That’s right.
IMO, the body language of the guy in the vehicle says no threat.
Just driving off is not lethal threat to the officer unless he’s stupid enough to reach in the car and put himself in mortal danger.
Dumb, dumb, dumb...
I do think the DA was wrong to comment about the traffic stop. The law states the front license plate is to be there. Officers issue fix-it tickets for that sort of thing all the time. It’s legit.
And for the DA to put the officer down for stopping a guy based on that, reveals an attitude problem.
The officer was wrong. The DA is right to charge the officer, but he is not right to criticize the officer for doing his job.
I once asked a city police officer how he viewed the presence of officers on a local Jr. college campus. I had observed one making a traffic stop. He said he had no problem with it at all, that these guys were fully functioning police officer just like he was.
So I’m not real quick to dump on the campus officer for this stop. It was probably legit.
I note the officer didn’t go postal when the driver pulled out a bottle of gin. Too bad he couldn’t keep his composure later.
“The officer was wrong. The DA is right to charge the officer, but he is not right to criticize the officer for doing his job.”
Pretty much my thoughts at this point. I watched the camera footage several times on youtube, and it looks like a bad shoot to me. But the prior stop itself appeared to be perfectly legitimate. And it was just plain unprofessional (though likely politically expedient) for the DA to use the language he did.
Officer Tensing knew Dubose was getting ready to play the old name game with him. It happens thousands of times a day in this country. I have been a reluctant but skilled participant in it at least a hundred times, conservatively. It’s just a reality of police work.
The name game is “I have no ID, I will give you a name, not my real name, but someone elses who I have memorized, most likely a family member, in the hopes you won’t be vigilant in comparing the driver’s license photos.” Or “I will give you a social security number, not my real one, in hopes of throwing you off.”
Like I said, it’s a game and after a few times of seeing it, you get really good at shutting it down.
Dubose had no license with him, probably had warrants, was going to get hooked up, car towed, so he he was probably going to give false name. Officer Tensing, just like the Trooper with Sandra Bland, was going to have him step from the vehicle, hence telling him to take the seatbelt off and then starting to open the door. Dubose reacted by pulling and holding the door shut, then putting the car in drive. Officer Tensing told him to Stop, he refused, Tensing then made the “tactical” not “legal” error of reaching in to turn the car off.
The two primary case laws they will look at in regards to this will Graham vs. Connor and Tennessee vs. Garner. The standard they will look at will be whether another officer in a similar situation with a similar amount of experience and training, would do the same thing. The contention will not be whether they would shoot, but whether would reach in at all. However, as I mentioned before, that is not a legal issue, but a policy one or lack thereof.
People are saying he is lying. Well, all he has to do is convince one juror that he was doing what he said he was doing and go tangled in the steering wheel, and he is going to get a hung jury.
Remember, they are going to trot out about ten or twelve officers and paramedics from different agencies and each one will be asked if they believe that he was dragged and possibly injured. How many times did they ask him if he was alright without knowing he was recording?
Furthermore, his back up officer had a rookie trainee. He will be the first the feds go after for testimony on the fed side, since lying to a special agent is a crime, not so to a police officer.
In Ohio they do not issue fix-it tickets. The license plate is a pretext for a drug search or just outright harassment. If they find anything else such as an unbuckled seatbelt then a citation is issued.
Express a little attitude about getting $300 worth the fines for a plate and a belt and you can watch the peace officer start losing his composure. He knows that he is engaging in chickensh@& and doesn’t want to be disresepected.
I see it pretty closely to the way you do. The officer had started to open the door, the guy pulled it closed then tried to drive off, the officer then reached in to try to shut off the ignition. A multitude of dumb tactical moves that put him in mortal danger. What followed, followed.
The prosecutor’s completely out of line, though. Determine the facts, accomplish the indictment and take the case to court. Grandstanding and character assassination have no place in a proper criminal prosecution.