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A police officer has been recently charged with a felony charge after she fired her weapon on a shoplifting suspect instead of using other use of force. Julia Crews was charged with second-degree assault on May 1 in connection to the incident against Ashley Hall.

Wesley Bell St. Louis County Prosecutor said the officers actions at the St. Louis-based supermarket Schnucks fit the charges.

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“It is our position that the officer’s actions were reckless,” Bell said at a news conference the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.

The state’s law defines second-degree assault causing physical injury to another person with a firearm, or recklessly causing serious physical injury to another person. Crews faces one to seven years in prison if convicted.

The officer is now on administrative leave amid an investigation, was booked Wednesday afternoon and held on $20,000 bond. She posted $2,000 of that and was released.

The incident began when Crews arrived at the Ladue Shopping Center, where a Schnucks spokesperson told 5 On Your Side two women left without paying. When the officer stopped one of the women, the spokesperson said, a struggle ensued. The arrest documents stated the woman, whose family identified her as 33-year-old Ashley Hall.

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Hall tried to flee and evade arrest when Crews announced she was going to use her Taser. However, rather than grabbing the taser, Crews fired her gun her attorney Travis Noble detailed at a news conference. “Realized her mistake and immediately rendered first aid” Noble.

“It will be very apparent on her face that this is nothing more than a tragic accident,” Noble said, according to the Post-Dispatch. “She’s devastated about this. She’s never pulled her gun, and I don’t know if she’s ever pulled her Taser as a Ladue Police Officer.”

Hall, a mother of five who is soon to become a grandmother, remains hospitalized.

Hall’s family said she was on life support Wednesday and suffers from at least two broken ribs. Hall’s mother, Karen Carter, said she is not resentful.

“I’m not angry,” she said. “I have to have mercy in my heart … and right now I need everyone to pray for my daughter.”

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