Because state law prohibits footage that depicts a juvenile engaging in a “delinquent act,” police are refusing to share body camera video of three Des Moines officers fatally shooting a 16-year-old boy during a domestic disturbance last month.
According to The Des Moines Register, the city’s legal department intervened just as the police department was about to release the video from all four of the officers engaged in the confrontation on December 26. The youngster repeatedly brandished a gun at the officers, and the state attorney general’s office has determined that the shooting was legal. The boy’s identity has not been made public.
According to Sgt. Paul Parizek, a spokesman for the Des Moines Officers, the city attorneys informed the police that the publication of the videos was prohibited by state law. In accordance with the legislation, records or footage regarding a minor allegedly committing a crime cannot be released by the police prior to the filing of a complaint, according to Parizek.
Even though the youngster was dead and no charges will be filed, he said that the law still applies in this instance. The Register declared that it would keep fighting in court for the videos’ release.
While the department investigates the shooting, all three of the officers who fired on the boy—Noah Bollinger, Zachary Duitscher, and Thomas Garcie—remain on administrative leave.
According to the police, the officers engaged in 4 minutes, 20 seconds of negotiations with the youngster while attempting to defuse the situation. The child was encouraged to lay down the pistol and surrender more than 70 times by the authorities and family members who were there at the flat close to the Blank Park Zoo, but he refused.
The youngster told the cops that his elder brother had just passed away and that “I want to be with my brother,” according to a report on the shooting. On November 5, the boy’s brother was tragically murdered in Glendale, a Phoenix suburb.
Three of the cops opened fire on the youngster when he raised his gun toward them, striking him 14 times in the chest, abdomen, and head.
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