First-degree murder charge dropped against ex-Philly cop in Eddie Irizarry shooting

The former Philadelphia police officer charged in the shooting death of a motorist during a traffic stop last summer was released on bail on Thursday after prosecutors dropped a first-degree murder charge against him.

Mark Dial is accused of shooting 27-year-old Eddie Irizarry several times as the victim sat in his car.

The 24-year-old cop and his partner, Officer Michael Morris, said Irizarry was driving erratically before going the wrong way on a residential street in Philadelphia’s Kensington neighborhood on Aug. 14, 2023.

After they pulled him over, Dial fired six bullets into Irizarry’s driver’s side window, bodycam video shows.

Authorities initially claimed Irizarry had jumped out of his car with a knife, but they later retracted their claims.

Dial surrendered to authorities in early September. He was released after posting 10% of this $500,000 bail, only to see his bail revoked a few days later — in one of many surprising developments in the case.

Charges against the former cop were thrown out and refiled within hours in late September. Dial was jailed again a month later.

Late last month, a judge denied Dial’s request to move the trial out of Philadelphia.

Dial was scheduled to go on trial next month on charges including first- and third-degree murder, manslaughter and official oppression.

A new trial, without the first-degree murder charge, is now set to begin in May 2025.

The decision to drop the highest charge came after Dial’s lawyers said prosecutors hadn’t turned over an expert witness report they planned to use at trial.

The move outraged Irizarry’s relatives, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer.

“An officer can kill somebody here and get away with it,” his aunt, Zoraida Garcia, told the paper. “You think any of us get bail if we kill somebody?”

With News Wire Services