*Former Dallas police officer Amber Guyger has won parole after serving about seven years for murdering 26-year-old Botham Jean inside his Dallas apartment.
The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles approved Guyger’s release Thursday, NBC News reports. Officials have not announced when she will leave prison.
A jury convicted Guyger of murder in October 2019 and sentenced her to 10 years. She shot Jean on Sept. 6, 2018, after entering his apartment and mistaking it for her own. The parole board previously rejected Guyger’s release in 2024. EURweb reported at the time that Jean’s family strongly opposed parole.
“So we have another two years of peace before we have to go through that again,” Jean’s sister, Allisa Charles-Findley, said then. That fight ended differently this time.
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The board cited Guyger’s prison adjustment and completion of treatment programs among its reasons for approving parole. It also cited no documented pattern of violent or assaultive arrests or convictions, according to NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth.
More than 6,300 people signed a petition opposing Guyger’s early release during her first parole review. Jean’s family and the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office also opposed that release.
“We are deeply disappointed by the decision to grant parole to Amber Guyger, the former Dallas police officer convicted of murdering Botham Jean,” Civil rights attorney Lee Merritt said. “Botham Jean was in his own home, eating ice cream, when his life was taken. He did nothing wrong.”
Merritt also addressed the length of Guyger’s punishment.
“A 10-year sentence was already a fraction of what was lost,” he said. “Releasing Ms. Guyger after seven years makes that loss feel even smaller in the eyes of the system.”
Guyger also faces a massive civil judgment stemming from Jean’s death. In 2024, EURweb reported that a federal jury ordered her to pay Jean’s family $98.6 million.
For Jean’s family, parole closes another chapter in a case they have fought since 2018. Guyger can leave prison early, but Merritt stressed what remains unchanged: “Botham does not get to come home.”
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