By Police1 Staff
DALLAS — Dash cam video is at the center of a controversy between a police department and a woman who was stopped while walking in her neighborhood.
Dorothy Bland, the woman that was stopped, believes the incident occurred because she is black.
Bland, who is the dean of the Frank W. and Sue Mayborn School of Journalism at the University of North Texas, wrote a column about her experience in the Dallas Morning News.
Corinth Police Chief Debra Walthall rebuttled Bland’s claims, saying the incident was a routine stop and officers were just doing their job.
The stop occurred on Oct.24 when Bland went out for a morning walk, according to the publication. Bland felt she had been racially profiled for the stop, while the department claimed several people reported Bland for dangerously walking in the roadway and stopped to insure her safety.
Dash cam footage of the encounter uploaded to YouTube garnered more than 300,000 views within three days of posting.
Chief Walthall told the Denton Record-Chronicle the two have talked to resolve the issue since Bland wrote her column.
“She said that she was ready to let this go,” Walthall told the publication. “She had said her piece in the paper, and we had a small discussion about how things could have been different if she contacted the police department first.”
Cornith police have been flooded with positive responses about the agency’s professionalism during the encounter, Walthall told the news site.
“Some people see it as racial profiling, but it’s been overwhelmingly positive,” she told the Record-Chronicle. “They thanked the officers and myself for handling it professionally.”