Gap remains in video record of fatal SC police shooting

[Brett Fitz]

Source: The Associated Press

By JEFFREY COLLINS and MICHAEL BIESECKER
Apr. 11, 2015 12:05 AM EDT

NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) — Dashboard video shows a police officer making a routine traffic stop. Cellphone video shows the officer shooting the fleeing motorist in the back. What remains a mystery is what happened during the minutes in between that led the polite officer to become a killer.

The dash cam footage released by state police on Thursday showed North Charleston Officer Michael Thomas Slager pulling over black motorist Walter Scott for a broken brake light last weekend. Slager, who is white, has been charged with murder in Scott's death.

Saturday's traffic stop opens like so many others as Scott was stopped in a used Mercedes-Benz he had purchased days earlier, footage from the patrol car showed. At the outset, it's a strikingly benign encounter: The officer is seen walking toward the driver's window, requesting Scott's license and registration. Slager then returns to his cruiser. On the dash cam video, Slager never touches his gun during the stop. He also makes no unreasonable demands or threats.

The video also shows Scott beginning to get out of the car, his right hand raised above his head. He then quickly gets back into the car and closes the door. After Slager goes back to his patrol car, minutes later, Scott jumps from his car and runs. Slager chases him.

What's missing is what happens from the time the two men run out of the frame of dashboard video to the time picked up in a bystander's cellphone video a few hundred yards away. The cellphone footage starts with Scott getting to his feet and running away, then Slager firing eight shots at the man's back.


Read more: http://bigstory.ap.org/article/b54f3d3df3cd43e98f0ff3449e70c298/gap-remains-video-record-fatal-sc-police-shooting

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What's missing is the common sense to realize that this was an execution by cop, plain and simple.

[pkdu]

1. Reads like the Police Union Rep wrote it for them.

No mention of 8 shots fired , 5 shots in the BACK , no mention of falsified Police reports . No mention of CPR that didn't happen, no mention of Medical Aid that didn't happen.

[Delver Rootnose]

4. There are far more people ....

....than there are police. The press, as the mouthpiece or the rich and powerful, have a vested interest in keeping the populace content with the status quo. They will fight mightily to explain away why a police officer murdered an unarmed fleeing African American man. Or at worst condemn one officer where they would normally cover up for him.

They cannot tolerate the idea that the police are fundamentally corrupt and don't protect anybody but the powerful.

[Klong]

2. Lets play devil's advocate

What if the perp stole to officer's tazer, (didn't happen cause the officer is seen dropping the tazer by the perp after he's shot) officer thinks the perp has the tazer, that would be enough to shoot the perp in the back (in a court of law). That could be the defense in this argument.

[rizlaplus]

5. That wouldn't stand up in a field full of red herrings

The cop shot 8 bullets at (and into) the back of a running man. The man was posing NO DANGER to the cop's life.

[Tempest]

9. How could you think he had the tazer

When it falls and hits the ground right in front of you?

Only a couple moron would even consider the possibility.

[Tom Ripley]

15. The devil would enlist a better advocate

[gwheezie]

3. the difference between the 2 videos

The 1st one the cop knew he was being recorded and the 2nd he didn't know he was being recorded.

[Novara]

10. And since there is that gap....

....Slager can make up some bullshit like he was afraid for his life.

The big tough cop who can easily shoot someone eight times while running away, and then plant evidence will lie and say he was afraid for his life. But the video shows that isn't true. He hunted him down like (sorry for the metaphor, but I think it fits) a runaway slave, with no consideration that he was even a human being.

[William Seger]

6. One thing we DO know about that gap...

... is that we can't trust what Slager says happened.

[Tempest]

8. This "polite officer" has a history of violence

He's being sued for attacking and beating a suspect.

The right wing AP is showing its bias.

[sendero]

11. Here comes the "doubt brigade"...

.... who's job it is to try to convince you that you just don't know all the facts. And that even though you saw a cop falsifying evidence you should believe him when he spins his ridiculous yarn about how an old dude who can barely run at all put him in fear of his life.

If you are stupid as a bag of rocks or as racist as a maggot you might believe it.

[jwirr]

12. In watching the first video I noticed that there is an object laying just in front of the shooters

feet. It is not clear what that object is but it could easily be the tazer. If so it is not clear how it got there but it could have been either the victim trying to get it when it was used on him OR the victim is tazed , turns and runs, the shooter drops the tazer to get at his gun and begins shooting the victim. Personally I think the shooter dropped it.

[Backwoodsrider]

13. I bet the cop gets manslaughter for the shooting

But he might be charged with falsifying evidence and lying on a police report. Fighting and ultimately shooting a black man in the line of duty is more acceptable to the powers that be than breaking the law by falsifying evidence...

sad but true

[cosmicone]

14. I know what happened in the gap

Scott was hiding behind a tree and just as the cop approached, tackled him to the ground with a karate kick. He then pulled two rifles hidden previously in anticipation of the encounter and started beating the poor officer laying on the ground. Scott then started choking the officer and just before the officer passed out, he made one brave surge, threw Scott off him and prevented Scott from taking his gun away. Unfazed by Scott's threats of "I'll kill you" as Scott pulled out a hunting knife from his pocket for hand-to-hand combat, the courageous officer decided to chase him once again and while still afraid for his life, shot him to save the community from the danger, risking his own life.

[Politicalboi]

16. A "third" brake light

Why do they keep talking like it was a legitimate pull over to begin with. Third brake lights are NOT required by law. All they gotta do is take the time when Mr. Scott started running to the time of the phone video. I'm sure it's not that long of a mystery.