Article from NYTimes.
I link the video below the article.
Here the link to the video. Warning: The video shows the killing of another human being. It may disturb you. It sure as hell did disturb me. Someone gets killed and it looked so trivial. It's weird how quiet everything is until the rest of the police arrives and makes noises and chases away the witnesses.Footage of St. Louis Shooting May Contradict Police Reports
Cellphone footage of a fatal police shooting in St. Louis on Tuesday raised questions about the initial account given by the police.
In the video, released Wednesday, a man wearing khaki pants and a dark, loose sweatshirt is seen pacing on a sidewalk when a police vehicle pulls up and two officers get out. They draw their guns and repeatedly yell at the man, “Get your hands out of your pocket!”
The man begins walking toward them, saying “Shoot me!” Then he turns away from the officers and steps over a small wall into a parking lot. At this point, his hands are out of his pocket and at his side, and the police start yelling, “Drop the knife!”
But the man circles back toward the officers, hands still at his side. Someone in the background can be heard saying, “Come on, drop it, bro.”
The video includes profane language and shows the shooting from a distance.
In another, less graphic video, security camera footage shows the alleged shoplifting incident that preceded the shooting.
The security camera footage of the alleged shoplifting.
As the man gets within about 10 feet of the officers, they begin firing. The man falls and writhes on the ground as the officers keep their guns trained on him. A man in the background can be heard saying, “Hands up.”
The video appears to differ from the initial account of the shooting given by the police. Sam Dotson, the chief of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department, initially told reporters that the man, Kajieme Powell, 25, had moved toward the officers with the knife raised. But the video showed that his hands were at his side. Chief Dotson also said on the day of the shooting that Mr. Powell was within three feet of the officers before they started firing, but he appeared to be farther away in the video.
The reason for the discrepancies between the initial account and the video was because Chief Dotson got his first account from witnesses on the scene, said Maggie Crane, a spokeswoman for the mayor of St. Louis, Francis G. Slay. But in an effort to be fully transparent, Ms. Crane said, the chief released the cellphone footage. The city has pledged a full investigation into whether the shooting was justified and whether the officers followed department protocol.
“We will not make a judgment call like that without having the full, thorough investigation complete,” Ms. Crane said.
