A 46-minute body camera video from the 2019 fatal interaction between Ronald Greene and state troopers as they drag him and stunned him during a car chase was made public by Louisiana officials on Friday.
Despite ongoing investigations, the state police disclosed all body cam footage associated with Greene’s arrest two years after Greene passed away and under increasing public criticism. Democratic governor John Bel Edwards reversed course and said he “strongly supported” the publication, describing the footage as “disturbing and difficult to watch.”
On May 10, 2019, a fatal incident over an unidentified traffic infraction escalated into a high-speed chase. Initially, authorities informed Green’s family that he had died after colliding with a tree. He passed away en route to the hospital, according to the state police.
“They murdered him. It was set out, it was planned,” Greene’s mother, Mona Hardin, said Wednesday. “He didn’t have a chance. Ronnie didn’t have a chance. He wasn’t going to live to tell about it.”
In the video, troopers rush Greene’s car outside of Monroe, Louisiana, as seen from the perspective of Trooper Dakota Demoss. He tried to raise his hands inside the car and they appeared to deploy a stun gun on him.
“I’m your brother! I’m scared! I’m scared!” Greene tells the officers.
As they wrestle him to the ground, one officer is heard calling Greene a “stupid motherf——.”
“Look, you’re going to get it again if you don’t put your f——- hands behind your back!” a trooper tells him, according to the video.
According to reports, Greene is briefly being pulled by trooper Kory York.
“I hope this guy ain’t got f—— AIDS,” one trooper can be heard saying as he lies face down on the ground while others wash their hands of the blood.
In a different video obtained by The Associated Press, Master Trooper Chris Hollingsworth, who later passed away in a single-vehicle accident shortly after learning he would be dismissed for the arrest, is said to have acknowledged to pounding Greene “ever-living f— out.”
“Choked him and everything else trying to get him under control,” he is allegedly heard saying. “He was spitting blood everywhere, and all of a sudden he just went limp.”
According to reports, Greene had alcohol and cocaine in his bloodstream when he passed away. He suffered head wounds, a broken breastbone, and a ruptured aorta, according to the report.
An investigation into the matter’s civil rights has been opened by the Justice Department.
Col. Lamar Davis, the superintendent of the State Police, who was not in charge at the time of Greene’s murder, declined to comment on the actions of the participating troopers or whether he thought they need to be charged. Although he claimed to have communicated with Greene’s family, he nonetheless expressed his sympathies and added, “I can feel their pain and feel it in my heart.”
“The officers who are subject to these investigations are afforded due process,” Davis said. “You have my commitment that we will follow the facts and hold our personnel accountable.”
The troopers who made the arrest have received punishment for prior offences. According to WFAB-TV, York received a 50-hour suspension for his treatment of inmates and turning off his body camera. DeMoss was detained earlier this year in connection with a purportedly unrelated use of force accusation from the previous year.
He is still on leave while the case is being investigated.
