Police video shows officers talking to YouTube shooter
Footage of woman calmly answering questions hours before her attack is released.
SAN DIEGO — A Bay Area police department on Friday released police body camera images of interactions between two of its officers and a woman who would open fire inside the YouTube campus hours later.
The video shows Mountain View police officers approaching Nasim Aghdam, 39, asleep in her car in a shopping center parking lot after 1:35 a.m April 3 and letting her know that she had been classified as a missing person out of San Diego County.
The woman, in a pink hoodie and black yoga pants, appears to be calm and cooperative, answering questions and shaking her head slightly when police ask whether she is suicidal or wants to hurt herself or others.
“In this instance if an individual is cooperative and does not present any sort of threat, continuing to unnecessarily question or delay them can lead to an unwarranted detention,” Mountain View police said in a lengthy statement regarding the release of the video and an explanation of actions by the officers.
During the interaction with police, Aghdam gives no overt indication of the terror that she would inflict less than 12 hours later. Authorities say she slipped onto the tech company’s grounds that afternoon and opened fire, injuring three people before taking her own life.
Near the end of the conversation, police tell her that they have to notify her father that she has been found but will tell him that she does not want contact with family.
Her family members, who live in Menifee in Riverside County, have said they did get that early morning call from police, but then called back to say they thought Aghdam might be in the Bay Area because she had been angry with YouTube over its policies.
Aghdam had several YouTube channels, posting sometimes bizarre videos on workouts and veganism.
Police acknowledged that the family mentioned YouTube but said they raised no alarms.
“At no point in either of our conversations did the family bring up any concerns about their daughter’s behavior, any potential violence she may carry out, or any likelihood that she could be a danger to herself or others,” police said Friday.