Bodycam footage leaks, resisting arrest charges dropped
David Kravets
Texas police on Thursday dropped resisting
arrest and other charges leveled against a mother and two daughters,
ages 19 and 15, the same day leaked bodycam footage of the incident
surfaced. The video shows a Fort Worth police officer manhandling the
children, questioning the mother's parenting skills, and not taking any
action against a man the mother accused of assaulting her seven-year-old
son.
The video, leaked to the Associated Press by
the family's attorney who declined to say where he got it, shows Officer
William Martin responding to mother Jacqueline Craig's call to police.
The woman had accused her neighbor, Itamar Vardi, of assaulting her son
because he threw some trash on the ground by his residence.
The officer, according to the video,
grills the mother on her parenting skills, and she erupts in anger.
That set the stage for the officer to pull a Taser, order her and others
in the area to the ground, and to use force to quell the situation. The
development is the latest example of how the publication of body cam
footage or cell phone video is altering the criminal justice system at a
time when more and more police agencies are deploying these video
recorders.
"I just recorded everything."
In the video, the mother is seen telling the officer that her son was choked by her neighbor for littering.
"Why don't you teach your son not to litter?" the officer is overheard saying on the video.
Moments later, the mother says that even if her son did litter, "It doesn't give him the right to put his hands on him."
"Why not?" the officer responds.
Hell breaks out shortly thereafter. "Get on the ground. Get on the ground," the officer is overheard yelling.
A few minutes later, one of the mother's
daughters is overheard screaming: "I just recorded everything. I just
recorded everything."
"Me too," the officer responded.
Next, the officer grabs the girl, seizes her
phone, and says, "you're going to jail, too," before arresting her. All
the while, another girl is also filming the incident, according to the
video. That girl tells the officer she is filming, and the officer
responds: "Me too, except mine's in HD."

The December incident, which was captured by
an untold number of mobile phones, went viral on Facebook. The video
released Thursday shows more details and contains more audio than the
footage taken at the scene with mobile phones. The bodycam video shows
the fracas from the officer's point of view.
"The Police Department recognizes we must work to repair the fractured relationships to our community," the agency said
in a press release. “We are committed to ensuring all Fort Worth police
officers live up to restoring the trust you have lost in our
department."
The officer is back on the job after a 10-day
suspension, which he is appealing. The neighbor, whom the mother accused
of roughing up her son, is expected to be charged with a misdemeanor assault count, according to local media.

The bodycam video also shows Officer Martin
pulling up one of the daughter's handcuffed arms from behind, pushing
another girl near his police vehicle, and forcing the 15-year-old
daughter into a police car with his foot.
Bodycam footage leaks, resisting arrest charges dropped
Reviewed by Chidinma C Amadi
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