A New York City correction officer was sentenced this week to between three-and-a-half and 10-and-a-half years in prison for accidentally shooting and killing his friend in 2018, just days after attending a gun safety class.
Alain Samba, 47, was convicted of second-degree manslaughter during a trial earlier this year in the Bronx. Prosecutors said he shot Marie Joseph Faye, 35, in his apartment while off duty in March 2018.
According to the Bronx district attorney’s office, Samba was handling a Glock semiautomatic handgun lacking a safety mechanism when he unintentionally chambered a round of ammunition. Then, prosecutors said, he pointed the gun at Faye and pulled the trigger, not knowing it would fire a bullet into her chest.
The NYC Department of Correction hired Samba in December 2016, said department spokesperson Latima Johnson. He was a probationary officer at the time of the shooting, and prosecutors said he had been trained in firearms safety two days earlier.
“This incident was a needless tragedy,” Bronx DA Darcel Clark said in a statement.
The DOC fired Samba in April 2018, Johnson said. He was indicted on manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide charges several weeks later.
Samba's defense attorney could not be reached for comment on Thursday.
Last year, an off-duty correction officer who worked as a firearms instructor at the DOC’s training academy was indicted on murder and manslaughter charges after a teen was fatally shot in the Bronx.
The officer, Dion Middleton, is accused of fatally shooting 18-year-old Raymond Chaluisant, who prosecutors have said was playing with a toy gun that shoots gel beads. The Correction Officers’ Benevolent Association said at the time Middleton had fired his weapon after feeling something hit his back. His criminal case is still pending in court.
That shooting came just a few weeks after another off-duty officer, David Donegan, fired his weapon after someone pointed a gun at a crowd of people celebrating the Fourth of July in Queens. Both Donegan and the other man were injured but survived, and corrections officials and staff praised the officer for his actions.
