A Louisville cop involved in the fatal shooting of a black man during the city’s George Floyd protests had earlier mocked a different protester on Facebook, celebrating the moment she was shot by pepper balls.
Officer Katie Crews, of the Louisville Metro Police Department, was placed on administrative assignment on Monday after she and another officer were confirmed to have been involved in the fatal shooting of 53-year-old business owner, David McAtee.
The department’s police chief, Steve Conrad, was fired the same day after it was discovered Crews and the other officer, Austin Allen, had their body cameras switched off during incident.
A post from Crews’ Facebook page last Thursday has since surfaced on social media, showing that days before the shooting she had uploaded a picture of herself policing the riots, laughing at the moment a protestor was injured by her fellow officers.
‘I hope the pepper balls that she got lit up with a little later on hurt,’ Crews wrote.
Officer Katie Crews, of the Louisville Metro Police Department, was placed on administrative assignment on Monday after she and another officer were confirmed to have been involved in the fatal shooting of 53-year-old business owner, David McAtee.
A post from Crews’ Facebook page show that days before the shooting she had uploaded a picture of herself policing the riots, laughing at the moment a protestor was injured by her fellow officers
In the photograph, taken by the Courier Journal, an older woman is seen attempted to hand Crews flowers in an apparent gesture of peace, while the officer stares back at her, stone-faced, with her hands on her hips.
‘She was saying and doing a lot more than “offering flowers” to me. Just so for it to be known,’ Crews claimed. ‘For anyone that knows me and knows that facial expression tells everything.’
After remarking about the pepper balls, Crews ended the post by taunting the woman, saying: ‘Come back and get ya some more ole girl, I’ll be on the line again tonight.’
Crews joined the Louisville Metro Police Department in 2018 and does not have any disciplinary records prior to the shooting of McAtee, the Courier Journal reported.
New LMPD Chief Robert Schroeder said Monday night he is aware of the post and has started a professional standards investigation into it.
Officers in the Louisville police force had been required to wear active body cameras following the death of Breonna Taylor – a 26-year-old black EMT who was killed in her home in March by Louisville police carrying out a ‘no-knock warrant’.
David McAtee was shot dead on Monday morning after Louisville officers and the National Guard ‘returned fire’ into a group gather in a parking lot, next to where McAtee’s business is located
Neither Crews nor Officer Austin Allen (right) had their body cameras switched on during the fatal shooting
On Sunday night alone more than 40 people were arrested marking the city’s fourth consecutive night of protests in Louisville
Police say that shortly after midnight on Monday, someone opened fire at officers from a parking lot at 26th and Broadway where a large number of people were gathered.
Allen and Crews, along with members from the National Guard ‘returned fire’ into the group, killing McAtee, who ran a popular barbecue stand nearby.
Police have said they don’t know if McAtee was the person who had fired at police. Allen and Crews were either not wearing or did not have their cameras activated and have been placed on administrative assignment, pending an investigation.
‘That is completely unacceptable. And there is no excuse for their clear failure to [follow] our policy,’ Acting Chief Rob Schroeder said Monday.
The death of McAtee is now under state, local and federal investigation.
Surveillance footage and police radio transmissions were released by the LMPF on Monday but didn’t provide answers in the incident. More footage from the incident will be released.
The McAtee, the owner of YAYA’s BBQ in Western Louisville with be remembered as a ‘community pillar’, his mother, Odessa Riley, has said.
‘He left a great legend behind. He was a good person. Everybody around him would say that,’ she said. ‘My son didn’t hurt nobody. He didn’t do nothing to nobody.’
McAtee’s eatery is located next to the parking lot where the shooting took place. He was known to give law enforcement free meals, to thank them for their service.
‘My son was a good son. All he did on that barbecue corner is try to make a dollar for himself and his family,’ Riley told the Courier Journal. ‘And they come along and they killed my son.’
The McAtee, the owner of YAYA’s BBQ in Western Louisville with be remembered as a ‘community pillar’, his mother, Odessa Riley, has said
Louisville Metro Police Chief Steve Conrad (above) was relieved of duty by Mayor Greg Fischer on Monday after it was revealed two officers involved in the shooting death of a local business owner at George Floyd protests earlier that day did not have their bodycameras activated
Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear condemned the incident in a statement Monday morning saying: ‘LMPD and the Kentucky National Guard returned fire resulting in death’ and that he has asked the Kentucky State Police to independently investigate the shooting.
At his morning press conference Beshear called on authorities to release body camera footage and was outraged to learn there was none.
Now he hopes for cell phone or other citizen video of the confrontation to emerge.
‘I believe the people of Kentucky deserve to see it for themselves,’ he said.
Officials haven’t said if the crowd in the parking lot of Dino’s Food Mart consisted of protesters or customers. The gathering came after the 9pm curfew in Louisville.
Protests took place in Louisville over the weekend to denounce the death of black man George Floyd, who died last week after a white police officer in Minneapolis kept a knee on his neck for over eight minutes in a disturbing video that has sent shock waves across the country.
Louisville police officers had been ordered to keep their bodycams activated following the police killing of 26-year-old black EMT Breonna Taylor (above) in March during a botch drug raid
Protesters also decried the police killing of Breonna Taylor. Taylor’s family has filed a wrongful death lawsuit claiming that she and her boyfriend thought their home was being broken into when officers entered without knocking. Her boyfriend shot at officers because they didn’t identify themselves and in turn Taylor was shot eight times in her bed.
On Sunday night alone more than 40 people were arrested marking the city’s fourth consecutive night of protests in Louisville.
On Thursday seven people were shot in the city during protests that took a violence turn. Officers were not involved in those shootings, Police Sgt. Lamont Washington said at the time, as per NBC.
Late Monday a crowd gathered at the parking lot in front of McAtee’s shop to mourn together. Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer arrived after 11am and was seen hugging and consoling McAtee’s mother.
‘He didn’t hurt nobody, didn’t deserve to get shot down like he did. I don’t know what happened, but whatever happened here, my brother didn’t do nothing wrong. He was an innocent person, and innocent bystander. He did not deserve this at all,’ McAtee’s sister said to Wave3.
She said that the crowd that gathered wasn’t a park of Louisville protests and that this group gathered every Sunday night for food and music and her brother always served food as his restaurant was next door to Dino’s Food Mart.