A fired Mesquite police officer took the stand Thursday to defend his actions in the November 2017 shooting of an unarmed man.
Derick Wiley, 37, is on trial a second time for the shooting that seriously injured 32-year-old Lyndo Jones.
"I was scared. I thought I was out there alone," Wiley testified.
At times during his testimony, the ex-cop cried, taking a moment to blow his nose on the witness stand.
He is charged with aggravated assault by a public servant and faces up to life in prison if convicted. Prosecutors rested their case Thursday morning.
Wiley responded to a 911 call about a suspicious person in a pickup truck outside a Mesquite business. He ordered the man to get out of the vehicle.
Body camera and dash camera footage shows the confrontation, including a scuffle on the ground, before shots were fired.
Jones was shot twice in the back.
The videos capture Wiley using profanity to order Jones out of the truck. After the shooting, Wiley said he believed Jones was burglarizing the truck and armed.
Jones was unarmed and had been sitting in his own vehicle. He testified that he followed Wiley's orders.
"I did what I was told," Jones testified Monday.
Wiley said Jones had a look on his face that "just wasn't right."
"I told myself the quicker I can get him handcuffed, then I'm safe," he testified Thursday.
The body camera footage shows Jones on the ground with his hands behind his back. Wiley puts his hand on the man, and Jones rolls out from under him and starts to run away.
"I'm coming up," Wiley said of standing up as Jones started to get away, "and I thought that he had a gun, and I fired twice."
After the shooting, Jones was arrested on a charge of evading arrest. The criminal charge was later dropped.
"I believed that there was clear evidence on the video that Mr. Jones had evaded arrest," said Sgt. Mike Parker.
Parker testified that he was the one to choose to seek an arrest warrant for Jones. He said he didn't believe Wiley should be arrested.
“He indicated that he was in fear for his life, at the moment that he fired his weapon. In that case, in my opinion, that makes that action justifiable," Parker said.
An owner of the Mesquite business where the shooting took place said that he feared for the officer's safety.
"I saw Mr. Jones struggling to gain control of Mr. Wiley's weapon," testified Henry Leaverton.
Jones got out of his truck without his shirt or shoes on before the officer arrived, Leaverton said.
The business owner said he told Jones he needed to leave the parking lot. Leaverton said he pulled up behind the officer's patrol vehicle after Wiley arrived and saw some of the confrontation.
RELATED: 'As calm as possible': Mesquite detective describes officer moments after he shot a man twice