SAN DIEGO – A former San Diego sheriff’s deputy who already pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter in connection with the fatal shooting of an unarmed suspect in 2020 has been indicted on two federal charges that could result in a life sentence, prosecutors said feds.

A federal grand jury returned a two-count indictment Friday charging Aaron Russell with depriving Nicholas Bils of his right to be free from officers using excessive force and discharging a firearm in furtherance of a violent crime, the U.S. Department of Justice said in a statement.

Bils, 36, was arrested in May 2020 at Old Town State Park in San Diego, where he was throwing balls to his off-leash dog. He brandished a golf club at a guard before fleeing and was arrested on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon and resisting arrest.

Bils was in a State Parks patrol car headed to the downtown jail when he managed to slip out of his handcuffs, reached through the window to open the car door, then jumped out and fled.

Aaron Russell, a corrections deputy with 18 months of experience, chased Bils and shot him four times, including once in the back. Surveillance footage captured the shooting.

Russell was charged with murder, but pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was sentenced to one year in prison and three years’ probation. The Justice Department said he faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted on the federal charges.

Contact information for Russell could not be found Sunday. He resigned from the sheriff’s office shortly after the shooting.

Bils’ mother, Kathleen Bils, told NBC 7 her son suffers from paranoid schizophrenia and is afraid of law enforcement, which may have contributed to his escape.

The shooting led to a wrongful death lawsuit filed by Bils’ relatives, which was settled in 2022, with San Diego County agreeing to pay the family $8.1 million.

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