Anger over Sandra
Bland's death in a Texas jail has
boiled over after newly released video showed what happened at the traffic stop
that led to her arrest.
Now, many
question whether she should have been arrested at all.
The dashcam
video shows Texas state Trooper Brian Encinia pulling Bland over July 10 for
allegedly failing to use her turn signal. What started as normal conversation
gets testy after Encinia asks her to put out her cigarette.
"I am in my
car. I don't have to put out my cigarette," Bland says.
"You can
step on out now," Encinia replies.
Bland refuses to
get out of her car, and the trooper opens her door and starts trying to pull
her out of the vehicle.
What happens
after that has ignited a debate about what the officer could have done versus
what he should have done.
'For a failure to signal?'
In the video, Encinia tells Bland she is
under arrest. She repeatedly asks why, but the trooper does not answer, other
than to say, "I am giving you a lawful order."
They argue, then Encinia pulls what appears to be his Taser and
points it at Bland.
He screams:
"Get out of the car! I will light you up! Get out! Now!"
Bland then exits
the car of her own accord, saying: "Wow, really, for a failure to signal?
You're doing all of this for a failure to signal?"
Much of what
happens next is not seen on camera, but the officer can be heard saying Bland
is not compliant.
"When you
pull away from me, you're resisting arrest," Encinia says.
A clearly upset
Bland can be heard saying: "You're a real man now. You just slammed me,
knocked my head in the ground. I got epilepsy you mother******."
"Good,"
he replies.
A female officer
tells Bland she should have thought about that before she started resisting.
What's the legality here?
Technically, a driver can get arrested
in Texas for simply failing to use a turn signal.
In the video,
Encinia tells Bland he intended to give her a warning -- until she failed to
comply with orders and repeatedly cursed at the trooper.
"You were getting a warning ... until now," Encinia
says. "You're going to jail."
CNN law
enforcement analyst Harry Houck said the trooper did have the right to ask
Bland to get out of the car and then try to pull her out of the vehicle.
"The fact
is an officer can make an arrest anytime ... you run a red light, parking
ticket, anything like that," Houck said. "What he did was he notices
she was agitated."
But Houck, a
retired New York Police Department detective, said the video concerned him.
"The one
problem I have was just that he told her to get out of the car because she
wouldn't stop smoking."
CNN legal
analyst Sunny Hostin said she advises people that "when you have a police
encounter, you want to make it as short and sweet as possible."
"But I
don't think that he had the right to ask her to get out of the car because not
putting out your cigarette is not cause for an arrest."
Texas Department
of Public Safety Director Steven McCraw said Encinia has been taken off the
street and has been assigned administrative duties pending the outcome of an
investigation.
"We have
certain procedures in place, and he did not comply with those procedures,"
McCraw said. "One of the many procedures is letting the individual know in
terms of what actions are going to be taken."
The director
also said, "A DPS state trooper has an obligation to exhibit professionalism
and be courteous throughout the entire contact, and that wasn't the case in
this situation."
What's the response?
Emotions ran high as people across the
country watched the video.
"Just
watched about 20 minutes of Sandra Bland's traffic stop," one person
tweeted. "(I don't know) if I've ever been so heated. I can feel my blood
boiling."
Just watched about 20 minutes of Sandra Bland's traffic stop. Idk if I've ever
been so heated. I can feel my blood boiling.
— Captain Africa (@See_Say_92) July 22, 2015
"Half of my
family (including my mother) works in law enforcement," Ashley C. Ford
tweeted. "I am well aware of my rights. Sandra Bland should've never been
arrested."
Half of my family (including my mother) works in law enforcement. I am well
aware of my rights. Sandra Bland should've never been arrested.
— Ashley C. Ford (@iSmashFizzle) July 22, 2015
Encinia has not
spoken out publicly about the incident. But he gave his account in his arrest
warrant affidavit, as reported by CNN affiliate KPRC-TV in Houston.
The trooper
wrote that Bland became "combative and uncooperative" and that she
was placed in handcuffs "for officer safety."
"Bland
began swinging her elbows at me and then kicked my right leg in the shin,"
Encinia said. "I had a pain in my right leg and suffered small cuts on my
right hand. Force was used to subdue Bland to the ground to which Bland
continued to fight back."
Encinia also
wrote that Bland "was placed under arrest for Assault on a Public
Servant."
Why problems with video?
The Texas Department of Public Safety
released almost an hour of dashcam video. But in parts of the footage, the
video is looped while the officer's audio continues uninterrupted.
For example,
there are moments when a car or wrecker driver appears in the frame, suddenly
disappears and then appears once again.
But the video of
the traffic stop was not edited, according to Texas Department of Public Safety
public information officer Tom Vinger. "There was a technical issue during
posting later in the video, and we are working to correct," Vinger said
Wednesday.
Murder or suicide?
While the video of Bland's arrest may be
startling, it still doesn't explain how she died in jail three days later.
According to the Waller County Sheriff's Office, Bland was found
"in her cell not breathing from what appears to be self-inflicted
asphyxiation." She received CPR, and an ambulance came, but she was
pronounced dead a short time later.
Authorities said
Bland apparently hanged herself with a trash bag from a metal barrier that
separated the bathroom from the rest of the cell.
There were no
cameras inside her cell, but cameras in the hallway showed no one entering or
leaving before the discovery of her body.
Bland's
relatives said they don't believe the 28-year-old would have killed herself.
They said she had just moved to Texas and looked forward to her new job as a
student ambassador to the alumni association at Prairie View A&M
University, her alma mater.
Waller County
District Attorney Elton Mathis promised a through and exhaustive review of the
case, which will be presented to a grand jury.
"It has not
been determined at this point that this was a murder. This investigation is
being conducted as a murder investigation would," Mathis said.
"Whatever the ultimate determination may be, whether that's a suicide or a
homicide, that will ultimately be decided by a grand jury."
Mathis said Bland's family had made "valid points that she
did have a lot of things going on in her life that were good."
But
investigators were examining online videos posted by Bland in March in which
she talked about battling depression and post-traumatic stress disorder,
according to Mathis.
Sharon Cooper
said her sister hadn't been diagnosed with either depression or PTSD and that
her video message was intended to be inspirational to people feeling the same
way.
The Texas
Rangers and the FBI are also investigating Bland's death.
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