AURORA, Colo. — New video released to the public Monday does little to answer any questions about the moments before Aurora police officers shot and killed 14-year-old Jor'Dell Richardson.
Police have previously said Richardson reached for a gun after being tackled by police officers. Body camera video doesn’t show that happening, though you can hear officers yelling about the gun. The new surveillance video just put out to the public isn’t clear either.
The video shows officers arrive at a strip mall on June 1 in an unmarked truck with police lights. Immediately, they begin chasing a group of teenagers who’d just attempted a robbery of a convenience store.
The boy in the white, we’d later learn, is Richardson.
He runs from police to the back alley. He’s tackled by two officers and looks to be on his back. You can see his arms moving, but it’s hard to tell exactly what’s happening.
The Aurora Police Department has previously said that he's reaching for a gun. Watching this video, it’s impossible to see.
What we do know is police shot and killed Richardson in this alley. He was carrying a pellet gun, but not a semi-automatic gun as was originally reported by police.
In body camera video previously released, officers can be heard yelling, "Gun, gun, let go of the f***ing gun. I'm going to shoot you."
Seconds later, Richardson is killed.
"At no time, in no frame, does the video depict -- the surveillance video of the alley -- does it depict Jor’Dell with his hands on the pellet gun," said Edward Hopkins, an attorney representing Jor'Dell's family. "You do not see in that surveillance video any pellet gun. At no time."
Attorneys for Richardson's family say the new video shows officers were not justified in killing him.
"When you say that he is reaching for a gun, one of the best things that you can do is circle in the video where that gun is. They will not be able to do that because you will not see a gun," Hopkins said. "All you can see in the surveillance video is him having one hand free. There’s no gun that it appears he could’ve accessed if he wanted to."
Aurora police aren’t answering questions about this case. The department only released the video Monday because they said they’re required to under state law. APD will not go on the record to say whether the surveillance video supports its claim that officers saw Richardson reaching for a gun.
The chief of police has previously said his officers thought Richardson was armed and could kill them.
"These officers did not have the opportunity to assess threats and to go frame by frame," Chief Art Acevedo said at a news conference in early June, shortly after the shooting. "They didn't have an opportunity to back up, they didn't have an opportunity to do any of that. It happened real time."
For eight days following the shooting, Acevedo told the public that Richardson had a semi-automatic weapon when he was shot. He then corrected that to say it was a pellet gun.
Acevedo blamed the major misunderstanding on communications issues and that he was never told the information until he asked for it, according to an interview with the Aurora Sentinel.
The department said that wouldn’t have made a difference in the officer’s decision to fire their weapon because the pellet gun looked so much like a real gun.
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