

A former transit officer convicted in the fatal shooting of an unarmed man at an Oakland train station was released from jail early Monday without relatives being allowed to lodge a protest, an uncle of the slain man said.

"They snuck him out," Cephus Johnson, 53, a systems engineer, said during a demonstration outside U.S. District Court in downtown Los Angeles.

Johannes Mehserle, 29, was released after serving 11 months of a two-year sentence for involuntary manslaughter in the shooting death of Oscar Grant III on New Year's Day 2009.

Grainy video footage of the shooting showed Mehserle, who is white, firing one round into the back of Grant, who was black.

Mehserle testified he meant to use his Taser but mistakenly grabbed his pistol. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Robert Perry ruled Friday that Mehserle should be given credit for time served and good behavior.

Johnson said he was on the phone with a court clerk as the judge was issuing his decision. The clerk told him the hearing on the release would be held Monday morning, Johnson said.