Milwaukee police shooting of Anthony Virginia leaves more questions than answers

Milwaukee police shot and killed 41-year-old Anthony Virginia on the city’s north side last year, but details about the medical examiner’s ruling leave more questions than answers. 

The shooting took place March 8, 2025, on railroad tracks near the 5000 block of North 37th Street. 

Virginia’s family are pursuing a civil suit after officials made a hasty decision to not file charges against the officers, according to Virginia family attorney Will Sulton. 

“Anthony’s case is the only case in my 18-year career where we convinced the medical examiner’s office to change the cause and manner of death in a police shooting,” Sulton told the Milwaukee Courier on June 4. 

MPD released footage of the incident about two weeks after the shooting. The video effectively shows nothing as the shooting didn’t happen at close range and wasn’t picked up by body cam. 

What is known is Virginia was walking with another 34-year-old man when police approached to stop them because they were accused of burglary/entry into a business on the 5100 block of North 32nd Street, where shots were fired.

The video shows the officer exiting his squad and a short foot chase ensued. Moments later, more officers arrive and yell commands for the men to get on the ground before suddenly gunshots ring out. 

The 34-year-old man was later arrested but Virginia was fatally shot. 

As he lay on the ground fatally wounded, one officer is heard saying over the radio “he had a gun.”

Citing safety concerns, minutes would pass before officers decide to approach Virginia to try and render aid.

A gun was recovered next to Virginia, but there are discrepancies on whether Virginia had the gun pointed at his own head before officers shot. 

Sulton said shortly after the incident he met with Assistant Medical Examiner Jessica Lelinski, District Attorney Kent Lovern, and a police detective from the Wauwatosa Police Department, which was the outside agency handling the investigation. 

Sulton said Lelinski had to be convinced to change the cause and manner of death from suicide to multiple gunshot wounds. Lelinski originally ruled that Virginia was holding his gun to his head when the officer shot him in the liver resulting in a flinch reaction setting off his own gun, Sulton said. 

MPD and the Milwaukee Police Association made statements at the time that argued Virginia pointed a gun at officers, according to Sulton. 

Sulton said the officer that shot Virginia was “completely reckless” in his actions to begin with, not even recognizing his fellow officer near the shot’s trajectory, but more so, officials don’t agree on the circumstances of the shooting. 

“The medical examiner’s office confirmed that (Virginia) had a gun to his head,” Sulton said. “Originally, his family was told that (Virginia) was shot to death by this officer because he pointed a gun at the officer.

“How could it be that he killed himself and been shot by this officer? How could this officer shoot him if he had a gun to his head?

“You can’t tell me you’re gonna shoot someone who has a gun to their own head. And so the officer just flat out lied.”

“Me and the detective had the same look on our face when (Lelinksi) said suicide. Nobody knew that. I suggest, what are you talking about?

“We got a press release from the police department, the police association, even the detective at the end of the table, all saying that (Virginia) was shot and killed because he pointed a gun at an officer. Why are you saying suicide?

“(Lelinski) responds, ‘Well the liver shot could have killed him.’ I said, well yes, no shit.

“I turned to (Lovern) and said, Kent, you’re gonna let this go? He said, ‘I didn’t know about that, I’m just hearing about it right now.”

Sulton said Lelinski agreed to change the cause and manner of death to multiple gunshot wounds. And Lovern followed up in a letter about four, five months later justifying the shooting, according to Sulton. 

“(Lovern) said something like it was near simultaneous when he was lifting the firearm,” Sulton said. “I said, how can you possibly know that?”

“If he’s lifting the firearm from the side to his head, setting aside everything else that he’s not extending it, he’s not pointing it at an officer or anything like that. The flinch reaction would not have caused a gun to be discharged by his head. The gun would have already been at his head at the moment of the flinch reaction.”

Lovern’s letter to Police Chief Jeffrey Norman, dated Feb. 24, identified the involved officers as Andrew Schnell and Jesse Busshardt.

Officers “ultimately observed Virginia display a silver handgun and raise it as if to point it toward Schnell,” Lovern wrote. “Busshardt then heard shots being fired. At this time, Schnell fired three shots with his rifle. Busshardt heard one round fly right past him and he observed Virginia fall to the ground. Busshardt then observed Virginia with wounds to his head and torso area, while still holding in his right hand a (gun).”

“Schnell told investigators that he fired shots after observing Virginia display and raise a handgun while looking directly at him. He indicated he feared for his life when he decided to shoot.

The letter states the 34-year-old man with Virginia told investigators he “observed Virginia with a firearm that he refused to drop and believed he pointed the firearm in the direction of an officer before seeing him fire one shot.

Lovern wrote the “use of force” was justified after Virginia created an “objectively reasonable belief in Schnell’s mind that there was imminent risk of bodily harm or death to him or someone else on the scene.

“This office is closing its review of the use of force by the officer in this matter.”