Source: Aurora Police Department / YouTube/CBS News
A startling case out of Aurora, Colorado, highlights a specific type of negligence adding to the ongoing thread of pain and horror when it comes to how law enforcement interacts with Black communities.
A bodycam video from an August 27, 2019, arrest went viral on Tuesday, showing all the ways former Aurora Police Department officer Levi Huffine ignored the pleas of Shataean Kelly, a 28-year-old woman who was arrested after fighting with another woman.
Huffine admitted that he ignored Kelly because he believed she was faking based on his “15 years of transporting prisoners.”
Huffine was fired from the force in February but the video resurfaced as he fought to appeal the department’s decision during a hearing on Wednesday and Thursday, CBS News reports.
In the video Kelly pleads for help after lying face down hogtied in the back of Huffine’s vehicle. Kelly slid off the back seat and became stuck which could have proved deadly while Huffine drove unmoved. She rode in that position for 21 minutes according to CBS Denver.
“Officer please, I can’t breathe,” Kelly says. “I don’t want to die like this. I’m about to break my neck.”
Huffine argued that he was justified for hog tying Kelly because she attempted to open the car door to escape.
“I don’t want to die like this, officer. …I’m a good person I’m just under the influence,” she said, adding, “This is some slavery sh*t. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry God … It hurts so bad … Please don’t let me die back here.”
“Master, I’ll be good,” she continued.
“That is not what we’re hired to do. We are not judge, jury and executor. We are not to treat people inhumanely like they don’t matter,” Aurora Police Chief Vanessa Wilson said during the hearing, which took place over Zoom.
“[Huffine] is lucky that she did not die in the backseat of that car because he would be, in my opinion, in an orange jumpsuit right now. This is not what I expect from my officers.”
“I’m angry,” she continued. “Every time I watch this it makes me sick.”
Huffine evaded responsibility by focusing on Wilson’s assessment of his callous behavior.
“I am not the person that was painted by the chief of an officer who inhumanely treats prisoners. … It was character assassination is what I would consider it,” he said. “That is not me. I am not somebody who is out there to punish people. That is not my position. I’m out there to protect, to protect the individuals who need us the most.”
“There was no way [to see Kelly in the backseat] with the way I was positioned in the vehicle. With the way I set my vehicle up every day, it is impossible for me to see a prisoner who is in the floorboard of my vehicle,” he said.
Huffine skirted criminal charges because police believe Kelly was not physically harmed in the incident, even though she could have died from “positional asphyxia,” a term Wilson argued in the hearing.
The city dropped charges against Kelly who faced injury to property for allegedly damaging the vehicle and abusive language/threat charges.
When the hearing concludes, Aurora’s four member civil service commission will issue a written ruling either upholding the Huffine firing, or potentially giving him his job back with a lesser penalty.
Huffine’s flippant demeanor while using the hog tie method and Kelly’s “master” reference proves that the foundation of policing in the United States formed out of enforcing order upon slaves is still alive and well.
The Aurora Police Department has already faced controversy for the tragic death of Elijah McClain and issued an apology after officers drew guns on a Black family accused of stealing their own car earlier this summer.
