Rochester police in New York on Thursday released extensive camera footage of the incident late last month, in which police sprayed a 9-year-old girl with pepper.
In the images, representing the police posted on YouTube, some of the nine officers who responded to one Calling “ family troubles, ” you can hear the girl threatening as they struggle to get her into the back of a police car.
“Listen to me – you will be sprayed if you don’t come in,” says an officer according to the footage.
“Get in the car,” says another. “I’m done telling you.”
“I’m going to give you pepper spray, and I don’t want that,” says an officer. “So sit back.”
“Please don’t,” says the girl.
One of the cops eventually sprays the girl and closes the door as the girl screams, “My eye is bleeding!”
“Officer,” she says between sobs to a female officer in the front of the car, “please don’t do this to me.”
The officer then replies, “You did it to yourself, honey.”
The 90-minute footage, significantly longer than the 11-minute video released shortly after the incident, came as part of the city’s commitment to “be transparent and share all information and video about this incident,” Rochester Mayor Lovely Warren (D) said.
“I continue to share our community’s outrage over the treatment of this child,” Warren added The New York Times
Deputy Police Chief Andre Anderson said at a press conference When the first images were released from police, officers were told that the girl “indicated that she wanted to kill herself and that she wanted to kill her mother.”
Anderson added that the girl then ran away from home and was chased by an officer. Cops then tried to get the girl into a police car for several minutes, while the girl refused, called her father, struggled, and at one point kicked off an officer’s camera before another sprayed her with pepper.
Anderson said at the time that the child was taken to Rochester General Hospital and later released.
The incident quickly went viral and caused widespread outrage, with many claiming that police had falsely used violence against a minor.
Warren confirmed to The Hill earlier this month that multiple agents were involved in the incident was suspendedThe suspensions would apply immediately and will in any case continue during an internal police investigation.
Elba Pope, the girl’s mother, said days later that officers ignored her during the incident when she told them her daughter was having a mental health crisis.
Pope lawyers have filed a formal notice of intent to sue the city for “emotional distress, assault, destruction, excessive violence, false arrest, false incarceration,” according to The Washington Post.