Watch: How the fatal Senatobia shooting unfolded in 25 seconds

By Julie Lee, Sarah Whites-Koditschek, and Mukta Joshi | Originally published by Mississippi Today

Julie Lee is a data reporter at Mississippi Today. Sarah Whites-Koditschek and Mukta Joshi are investigative reporters at Mississippi Today spending a year as New York Times Local Investigations fellows. They report for the Deep South Today Investigative Reporting Center in collaboration with The New York Times.

Reporters for Mississippi Today closely examined video footage and broke down key moments of the police confrontation that ended with the fatal shooting of 1-year-old Kohen Wiley in a Walmart parking lot this summer.

The frame-by-frame review shows how a tip that two women were running out of the store escalated in a matter of seconds, with five officers surrounding their car, guns raised. The video analysis also catalogs the moments cited by several experts who said the police unnecessarily escalated the encounter and put themselves in harm’s way.

The Mississippi attorney general, Lynn Fitch, announced last week that the state would not pursue criminal charges against Hunter Foster, the Senatobia police officer who shot Kohen. The toddler was sitting on his mother’s lap as a second woman drove. Foster fired at the car as it drove in the direction of two officers, and Fitch ruled his actions were justified. 

That decision came after a state investigation that relied heavily on the video shown here.

The footage begins just after 2 p.m. on June 14, inside a small room with video monitors near the store entrance. A Walmart employee steps in, interrupting police officers who are discussing an unrelated incident.

Outside, the two women, one of whom is carrying Kohen, run toward a gray sedan in the parking lot, Walmart surveillance footage shows. Latoya Ferrell, carrying a box of diapers, gets in to drive. Kohen’s mother, Vellesiya Wiley, climbs into the passenger seat with her son. 

It is unclear if the officers knew who the women were or why they were running. No one in the video accuses the women of a crime, hints at why they are running or mentions a child. 

An incident report that Senatobia officers filed later said baby clothes and a large box of Pampers Easy Ups diapers were stolen. The report says the diapers were “under rang,” a term for when an item is skipped at self-checkout or a cheaper item is scanned instead. Neither woman has been charged.

As the officers run toward the car, it backs out of its parking spot. They shout, “Stop!” 

The first person to draw a gun is a deputy from the Tate County Sheriff’s Office. He points it at the ground and holsters it almost immediately as the car continues to reverse. Meanwhile, Foster draws his gun. He is the first officer to aim at the car, 20 seconds after the Walmart employee alerted the officers.

Jeremy Bauer, a forensic reconstruction expert who reviewed body-worn camera footage from Foster and two other officers, said the car was still backing up when Foster pointed his gun at it.

Russ Hicks, a retired law enforcement officer and instructor from Washington, said, “What concerns me is taking out the gun so quickly on this kind of a case.” Hicks consults with police departments on use of force and de-escalation techniques.

As the driver backs out of her parking space, she hits an SUV, momentarily coming to a stop. The officers close in around the car, continuing to yell, “Stop,” and drawing their weapons. By the time the car accelerates forward, all five officers have drawn their guns.

The car accelerates toward Foster and a sheriff’s deputy. The front wheel appears to turn left, away from Foster. As the car’s bumper approaches Foster’s leg, he fires one shot at the windshield, about 25 seconds after the Walmart employee ran in.

An analysis of body-worn camera footage indicated the audio was at times mismatched to the video by fractions of seconds. The analysis indicated that Foster’s video had a larger lag, though still less than one-third of a second. For that reason, Mississippi Today muted the footage from his camera.

According to Bauer, the forensic reconstruction expert, Foster fires the first shot when his right leg is in front of the bumper and his left leg is beside the car. 

Bauer said it was hard to tell if Foster was grazed by the car. He noted that Foster’s balance was not disrupted and said there was “no definitive evidence of an impact.”

It is unclear in the videos whether any of the other officers who were close to the car were hit, Bauer said. He saw no evidence of possible contact with the other officers beyond one officer who braced his hand on the hood of the car. 

Veronica Roberson, Kohen’s grandmother, said Mississippi Bureau of Investigation officials told her when she viewed the footage that one officer — not Foster — was struck by the car. She said she was told that the officer who was struck was a sheriff’s deputy who was standing in front of the car. 

Walmart surveillance video seems to show him jumping out of the way in time. But the Walmart camera was recording at a lower frame rate than body-camera footage, so it is difficult to determine whether it accurately captured his movement. Other camera angles appear to show the car veer closer to him, and the deputy can be seen lifting his leg and bracing his hand against the car.

The videos released Thursday are a portion of the camera footage collected by state investigators, though they appear to capture the critical moments around the time of the shooting.

Leaked footage published by Darkhorse Press, a Mississippi news outlet, on Oct. 20 included a clip of Foster and another officer talking outside the hospital where Kohen was pronounced dead. In that video, which starts about 20 minutes after the shooting, Foster asks whether the 1-year-old had been hit, saying, “I didn’t even see a baby in her lap,” adding an expletive. That clip was not included in the footage released by the state Thursday. 

Foster was placed on administrative leave by the Senatobia Board of Aldermen on June 16, two days after the incident. He resigned last Wednesday.

Watch the compilation of the footage released by the Mississippi Department of Public Safety here:

This article was originally published by Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Source: Original Article