Tulsa police key claim challenged
Lawyer: Victim didn't reach into vehicle
A day after police in Oklahoma released video that shows a white Tulsa police officer fatally shooting an unarmed black man, attorneys representing the slain man's family released photos that contradict a key claim in authorities' version of events.
At a news conference Tuesday afternoon, civil rights lawyer Benjamin Crump said Terence Crutcher never reached his hands into the driver's side window of his stalled sport utility vehicle before he was shot by police.
Crutcher couldn't have reached into the vehicle, Crump said, because enhanced photos of the vehicle taken from police video show that the window was rolled up.
If confirmed by police, the admission would eliminate one of the chief justifications for police using deadly force against Crutcher.
The release of the photos came on the same day that a police official told the Tulsa World that officers discovered PCP in Crutcher's vehicle.
Tulsa homicide Sgt. Dave Walker declined to say where the drug was found in the vehicle or if investigators had confirmed whether Crutcher was intoxicated during his interaction with police.
Crump said reports linking Crutcher to drugs were an attempt to “intellectually justify" Crutcher's death. Holding up several large images taken from the video of the shooting, Crump told reporters, “when you look at this video — we have technicians that have enhanced the video and stopped the video — you can see clearly that the window is up and there's a streak of blood on the window,” he said. “How could he be reaching into the car if the window is up and there is blood on the glass?”
Police have said responding officers thought Crutcher reached his hand into the vehicle moments before officers shot the 40-year-old father. The claim was repeated by attorney Scott Wood, who is representing Betty Shelby, the white Tulsa police officer who fatally shot Crutcher.
Crump's claims arrived a day after police released video that shows Shelby fatally shooting Crutcher.
“It's very difficult to watch,” Police Chief Chuck Jordan said Monday.
Jordan said investigators never found a weapon on Crutcher or in his vehicle after he was killed Friday as he stood beside his SUV.
U.S. Attorney Danny Williams announced that the Justice Department has opened an independent investigation of the shooting.
The footage is the latest in a series of controversial videos showing white police officers fatally shooting unarmed black men. Crutcher is one of at least 697 people — 172 of them black men — who have been fatally shot by police officers this year, according to a Washington Post database tracking police shootings.
Tiffany Crutcher, the slain man's twin sister, appealed for peace. “Just know that our voices will be heard,” she said, according to the Tulsa World. Noting that “the video will speak for itself,” she added: “Let's protest. Let's do what we have to do, but let's just make sure that we do it peacefully.”
Wood, Shelby's attorney, told the Tulsa World that Shelby opened fire and another officer used a stun gun when Crutcher's “left hand goes through the car window.”
Wood said that when his client arrived at the scene, several minutes before the camera footage begins, she found Crutcher's vehicle in the middle of the road with the engine on and the doors open.
Shelby thought Crutcher was behaving like someone under the possible influence of PCP, Wood told the World, noting that Crutcher ignored the officer's commands to stop reaching into his pockets. Shelby feared Crutcher might have a gun in his pocket, Wood added.
Shelby, he said, had checked the driver's side of the SUV when Crutcher approached her. At that point, the attorney said, a backup officer arrived and drew his stun gun. Wood said the stun gun and service weapon were fired simultaneously.
Police told the Associated Press that Shelby had a stun gun when she shot Crutcher but did not use it.
The Crutcher family and their attorneys were particularly angered by audio recordings of the responding officers, in which one describes Crutcher as a “bad dude.”
“That big bad dude was a father,” Tiffany Crutcher said, “that big bad dude was a son, that big bad dude was enrolled at Tulsa Community College just wanting to make us all proud.”