Managing Editor
I can’t pinpoint exactly when it started, but sometime this summer my wife Nancy hooked me on watching YouTube videos of arrests from around the country captured on police bodycams.
There are drivers who try to evade arrest by pulling away from traffic stops and then taking officers on high-speed chases. There are some women frequently described in these videos as “Karens” who shout and scream and resist and obstruct being arrested.
I’ve seen arrest videos on YouTube from as recently as two weeks ago and some even have a former police officer who narrates or explains why an officer takes specific actions when investigating criminal offenses and situations.
Many of these videos share one thing in common – drivers suspected of drunk driving. Once pulled over, the investigating officer will ask a driver for his or her driver’s license, vehicle registration and proof of insurance. Inevitably, the suspected driver will not have any of that and tells the officer that with slurred speech, glassy eyes or the inability to stand, let alone drive a motor vehicle.
Here is a sampling of some of my all-time bodycam arrest favorite videos that I have watched so far:
The owner of a self-serve car wash in Florida called police at 1 a.m. to report that a woman had been sitting in her SUV in the car wash parking lot since 7 p.m. and he found that behavior to be suspicious. Even though the car wash was open 24 hours, he thought she was using drugs there and asked police if they could investigate and get her to leave his property. He said he had video security footage of her being there that long.
Arriving at the scene, officers approached the woman’s car, and she was speaking with someone on her cell phone and ignored them. They banged on her car window until she rolled it down and instructed them to stop and go away. When one of the officers asked what she was doing there and told her that the car wash owner wanted her to leave, she refused, saying she hadn’t done anything wrong. She rolled up her window and ignored police asking for her identification and to get out of her car to talk to her.
Eventually, the police smashed her window and dragged her out of her car but before that happened she said she didn’t believe the officers in uniform were real police. She demanded to speak to a supervisor and a sergeant and as she was being handcuffed, she repeatedly asked why she was being arrested. The officer told her she was arrested for trespassing because she did not leave when instructed to by police.
Another weird incident was caught on bodycam video in Florida and involved a van, a topless woman, a medical student from Jamaica and barking sounds coming from the van during the arrest. Apparently, a homeless woman who lived in her van had stopped to pick up the medical student who was hitchhiking. All the seats in the van had been removed except for the driver’s seat. On the floor on the back of the van was a large mattress in which the woman had tied up the college student at gunpoint and made him lie there.
Officers had observed the woman speeding and swerving all over the roadway and chased her for miles. Her tires became flat when she ran over police stop sticks, but she kept right on going until one of her rims crumbled. She refused to get out of the van and started throwing mountains of trash out the van’s passenger door. She allowed the college student to exit the van and then started making loud noises sounding like a barking dog and then a clucking chicken.
She eventually threw her gun out the window and tried to run away to escape but was wrestled to the ground by officers. She wasn’t wearing a shirt and had to have a towel wrapped around her before being transported to jail for kidnapping, drunk driving, assault on a police officer and resisting arrest.
I’m always amazed at how much some of these suspects do not listen to basic commands. Even though they are told time and time again what they are being charged with, many say they’ve done nothing wrong and are not under arrest.
In yet another video, a fugitive from Vermont was living with seven other people in a Florida home. She had an outstanding warrant for theft and officers pulled her over for matching a woman who had stolen from a smoke shop a block away. When placed in handcuffs, she bolted and tried to run away but was captured. She told police she was seven months pregnant and started to cry and asked why she was being arrested. The woman denied having a warrant for her arrest and that she didn’t want to have a baby in jail.
These videos are like watching a trainwreck but you can’t look away.<
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