A police spokesman saw the footage said it does not show police misconduct. “I support and commend the law enforcement officials for their bravery and courage during this hard situation”.
Advertisement
One man was critically injured in Wednesday’s protest. City officials say police did not fire on the victim.
Video obtained and verified by The Associated Press, which was recorded right after the shooting, shows someone lying in a pool of blood as people scream and a voice yells for someone to call for help. People are then told to back up from the scene.
However, he did sustained life-threatening injuries.
Demonstrators shouted “black lives matter” and “hands up; don’t shoot” while cursing at officers with bicycles blocking intersections. As the protesters approached the Omni hotel, officers in riot gear lined up outside arm in arm and a few marchers threw bottles and clods of dirt. Protesters dispute the police department’s version of events that Carr was shot by a fellow civilian, not a police officer. The police have thrown tear gas at them upon being attacked, but bystanders reported that the police were not following protocol in handling the crowd.
But not all the marchers left.
The streets in downtown Charlotte appeared to be calm Thursday morning.
During the second night, one protester was reportedly shot by another amid the chaos.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Chief Kerr Putney defended his officers’ actions in an interview with Fox News’ Megyn Kelly on “The Kelly File”.
In some policing circles it’s considered a rule of thumb that videos showing potentially questionable shootings or that could otherwise be inflammatory should be released expediently to avoid allegations of a coverup. “We’ve been very patient, but now they’ve become very violent”.
Regarding the mention of a TBI, member station WFAE’s Gwendolyn Glenn says that Keith Scott sustained “very severe injuries” from a vehicle accident about a year ago.
“We’re just going to present the facts and let the justice system run its course”, he told “The Kelly File”.
“He got out of his auto, he walked back to comply, and all his compliance did was get him murdered”, said Taheshia Williams, whose balcony overlooks the shady parking spot where Scott was Tuesday afternoon.
Officer Brentley Vinson, who is also black, shot 43-year-old Keith Lamont Scott on Tuesday outside a Charlotte apartment building. He added that the video, which Scott’s family may be able to watch, does not provide “definitive visual evidence” that Scott pointed a gun at the officer.
“We’re here to seek the truth, so we’re investigating that to find the truth, the absolute truth as best as the evidence can show us”, Putney said, as quoted by Reuters.
Neighbors, though, said that the officer who fired was white and that Scott had his hands in the air.
Advertisement
The largely peaceful Thursday night demonstrations called on police to release video that could resolve wildly different accounts of the shooting this week of a black man. At the time, less than half of the fatal police shootings captured by body camera in 2015 had been publicly released – even though, in nearly all cases, the officers involved had been allowed to view the camera footage while preparing their statements about the shooting. He said Charlotte now has more resources to deal with problems, following a declaration of a state of emergency and the arrival of the North Carolina National Guard and more officers from the State Highway Patrol.
