SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, Jan. 12, 2016 (Gephardt Daily) -– A controversial video ─ released last Friday, purported to show the intentional and fatal shooting of a handcuffed man by a Salt Lake City police officer, has been debunked, according to the Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill.
Gill made the announcement during a Tuesday news conference, where he was joined by Salt Lake City Mayor Jackie Biskupski and Salt Lake City Police Chief Mike Brown.
Gill said the video, which was shared by multiple media outlets, had been analyzed throughout the weekend by members of his staff, as well experts at the Intermountain West Regional Computer Forensics Laboratory.
The video shows the aftermath of a fatal police shooting which claimed the life Salt Lake City resident James Barker. Barker had been confronted by Salt Lake City police officer Matthew Taylor after reports of a man acting suspiciously in the lower Avenues.
The conclusion was, Gill said, that it “does not depict criminal activity by officer (Matthew) Taylor” as many media outlets suggested.
According to Gill, the video, given to the media by former Davis County law enforcement officer William “Dub” Lawrence, had actually been seen by a detective the day of the Jan. 8, 2015 shooting, and was deemed inconsequential.
Then, in a surprise move, Gill released a second, previously unreleased video, which was shot by an witness from another angle on that same day.
That previously withheld video, also taken in the shooting’s immediate aftermath, shows officer Taylor from a different vantage point, one that Gill says exonerates the officer.
“When I match it up against this video, I can clearly see that the gun is holstered,” Gill said. “And that, pop, pop, pop, we hear on the video given to us (Friday) ─ I don’t know what that is, but I can definitely say that it’s not the fire from a service revolver.”
When asked why Salt Lake City police had failed to gather or share the videos with the DA’s office, Chief brown said, “Hindsight is 20/20. We now have rectified that situation. As we conduct investigations into the future, every bit of information ─ everything is important, and we will collect it.”
To see Tuesday’s press conference in its entirety, please click on the video player above.
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