The Borneo Post (Sabah)

More video emerges of suspected drug planting by Baltimore police

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BALTIMORE: The Baltimore Police Department suspended seven officers after body camera video emerged that the city’s public defender said appeared to show them planting drugs in a car during a traffic stop, the second such episode in the city in two weeks.

Some of the videos published this week showed officers searching around the driver’s seat of a car for several minutes but finding nothing during the stop on Nov 29 last year. Other videos recorded about 30 minutes later show one officer crouching near the seat as others look on.

When he steps back, colleagues can be seen switching on their cameras, at which point audio can be heard. The cameras are designed to store silent video footage of the 30 seconds preceding the camera’s activation.

“Now?” someone can be heard saying. Then a different officer steps toward the seat and quickly makes a discovery.

“Oh here you go,” he says, holding up a black bag that police say contained illegal drugs. “That’s the weed smell right there.”

The videos were released by the lawyer of one of two people in the car who were arrested on drugs charges. The charges were dropped on Monday, the Baltimore Sun said. Baltimore Police Commission­er Kevin Davis defended his officers on Wednesday, telling a news conference his department was facing ‘growing pains’ with the technology they started using 14 months ago.

“I do know it’s not healthy to jump to a conclusion that officers did something criminal just because their camera was off,” Davis said, adding that he would wait until an internal investigat­ion was complete before making a judgment. — Reuters

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