Brutality Alleged in Officer’s Retrial

Police officers used flashlights “like clubs” to kill a black motorist, prosecutors said in opening statements as a white former officer went on trial for a second time. A mostly white jury in Detroit had been seated to hear the retrial of Walter Budzyn, a change from the almost all-black jury that convicted him in 1993 in his first trial of killing Malice Wayne Green. Green, 35, died after a confrontation with police in front of a known crack house in November 1992. Budzyn, 52, spent 4 1/2 years in prison before his conviction was reversed because during a court break the jury had been shown a segment of the movie “Malcolm X.”