In North Charleston on Saturday, April 4, a fatal police-involved shooting occurred. Officer Michael Slager reported that he pulled over Walter Scott for a routine traffic stop, was attacked by Scott, and in a struggle for the officer’s Taser Slager shot the victim in self-defense. It looked like Scott would become another name on the already long list of unarmed African-American men killed by white police officers who weren’t punished.
Then, on Tuesday, April 7, a video surfaced showing that Slager had not been entirely truthful. In the video, Scott drops something at the feet of Slager and begins running away. Slager draws his sidearm and shoots Scott in the back more than half a dozen times. Scott crumples to the ground, and Slager fires one final time. Slager has been charged with murder.
In Tulsa on Thursday, April 2, another fatal police-involved shooting occurred. Deputy Robert Bates reported that he was participating in an arrest of Eric Harris, who was resisting. In order to subdue Harris, Bates drew his firearm and shot him. It looked like Harris would become another name on that long list.
Then, on Friday, April 10, another video surfaced. In the video, Bates jumps out of his car and begins pursuing Harris. Bates tackles Harris, who still attempts to escape. Bates shouts, “Taser, Taser” immediately before firing. In the heat of the moment, however, Bates accidentally grabbed and fired his handgun instead, killing Harris. The shots are immediately followed by, “Oh, I shot him, I’m sorry!” Bates has been charged with second-degree manslaughter.
Luckily we have video of both of the incidents in this twisted tale of two cities, otherwise we would have nothing to go off of other than the respective officer’s word. Compare these two cases to the shooting of Michael Brown last summer in Ferguson, Missouri and the importance of the existence of a video record of the event is immediately obvious. The supporters of the officer who shot Brown could resoundingly clear his name if they had video showing Brown assaulting the officer. Brown’s supporters could probably get the officer convicted for murder if the video showed the officer shooting a fleeing Brown with his hands over his head. One of the most contentious events in American race relations in the last decade could be resolved if we just had video of what happened.
Here in South Carolina, we got lucky that a bystander happened to be nearby. We got lucky the bystander happened to have their phone on them. We got lucky the bystander happened to decide to use that phone to record the incident. And we got lucky the North Charleston police happened to not see the bystander and force him away or worse, delete the video.
We should never have to rely on “luck” that the truth is revealed and that justice is served; our police officers should be required to wear body cameras while on duty. This little precautionary measure can simultaneously help protect police from unfair treatment by the public and the public from unfair treatment by the police.
Body cameras won’t be able to resolve every question raised in every police incident. But isn’t even a shred of objective truth in these high stakes games of he-said-she-said worth the price of a GoPro?