Dashcam Footage Shows Officer Kill Philando Castile

The footage was made public Tuesday
By Michael Harthorne,  Newser Staff
Posted Jun 20, 2017 6:13 PM CDT

“Sir, I have to tell you that I do have a firearm on me," Philando Castile tells Officer Jeronimo Yanez seconds before he is shot multiple times. Police dashcam footage of Castile's death that was shown during Yanez's manslaughter trial was released to the public Tuesday, the Washington Post reports. The video (Warning: graphic content) shows the interaction between Yanez and Castile was calm for about 30 seconds until Castile—who had a permit to carry a firearm—told Yanez he was armed. In response to Castile's declaration, Yanez yelled, "Don't pull it out," according to the Atlantic. Both Castile and girlfriend Diamond Reynolds in the backseat said he wasn't. Within seven seconds of learning Castile had a gun, Yanez had opened fire.

In the aftermath of the shooting, Reynolds is heard calmly speaking to Yanez while he yells expletives and calls for backup. “He had an unreasonable fear of Philando Castile as a black man, which caused him to overreact ... which resulted in the death of Philando Castile,” a civil rights attorney tells the Star Tribune after watching the dashcam footage. The footage was shown to jurors during the trial and reportedly again upon request during deliberation. Yanez, who testified he thought he was going to die, was acquitted of manslaughter. "It raises the question: How will you ever get a guilty verdict?” the president of the African-American Leadership Council says. (More Philando Castile stories.)

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