By Virginia Bridges
The Herald-Sun, Durham, N.C.
DURHAM, NC — Police body-camera footage of a 30-year-old man shot by police shows officers struggling to handcuff the man before deploying a Taser and, seconds later, shooting him.
The footage released June 27 from the March 30 shooting begins by showing two officers on the still-dark morning encountering Ondrae Hutchinson, who was yelling in a driveway at 9 Bevel Court.
They went to the home around 5:20 a.m. after a woman called 911 to say the father of her child was damaging property inside the home and scaring her child, The News & Observer has reported.
While standing in the driveway, Hutchinson says the officers couldn’t touch him and asked why they hadn’t pulled their guns out.
“I don’t feel pain no more because I am righteous. I give, I do unto others; that I want to do. I just do it some ways wrong sometimes,” he says.
“You don’t understand that,” he says.
Hutchinson continues to yell in the driveway as Officer Jerry Lanier goes into the open garage to talk to the woman who had called 911. She is holding a baby.
Hutchinson follows and refuses to walk back outside the garage after officers ask him to do so repeatedly. Officer Elizabeth Masnik follows Hutchinson into the garage.
“Go out there and talk to her,” Lanier tells Hutchinson, pointing to Masnik, whose body-camera recorded some of the footage.
“No,” Hutchinson says. “You can’t make me.”
As Lanier and Masnik continue to ask Hutchinson to leave the interior of the garage, they attempt to handcuff him.
“Get off of me, “ Hutchsinson says. “Why y’all can’t handle me.”
The officers struggle to get handcuffs on Hutchinson for nearly two minutes.
Masnik says, “I am losing him,” followed by her yelling “no ,no, no, no” as the the struggle escalates, according to the video.
Officer Richard Jimenez and Officer Blake Mouzon come into the garage with guns drawn and find Hutchinson struggling with the other two officers.
“I will shoot you. Stop,” Jimenez yells at Hutchinson. “Let go of the gun. ... Let go or I will shoot you.”
A city report released after the shooting said Hutchinson grabbed onto Lanier’s gun with two hands.
The video shows the officers struggling to control Hutchinson’s arms and hands which at points appear near where Lanier’s gun would be, but the dark video doesn’t show Hutchinson’s hands on the gun.
Hutchinson continues to struggle with the two officers and hits Lanier in the face. Masnik deploys and hits a Hutchinson with a Taser.
The officers continue to struggle with Hutchinson over the next several seconds.
Jimenez again says “let go of the gun” just before three shots are heard on the video that is blurry from the motion at that time.
Jimenez shot Hutchinson, who was taken to Duke University Hospital, where he died.
The footage was made public after a court filing by multiple media outlets, including The N&O and The Herald-Sun.
Jimenez won’t face any charges, Durham County District Attorney Satana Deberry has said.
“The evidence from this investigation establishes that a reasonable officer in Officer Jimenez’s position would have believed that he and the other officers were in danger of imminent deadly force from Mr. Hutchinson,” Deberry wrote in a letter to Police Chief C.J. Davis, The N&O has reported.
Since 2013 there have been seven fatal police shootings involving Durham police and one fatal shooting in Durham involving the State Highway Patrol. There has been one non-fatal shooting since then involving the Durham County Sheriff’s Office.
©2019 The Herald-Sun (Durham, N.C.)