A state police firearms instructor who accidentally shot and killed a rookie trooper during a training session can be sued by the dead man's mother, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday.

The decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit overturns a ruling by another federal judge who concluded that instructor Richard Schroeter was immune from the lawsuit over the September 2014 death of Trooper David Kedra.

The appeals court's precedential ruling by Judge Cheryl Ann Krause means Kedra's mother, Joan, can keep suing Schroeter in U.S. Eastern District Court.

Trooper Kedra was shot in the abdomen during what was supposed to be a routine training session in Montgomery County. He had been sent to the session so Schroeter, a 20-year state police veteran, could show him how to use a new handgun the force was introducing.

Richard Schroeter

Schroeter ignored all of the safety protocols during the session, failed to determine whether the gun was loaded or empty, and pulled the trigger while pointing the weapon at Kedra, Krause noted.

Kedra, 26, died several hours after being shot.

Schroeter, now 45, retired from the state police and pleaded guilty to reckless endangerment charges. A Montgomery County judge sentenced him to 2 weeks in prison in August 2015.

Joan Kedra appealed to the circuit court after U.S. Eastern District Judge Eduardo C. Robreno dismissed her civil rights lawsuit on grounds that Schroeter was legally immune from the complaint.

Krause's panel revived the suit after finding Joan Kedra has shown, preliminarily, that Schroeter might be legally liable because his fatal actions constituted a "state-created danger."

"This was not merely an accidental discharge of a firearm that happened to be pointed at another officer," Krause wrote. "Instead, at training Kedra was required to attend he was subjected to his training instructor contravening each and every firearm safety protocol by skipping over both required safety checks, treating the firearm as if it were unloaded, pointing the firearm directly at Kedra and pulling the trigger."

"The risk was obvious, the risk was actually known to (Schroeter), the safety precautions that could have avoided that risk were the very subject matter of (Schroeter's) expertise, and those safety precautions were skipped or directly contravened," Krause added.