Defense Attorney Blasts Officers Who Shot 29-Year-Old Massachusetts Cop — ‘You Don't Shoot Someone Trying to Harm Themselves’

A woman police officer from Massachusetts is now at the center of a tense and emotional trial. Kelsey Fitzsimmons is accused of pointing her gun at fellow officers during a chaotic incident at her home in June 2025. When the officers arrived at Fitzsimmons’ house to serve a restraining order, they recalled how the 29-year-old had pointed her gun at them. The restraining order was filed by her then fiancé, Justin Aylaian, a local firefighter.

Aylaian had alleged that Fitzsimmons was mentally ill and had threatened him and their four-month-old son. However, things got complicated, when Fitzsimmons shared a very different version of what happened that day.

After officers arrived with the restraining order, they said, Fitzsimmons pulled out her service weapon, pointed it at the officers, and even pulled the trigger. However, the gun did not fire because there was no bullet in the chamber, even though the magazine was full.

According to the Daily Mail, this led one of the officers, Pat Noonan, to shoot Fitzsimmons in the chest, saying he acted in self-defense. Although she survived, the 29-year-old suffered serious injuries, including a collapsed lung.

Following this incident, her lawyer, Timothy Bradl, said in the trial that she never tried to harm the officers. Instead, she acted out of deep emotional pain and tried to take her own life because she feared losing her child.

This statement was corroborated by one of the first witnesses, Sean Daley, who claimed to have entered the house after he heard someone inside shouting, “Don’t do it, Kelsey,” followed by gunshots. With Fitzsimmons lying on the ground, badly injured, Daley said she told officers, “I’m sorry, I want to die.”

Meanwhile, prosecutors told a different story, where they showed a video of Aylaian entering the basement before the gunshots were heard. He was then seen running out of the home as emergency responders arrived.

However, the prosecutors’ version suffered a major setback as the trial lacked body camera footage. Massachusetts does not require all police officers to wear body cameras. Therefore, the officers at the scene did not have them on.

So, without clear evidence of what happened inside the home, the trial became complicated for the prosecutors. Yet, they proceeded to argue that Fitzsimmons misled officers about where her guns were kept, and claimed that she reached for her weapon in a threatening way.

However, Bradl strongly disagreed with this statement. He said the officers’ own words suggest she was trying to harm herself, not others. He argued that officers would not shout “no” in that way if they believed she was aiming at them.

“Kelsey, no. Kelsey, no. You don't say that when you're staring at the muzzle of a gun pointed at you. You say that to a person who has a gun to their head, and you don't shoot someone in the chest when they are clearly seeking to only harm themselves.” Bradl said.

Fitzsimmons had been on the police force for just over a year before the incident, and now she has chosen to have a bench trial. Which means, a judge, not a jury, will hear all the evidence and give a verdict within a week.