A Pennsylvania police officer has been charged with voluntary manslaughter in the fatal shooting of a 22-year-old college student who had mistakenly gone to the wrong house late at night while waiting for friends.
Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin Steele announced Tuesday that Upper Pottsgrove Police Cpl. Sean Farrell, 58, faces charges in the Aug. 23 death of Glenwood Earl Pysher IV. Steele stated that Farrell had less-than-lethal options available and was not justified in using deadly force during the encounter.
The Montgomery County Detective Bureau’s investigation, which included a review of Farrell’s body-worn camera footage, concluded that the officer was a safe distance from Pysher, who had his hands in the air and was unarmed. "This is not a legal use of deadly force, leading to the charge of Voluntary Manslaughter,” Steele said in a news release.
Farrell surrendered to authorities and was released on $75,000 bail. He is required to surrender his weapons to state police as a condition of his release and has a preliminary hearing scheduled for Sept. 10.
According to the district attorney's office, the incident began when a resident called 911 to report someone attempting to break into their back door. Farrell arrived at the scene and encountered Pysher on the home's patio near the back door. Body camera footage showed Farrell ordering Pysher to show his hands and then to drop to the ground. Pysher is seen raising his hands and walking toward the officer while being instructed to get down. Farrell then fired two shots, striking Pysher twice in the chest.
Authorities said Pysher was between 17 and 20 feet away from the officer when he was shot. Farrell later told another officer that Pysher had charged him while screaming and yelling, but the body-worn camera footage did not corroborate this claim, according to an affidavit filed with the criminal complaint.
Investigators determined that Pysher had been celebrating a friend's birthday and, after leaving one location, intended to go to another friend's house but ended up at the wrong address. Pysher's father stated that his son likely attempted to open what he believed was his friend's door before realizing his mistake and sitting on the back porch to contact his friends.
Nationwide data compiled by Bowling Green State University criminal justice professor Philip Stinson shows that between January 2005 and July 2026, 218 local sworn police officers were charged with murder or manslaughter following on-duty fatal shootings. Of these cases, 78 officers have been convicted, and 107 have been acquitted or had their cases dismissed. In Pennsylvania, 10 officers have faced similar charges during that period, with six convictions.
Stinson noted that while there are annual fluctuations in the number of officers charged, these variations are statistically insignificant given the close to a thousand fatal police encounters annually. He described these cases as challenging, with grand juries and criminal jurors often hesitant to second-guess split-second decisions made by officers in potentially violent situations. The data also indicates that a majority of officers charged in fatal on-duty shootings did so against unarmed individuals; only 10 of the 78 convictions involved victims who were armed with a gun.