I must admit that I have not been a fan of police body cameras. I thought they were unnecessary. After all, we've gotten along without them for so long. Save for a very few cases, what purpose would they serve? Also, I thought that the footage might somehow be able to be tampered with or a situation taken out of context to taint or skew an incident.
Well, I've now taken a full 180-degree turn and am all for bodycams. To prove the need for such devices, allow me to cite two recent incidents involving white police officers and "people of color" claiming to be victims of these "racist" cops.
The first took place almost a month ago, on April 27, in Virginia, but has just recently come to light. Leftist "person of color" Dawn Hilton-Williams was pulled over in Brunswick County by a white officer for doing 70 mph in a 55 mph zone.
After she was ticketed, she took to Facebook live to chronicle her traumatic experience. She claims to have been threatened by the white cop. She said that all "my African-Americans and people of color will know exactly what I'm talking about. I want to get a check-in on our people."
Watch Hilton-Williams' video:
Our people? What people would they be? You mean black people – the "black community"? Imagine if I, as a whitey white man, said such a thing on Facebook. The video would be labeled as hate speech and pulled down immediately.
Hilton-Williams then begins to choke up saying she was immediately afraid of the state trooper who pulled her over. She says, choking back tears, that, "the man threatened to pull me out of the car," and that, "we shouldn't be afraid to drive and get pulled over by the police."
Now if this were the only account of the incident, the cop would be in big trouble. Thankfully it isn't. Thank heavens for the sergeant's bodycam, which captures the truth.
He approaches the car and wishes Ms. Hilton-Williams a good afternoon. Oh no – how threatening! The officer was nothing but calm and courteous the entire time.
Officer's bodycam video:
After returning from his car, he explains, in detail, the ticket – that she can pre-pay it or appear in court to dispute it. All the while the sergeant remaining calm and courteous.
And then comes the incident she described as the trooper threatening to pull her out of her car. With a bit of context, things look a lot different. Ms. Hilton-Williams refuses to sign the ticket. The officer explains that by law she must sign the ticket – that it is in no way an admission of guilt, but if she refuses, he has no choice but take her out the car, arrest her and take her in front of a magistrate. The cop is doing his job and following the law. Yet he was never threatening or aggressive.
In other words, Ms. Hilton-Williams lied about the entire incident.
The second incident involved the Rev. Jarrod Moultrie, the NAACP president of Timmonsville, South Carolina, being pulled over by another "racist" white cop. Now granted, the stop was over the minor infraction of not signaling at a stop, but that's not the issue.
Bodycam video:
After the stop, the wrong reverend took to Facebook to post the following:
"TONIGHT I WAS RACIALLY PROFILED by Timmonsville Officer CAUSE I WAS DRIVING A MERCEDES BENZ AND GOING HOME IN A NICE NEIGHBORHOOD," Jarrod Moultrie posted on Facebook April 13.
Moultrie also posted that the officer asked him if he had any drugs in the car, where he worked, who was the owner of the car and why he was in the neighborhood. All lies. Mysteriously the post has been deleted. Wonder why? And interestingly, the Mercedes license plates belong to a 1992 GMC truck Moultrie owned. Evidently, the transfer didn't make it into the system.
Still, the officer was nothing but kind, deferential and courteous. And it appears that he let the reverend off with just a warning.
Yet again, without bodycam evidence, I dare say this would have turned out a lot different. An investigation would no doubt have been opened – the police officer possibly suspended and his reputation trashed.
I was never a fan, but I am now. Thank heavens for bodycams.