The video they released Friday includes audio and video of the scene before and after Scott was shot, however does not show the actual shooting or whether cott is armed.
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The footage released to the public is not the video in its’ entirety, Putney explained.
Earlier Saturday, the NAACP in Charlotte joined the calls for police to share the footage, calling it “video that is ours”. The two said they saw him rolling a marijuana joint. Police were in a parking lot in northeast Charlotte looking for a criminal suspect – not Scott – when they noticed the marijuana, Putney said.
Former FBI agent and prosecutor M. Quentin Williams analyzed the video released Friday with NBC Charlotte’s Michelle Boudin, saying it’s unclear if Scott had a gun in his hand when he was shot.
Charlotte police released footage Saturday of the fatal shooting of Charlotte resident Keith Lamont Scott, including both dashboard camera footage and body camera footage. “The footage only supports all the other information, physical evidence, the statements from witnesses and officers and all of the other information, scientific and physical, that create the whole picture”.
He said he made a decision to release the videos in the interest of transparency and because the State Bureau of Investigation, which is leading the inquiry in the case, had completed key interviews with witnesses and assured him the release would not harm the integrity of their probe.
Not all the video data would be released on Saturday, Putney said, only that covering the initial police encounter through the end of the shooting.
Putney had said, before the videos were released, that “there is no definitive visual evidence that he had a gun in his hand”.
The dashcam video appears to show Scott with something in his hand as he backed away from the SUV, but his arms did not appear to be either raised or extended before he was shot.
Hundreds of demonstrators took their protest to the Charlotte police department on Saturday.
Charlotte is the latest US city to be shaken by protests and recriminations over the death of a black man at the hands of police, a list that includes Baltimore, Milwaukee, Chicago, New York and Ferguson, Miss.
Forty-four people were arrested after Wednesday’s protests, and one protester, Justin Carr, 26, who was shot died at a hospital on Thursday.
On Thursday, Governor Pat McCrory declared a state of emergency and deployed National Guard troops to the city, and Mayor Jennifer Roberts enacted a midnight-to-6 a.m. curfew.
When officers “see the weapon, and they see the marijuana, they say, ‘oh-oh, this is a safety issue for us and the public, ‘” Putney said.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department (CMPD) has also released a detailed statement providing a police account of Scott’s shooting. CMPD said he was holding a handgun, but the family believes he was unarmed, the lawyers said. “I wish I could control the outcome of the shootings”, Putney added.
Before the footage release, Time Warner News Charlotte reporter Caroline Vandergriff reported protesters’ assertion that they won’t stop protesting until full footage arrives.
Authorities previously declined to release the footage, arguing it could jeopardize the integrity of the investigation of Tuesday’s shooting that has been taken over by the State Bureau of Investigation.
The protesters and black community leaders have been demanding the release of police videos. “It’s appropriate to do so.In the spirit of transparency, you are going to get everything we can deliver”.
Those commands aren’t heard in the body camera video, which doesn’t have audible sound until after the shooting.
The circumstances under which Scott was shot, including whether he was holding a gun, have come under increasing scrutiny since the Scott family released cellphone video images that Scott’s wife, Rakeyia, recorded in the moments leading up to his death.
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He did note, however, that there’s no clear evidence that Scott pointed a gun at an officer.
