesville, Texas. She was denied parole in 2024.

A spokesperson for the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles told The Dallas Morning News that Guyger's parole was granted because she has not demonstrated a documented pattern of violence. The board also cited her satisfactory institutional adjustment and completion of a treatment plan aimed at enhancing her future employment prospects.

Lee Merritt, a civil rights attorney who represented Jean's family, expressed disappointment with the parole decision. "Botham’s family and the community strongly opposed this parole," Merritt stated. "They stood up again and again to ask that the full sentence be served....Releasing Ms. Guyger after seven years makes that loss feel even smaller in the eyes of the system. It is not smaller."