HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — A Pennsylvania prosecutor plans to make public a video of a police officer fatally shooting an unarmed man in the back as he lay face down.
District Attorney Ed Marsico notified a judge in Harrisburg on Friday that he will release the video Wednesday unless the judge intervenes.
Police say the video from the stun gun of Hummelstown Police Officer Lisa Mearkle shows her shooting 59-year-old David Kassick twice after a Feb. 2 chase that began over expired inspection and emissions stickers.
The judge had previously been asked by defense lawyers to block the video’s release. But the judge held up taking action until prosecutors said they planned to make it public.
Mearkle is charged with criminal homicide and is on unpaid leave. Her lawyers say she acted in self-defense.
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The only way this all stops is for new rules regulating when a cop can discharge his weapon…the old-tried-and-true-cover-it-up excuse of " I feared for my life" bullshit needs to end. My recommendation would be this one time…“when you are drawn on then may you return deadly fire…all other times you will find non lethal methods” No killing over screw drivers, Skittles, skateboards, etc etc etc…“only when a gun is being drawn shall you draw in return”…that’s how the rest of the western world deals with this. I just don’t understand why killing someone is the first option, not the last. Yes, you pull a gun out on a cop and get shot then you got what you deserved…but no other time does a person deserve to be killed, tased or bean bagged, yes, but not killed. And how does a cop shoot someone in the back 3 times and claim self defense when you have a gun and they dont?
Of course they did.
How about some proportionality to the offense? Police are supposed to be trained to defuse a situation, but day after day we’re seeing capital punishment for expired stickers, a non-working headlamp, a bench warrant for delinquent child support, and small-bore traffic violations by bicyclists.
You obviously haven’t seen the latest kung-fu films, where people restrained face down magically flip up off the ground, spin around in mid air, and administer a lethal strike to their captors.
Wait - she had her stun gun out as well and didn’t use that instead? W. T. F.?