Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Wife’s phone recording of N.C. face-off released
In video, she cries: ‘He has no weapon’
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The wife of a man fatally shot by police earlier this week recorded part of the encounter, and video that was released Friday captured her pleading with officers not to fire at her husband.
This video footage was the first glimpse of what happened before and after a shooting that has inflamed Charlotte and prompted intense, sometimes violent protests. The 2½-minute recording emerged as city officials have refused to release police video showing an officer shooting and killing Keith Lamont Scott, a 43-year-old black man. The recording, taken by Scott’s wife on a cellphone, did not capture the shooting, but instead shows an officer aiming a gun at an unseen Scott while police yell at him to drop his gun.
In the video, Rakeyia Scott can be heard yelling to the officers that her husband did not have a gun.
“Don’t shoot him,” she said. “Don’t shoot him. He has no weapon. He has no weapon. Don’t shoot him.”
She then urges Scott to get out of the car and repeatedly says, “Don’t you do it,” until multiple gunshots are heard. At this point, the camera is facing the ground.
“Did you shoot him? He better not [expletive] be dead,” she yells, hurrying closer to the scene on a treelined street.
When she gets nearer to the scene, at least four officers are seen gathered around someone who is down on the street. Two of the officers were kneeling over the person on the ground.
Broadcaster NBC News first published this video Friday afternoon, and attorneys for Scott’s family released it to other media outlets.
Representatives for the Police Department and the mayor’s office did not immediately return emails seeking comment.
Police have said they have no immediate plans to release their two recordings of the shooting, which inflamed Charlotte and led to days of intense, sometimes violent protests in the city. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Chief Kerr Putney said Friday that there is footage from at least one police body camera and one dashboard camera.
Authorities have said officers encountered Scott because they were searching for another man, who had an outstanding warrant. According to police, officers saw Scott get out of a car with a handgun and get back into it, and they ordered him to get out and drop the weapon. Police say he posed a deadly threat and refused to drop the gun.
Video of the officer shooting Scott has become a focal point for demonstrators in Charlotte, who have taken to the city’s streets and called for footage to be released. Scott’s relatives, including his wife, watched the police videos on Thursday, according to their attorneys, and came away with “more questions than answers.”
The footage released Friday came after a relatively calm night, as two nights of violent protests gave way to largely peaceful demonstrations that stretched into the early morning.
Authorities said a curfew from midnight until 6 a.m. intended to help keep the city calm would continue into the weekend, until the state of emergency declared by the governor ends.
After the curfew took effect, police allowed the crowd of demonstrators to thin without forcing protesters off the street. Police Capt. Mike
Campagna told reporters that officers would not seek to arrest curfew violators as long as they were peaceful.
Putney said Friday that releasing the footage of Scott’s death could inflame the situation. He has said previously that the video will be made public when he believes there is a “compelling reason” to do so.
“It’s a personal struggle, but I have to do what I think is best for my community,” Putney said.
During the same news conference, Charlotte Mayor Jennifer Roberts said she believes the video should be released, but “the question is on the timing.”
Earlier in the week, the Charlotte protests turned violent, with demonstrators attacking reporters and others, setting fires and smashing windows of hotels, office buildings and restaurants.
Forty-four people were arrested after Wednesday’s protests, and one protester who was shot died at the hospital Thursday. City officials said police did not shoot 26-yearold Justin Carr. On Friday morning, police announced that Rayquan Borum, 21, was arrested and charged in the killing.