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Police dashcam released following Walter Scott killing

Dashcam video has emerged showing a black South Carolina man running from his car after a traffic...
Newstalk
Newstalk

07.36 10 Apr 2015


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Police dashcam released follow...

Police dashcam released following Walter Scott killing

Newstalk
Newstalk

07.36 10 Apr 2015


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Dashcam video has emerged showing a black South Carolina man running from his car after a traffic stop by a white officer, who gave chase before shooting him dead.

The footage, released by the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division, does not show Officer Michael Slager shooting Walter Scott but does reveal more about the minutes before the killing in North Charleston last Saturday.

Slager, who has been charged with murder and dismissed from the police, is seen approaching a car and asking the driver for his licence and proof of insurance.

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The patrolman tells Mr Scott he has been pulled over because of a broken brake light. After a brief exchange, the officer returns to his patrol car.

The 50-year-old gets out of the vehicle, and Slager tells him to stay in the car. Several seconds later he leaves the black Mercedes-Benz again and runs away.

After Slager gives chase, someone can be heard shouting: "Taser, taser."

The 33-year-old patrolman said in a call to a dispatcher that he fired his weapon because Mr Scott took his stun gun and he feared for his life.

But he was charged over the killing after a separate video, filmed on a mobile phone by an onlooker, showed the officer firing eight shots at Mr Scott's back as he flees.

In the second video, Mr Scott does not appear to be armed.

A post-mortem examination has found Mr Scott had multiple gunshot wounds on the back of his body.

His father has said his son, a father of four, may have run away because he owed child support money and did not want to go to jail.

The dashcam video emerged as a man who was hit with a stun gun by Slager in a 2013 incident said he would sue.

Mario Givens, 34, told a news conference Slager came to his house, pushed in the door and fired the stun gun at his stomach.

Mr Givens, who was unarmed, filed an excessive-force complaint at the time, but Slager was exonerated and allowed to remain on the force.

North Charleston police have said they will now review the case.

Mr Givens' lawyer, Eduardo Curry, said there was "a systemic problem" in the city's police department.

Slager, meanwhile, has hired Charleston lawyer Andy Savage - whose previous clients include convicted al Qaeda operative Ali al-Marri.
A fundraising page dedicated to Slager was shut down by GoFundMe on Wednesday.

North Charleston has said all officers in the city will now be equipped with body cameras.

But civil rights leaders on Thursday urged the South Carolina legislature to expedite a pending proposal for all police statewide to wear cameras on their uniforms.

Dot Scott, of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, said: "It will lessen the chance that any more black men will be used for target practice as Mr Scott was."


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