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Still no verdict in Buffalo Police officer's trial

A federal jury is continuing their deliberations in the trial of a Buffalo Police officer accused of using excessive force.

BUFFALO, N.Y. — A federal court jury will resume its deliberations Wednesday morning, at the   trial of a Buffalo Police officer accused of using excessive force.

RELATED: Opening statements made in BPD officer trial

Officer Corey Krug faces three counts of deprivation of civil rights and one count of falsifying a report in relation to three separate incidents in 2010, 2011 and 2014. 

Prosecutors, in their opening statements, said that in each instance Krug used excessive force, hitting three men with either his nightstick or flashlight, causing physical injury and that none of them fought back. 

They described him as "a bully with a badge."

Krug, an 18-year veteran of the Buffalo Police Department, faces up to 10 years behind bars if convicted.

In all, 22 witnesses testified during the three-week-long trial, and jurors began deliberating last Thursday.

On Tuesday, jurors returned to the courtroom three times.

Once to be re-instructed on "excessive force," and another time to watch once again a critical piece of evidence in the government's case: a video of an encounter between Krug and Devin Ford of Lackawanna, which occurred during the early morning hours of Thanksgiving 2014 on Chippewa Street.

The encounter, captured by a television news photographer, shows Krug striking Ford repeatedly with a nightstick after pushing him against a car and forcefully taking him to the ground.

The video shows Krug pushing his knee into Ford's chest while using the nightstick to strike him in the legs before fellow officers pull Krug away.

Krug had also been named in three civil rights lawsuits since 2010.

On their third trip back into the courtroom on Tuesday, jurors informed Judge Richard Arcara that their "deliberations had stalled" and asked for guidance on how to proceed.

Reminding them that they had only been deliberating for ten hours over the course of three days (which he call "not unusual" in such a case)  Arcara told them that he expected them to return to court on Wednesday and be ready to resume deliberating.

Krug has been suspended from his job, with pay, since being indicted in August, 2015.

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