Two former Capitol Police officers faced cross-examination Friday regarding their contention that they were forced to shoot a Jackson man in self-defense after he tried to run them over. 

Friday marked the third day of testimony in the manslaughter trial of Michael Rhinewalt and Steven Frederick Jr., who served on the crime suppression Flex Unit of the Capitol Police. 

Jurors’ deliberations are expected to begin Monday after they hear the judge’s instructions and the lawyers’ closing statements.

Friday also marked the fourth anniversary of the day, Sept. 25, 2022, when the officers fired into the Jeep Grand Cherokee of 25-year-old Jaylen Lewis and killed him.

Defense lawyers hadn’t planned to call the officers as witnesses because the prosecution had already introduced recorded statements of the pair explaining to investigators why they shot Lewis. Putting the officers on the witness stand meant they could be cross-examined.

But defense lawyers changed their strategy Friday after Hinds County Circuit Judge Faye Peterson said she would instruct the jury to consider these statements as “self-serving” hearsay because no cross-examination under oath took place.

As a result of that ruling, Frederick and Rhinewalt decided to take the witness stand.

Rhinewalt testified that they stopped the Cherokee that matched the general description of a car suspected in auto burglaries.

When Lewis backed up his Cherokee and rammed into another law enforcement car behind him, he and Frederick drew their guns, Rhinewalt said.

Both of them called out for Lewis to show his hands, he said, and he called out to Frederick, “Watch his hands. I think he has a gun.”

When Lewis pulled forward, he said he and Frederick screamed for him to stop, and so did his female passenger.

Rhinewalt said he made eye contact with Lewis. “It’s like he looks up, takes a deep breath and says, ‘F— you’ and gasses it.”

Nothing blocked Lewis from going to the left, Rhinewalt said, but “he turned his vehicle toward us, trying to run us over.”

He feared for his life, he said. “I thought of my wife and kids. I didn’t want to do what he made me do.”

He fired two shots into the front windshield, including the fatal shot to Lewis’ head, and a third shot hit the frame between the front windshield and side window.

He said he actually put his hand on the hood of Lewis’ car when he fired the third shot and that the car lifted him off the ground.

The impact of the car prompted him to roll on the ground, he said.

Special Assistant Attorney General Luke Williamson asked Rhinewalt if his testimony that he told Frederick about Lewis having a gun was in his original recorded statement to investigators.

Rhinewalt said no.

Williamson asked him about his statement that the car lifted him up. “That’s not in the recording, is it?”

Rhinewalt said no.

Williamson asked him about his statement about rolling on the ground.

“Actually I was struck,” he said. “I lost my balance from coming off the hood.”

“That’s not in the recording?” Williamson said.

“No, it’s not,” Rhinewalt replied.

Frederick testified that when he parked his Capitol Police car at a 45-degree angle in front of Lewis’ Cherokee, he blocked off the right-hand turn but left the area open to the left for Lewis to escape.

He said he got out of his car and began shouting, “Capitol Police. Capitol Police. Turn your car off. Put your hands out.”

After Lewis backed his Cherokee into the police car behind him, Frederick said he pulled out his weapon. He said Lewis then began to drive toward Rhinewalt at a good rate of speed.

He compared the sound of the 707-horsepower engine to a NASCAR engine. “I was scared,” he said. “I had a 2-year-old son.”

Frederick said he fired twice into the side window of the car.

Williamson asked him about the vest he wore that night.

Frederick said it was a vest his Army friend gave to him.

Asked what the patch on the vest, “No Quarter,” meant, Frederick replied that he didn’t know.

Merriam-Webster dictionary says no quarter means “no pity or mercy — used to say that an enemy, opponent, etc., is treated in a very harsh way.”

In military terms, “no quarter” means that enemy soldiers will be killed instead of being taken prisoner.