The final two cases against Henrico County Sheriff’s Deputies Brandon Rodgers and Kaiyell Sanders, charged in connection with Irvo Otieno’s death, have been dropped following the acquittal of another defendant in a related trial. 

Two nolle prosequi filings for Rodgers and Sanders were made by Dinwiddie Commonwealth’s Attorney Amanda N. Mann and approved last Friday.

The motions followed a trial in October for former Central State Hospital employee Wavie Jones, during which jurors acquitted him of any role in Otieno’s death after 20 minutes of deliberation.

“After careful examination of the facts and the law in this case,” Mann wrote in the motions, “the Commonwealth is of the opinion that, given the jury’s verdict in the first case, the result is likely to be the same given the parallel evidence for all charged. The Commonwealth has heard the jury’s determination and respects their verdict.”

Rodgers and Sanders were among seven deputies and three employees at Central State Hospital indicted by a jury for Otieno’s death. He died last year on the floor of the hospital’s admission suite. Otieno’s transportation to the hospital came after hours in custody at Henrico County Jail while in a mental health crisis. His death was later ruled a homicide due to mechanical and positional asphyxia, as determined by a Richmond medical examiner.

Rodgers and Sanders were initially charged with second degree murder, but these charges, along with others, were later downgraded to involuntary manslaughter.

Rodgers was scheduled for a jury trial later this month, while Sanders’ trial was set for December.

Mann had previously filed nolle prosequi for other charges related to Otieno’s death, which she described as strategic moves to reintroduce them in a way that would better serve the prosecution.

However, those cases have not been introduced, raising questions about the future of additional legal action in this case.

W. Edward Riley IV, Sanders’ attorney, was not surprised by Mann’s filings. He pointed to the results of Jones’ trial and the arguments made by his defense attorneys as evidence of the challenges facing the cases. Similar to Jones’ defense, Riley asserted that Sanders and the others charged were trying to help while emphasizing the threat Otieno posed to himself and others, as well as what Jones’ attorneys described as a “sudden cardiac event” as the cause of Otieno’s death.

“They had no ill will towards this gentleman,” Riley said. “They were just trying to get him to where he could get help because he hadn’t been taking his medicine.”

In the months following Otieno’s death and nationwide criticism of his treatment, his family reached an $8.5 million settlement with the state, Henrico County, and its sheriff’s department.

New legislation, Irvo’s Law, also was created and approved to allow expanded access for the loved ones of people experiencing mental health crises.

Otieno’s family and their attorneys have continued to seek accountability for those charged with his death and have been frequent critics of Mann’s handling of the cases, calling on the U.S. Department of Justice to take up the charges.

“Ms. Ouko was very dissatisfied with what she perceived to be a very lackluster and halfhearted effort by Commonwealth’s Attorney Amanda Mann to prosecute those charged in connection with her son’s death, which was ruled to be a homicide by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner,” Krudys said in a statement. “As the family has stated previously, this matter demands to be immediately investigated by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division.”

Mann did not release a statement on the filings or respond to inquiries by the Richmond Free Press before publication.