A third video recorded from a Baltimore police officer’s body-worn camera has emerged showing questionable activity by officers and has raised concerns about possible police misconduct.
Baltimore’s state’s attorney Marilyn Mosby said this latest footage was recorded in June. The video has yet to be released publicly.
She said the video was ‘self-reported’ as a re-enactment of the seizure of evidence and that she was notified of its existence this month by police, according to a press release.
This is the third body-worn camera footage to emerge that has raised concerns about possible police misconduct.
Mosby’s office said at least 43 cases involving the officers in this latest video will be dismissed as a result of this body-camera footage. In addition, about 100 criminal cases could possibly be affected by the video.
Her office also said they are investigating whether any of the officers involved are material witnesses in other ongoing cases where their testimony is essential to prosecution.
Mosby and other police officials have been contending with the fallout and criticism from two other body camera videos that were released this summer.
The second video released earlier this month by officials shows multiple officers appear to conspire together to allegedly plant evidence against Shamere Collins in November 2016.
A third video recorded from a Baltimore police officer’s body-worn camera has emerged showing showing questionable activity by officers. Pictured above is a scene from a second video from 2016 that resulted in a charges being dropped against Shamere Collins due to possible police misconduct
The footage filmed during the second instance of possible police misconduct (above) shows several police officers searching the silver colored vehicle while turning their cameras off and back on in an unexplained way
Her defense attorney Josh Insley said he believes the shocking footage of the second video shows multiple officers ‘engage in what appears to be a staged recovery of narcotics’ in his client’s vehicle, the Baltimore Sun reported.
The charges against Collins were dropped based on concerns raised by this latest video. Insley said that he will be pursuing legal action against the Baltimore Police Department.
Collins was arrested on November 29, 2016 after authorities stopped her car when they claimed to have witnessed a passenger conducting what they thought was drug deal, according to police records.
Police said they smelled marijuana after stopping the car, prompting them to begin a search of the vehicle where they recovered heroin and marijuana, the Sun reported.
Charges were then filed against 35-year-old Collins and the passenger.
‘Those drugs were not in that car when we were pulled out, the state dismissed the case against me and my attorneys are reviewing the tapes to see what steps to take next,’ Collins said in a statement.
The office of the Baltimore public defender, which represented Collins, said the video ‘appears to depict multiple officers working together to manufacture evidence,’ the Sun reported.
The office of the Baltimore public defender, which represented Shamere Collins in the case, said the video ‘appears to depict multiple officers working together to manufacture evidence.’ Above an officer opens up a bag he claims to have found in the car after the same area had already been searched
Collins’ defense attorney Josh Insley said the charges against her were dropped earlier in August based on concerns raised by this latest video (above) that was recorded on November 29, 2016
The footage, which is a series of body-camera videos, shows several police officers searching the silver colored vehicle while turning their cameras off and back on in an unexplained way.
‘When the cameras come back on one officer is seen squatting by the driver’s seat area. The group of officers then wait approximately 30 seconds,’ the public defender’s office said in a statement.
‘Shortly thereafter, another officer asks if the area by that compartment has been searched.
‘Nobody responds, and the officer reaches in and locates a bag that appears to contain drugs right by where the prior officer was, and where the car had been thoroughly searched about a half an hour prior with absolutely no results.’
The time-stamped footage was reviewed and authenticated by the police department showed that series of events, the Sun reported.
One video, which was time-stamped at 11.50pm, shows an officer searching the driver’s side and spends roughly one minute searching the area and finds nothing.
A second video, which was time-stamped at 12.20am, shows officers standing around as one asks if anyone had searched near the driver’s seat. He then begins looking and seconds later finds a bag of alleged drugs.
A third video, time stamped around 12.20am, the officer can be seen pulling a bag from the driver’s seat area, which he suggests is full of marijuana and other drugs. That video was recorded from the body camera of the officer conducting the search.
In addition, the officer who initially found the drugs was not the same one who had initially searched the driver’s side area of the car, police said.
The seven officers in the second video have not been publicly named.
Also in August, it was reported that 34 drugs and firearms cases have been dismissed in Baltimore after another video showed police officers appearing to be planting evidence.
A police officer was recorded on his own body camera confiscating what is alleged to be heroin which he then places in a tin can at an undisclosed location in January this year.
That video is filmed with a mounted body camera and shows a man said to be a police officers stopping a vehicle and demanding the driver opens the door.
‘I want what you just bought boss’,’ the officer can be heard saying to the driver.
The driver hands a small wrapped bundle to the police officer.
The footage then cuts to the officer walking near a house with two other men wearing police vests.
The camera clearly shows a small plastic bag being unwrapped and displaying several pellets of what is allegedly heroin.
He then places the bag of pellets inside a tin can and puts it down on the ground.
The drugs were later used to arrest at least one individual, local news reports.
The body camera footage was released by public defender’s office earlier this year.
The cases dismissed relied on the testimony of the three officers appearing in the video and Mosby said at a news conference Friday that her office is still reviewing dozens of other cases involving the officers.
The cases being dropped are drug- or firearm-related. That officer has had his police powers suspended. Two others shown in the video are on administrative duty.
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