Video Evidence in Criminal Trials for Police-Involved Shootings: A Sociology of Perception

• In Event: 1555 - Section on Science, Knowledge, and Technology Refereed Roundtables (1 hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: 8. Toward a Sociology of Visibility

Abstract

The police-involved shooting of Walter Scott by Officer Michael Slager was captured on bystander cell phone video April 4th, 2015. The video was a fundamental piece of evidence in Slager’s ensuing criminal trial for Murder. One action in particular captured on video drew attention both in the media and in court; after shooting Scott, Slager dropped his Taser conductive energy weapon next to Scott’s body, a move that was widely interpreted as an attempt to “plant” it as if on Scott’s body at the time Slager shot him. This presentation seeks to explore the use of the “planting” narrative in the criminal trial – a narrative that is only implicitly referred to, and yet one that formed a crescendo point in the cross-examination of Slager by prosecutor Bruce DuRant. I argue it is a mistake to think prosecutors are themselves accusing Slager of “planting” the weapon, but instead use the ambiguous “planting” narrative as a way of implicating Slager’s own perception of his guilt at the time of the incident. I then consider how such interpretive flexibility in understanding the significance of actions re-presented in video poses a challenge to in both legal settings and video as data for (qualitative) sociological research.

Author

• Patrick G. Watson, Wilfrid Laurier University