BATON ROUGE, Louisiana—The cop who killed Alton Sterling called him a “stupid motherfucker” after shooting him six times at point-blank range, videos released Friday show.
Officer Blane Salamoni was fired and officer Howie Lake was suspended for three days, Baton Rogue police chief Murphy Paul said Friday. The Louisiana Attorney General’s Office declined to charge the officers this week, following the same decision by the Justice Department in 2017.
“These actions were not minor deviations from policy as they contribute to the outcome that resulted in the death of another human being,” Paul said.
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“Unreasonable fear within an officer is dangerous,” the police chief said. “Rather, an officer needs to respond with the awareness of the situation and the ability to effectively and rationally evaluate the situation and an appropriate response.”
Where Lake tried to de-escalate the situation, Paul said, Salamoni unnecessarily escalated it.
Salamoni and Lake arrived at the Triple S convenience store shortly after midnight on July 5, 2016. They were responding to a 911 call that said Sterling had brandished a weapon at someone while selling bootleg CDs.
The officers immediately engaged Sterling, escalating the situation. Salamoni pointed his gun at Sterling’s head.
“Don’t fucking move, I’ll shoot yo fucking ass, bitch,” Salamoni immediately screamed at him, as heard on body camera footage released by the department.
“Put your hands on the car or ima shoot you in yo fucking head, you understand?” His gun was inches from the side of Sterling’s head.
“Alright man, hold up, you hurt my arm,” Sterling told him.
After struggling with Sterling, they used an electric stun weapon on him unsuccessfully.
“Pop him again, Howie,” Salamoni yelled.
Salamoni tackled Sterling, a move described as “dumb” by a use of force expert hired by the Department of Justice.
On the ground, the officers struggled to control Sterling. “He’s going for the gun,” Salamoni yelled, and then fired three shots at Sterling.
Eyewitness video of the shooting, obtained by The Daily Beast in 2016, does not show Sterling reaching for his pocket, where the gun was. After the first three shots, Sterling rolled over, and Salamoni shot him three more times in the back. At that point, Sterling stopped moving.
After he stood up, Salamoni waved his gun at Sterling’s prone body. “Stupid motherfucker,” he said, breathing heavily.
The first agency to investigate Sterling’s killing was the Department of Justice’s Office of Civil Rights. In May 2017, the department decided not to bring federal charges against either officer.
“Although Sterling’s death is tragic, the evidence does not meet these substantial evidentiary requirements” in order to be a “prosecutable violation of the federal statutes,” said a Justice Department release closing the investigation. The Justice Department had presented evidence before a grand jury, according to an inventory of evidence received from the U.S. Attorney’s office and released to The Daily Beast by the Louisiana Attorney General’s Office.
An investigation by the A.G.’s office apparently neglected to interview the eyewitness who filmed the first video.
Attorney General Jeff Landry said he couldn’t convene a grand jury because of ethical considerations. “The officers in question... were justified in their use of force,” Landry wrote. “Therefore, the State cannot bring this matter before a Grand Jury to seek a Bill of Indictment.”
The summer Sterling was killed saw waves of protests against police across the country following his death and that of Philado Castile, a black man in Minnesota shot by a police officer who saw a gun on his person—which Castile was licensed to carry and was not brandishing.
In Baton Rouge, police responded to the protests by marshalling hundreds of officers in riot gear with armored vehicles and sound cannons. They arrested journalists and then, during one large protest in the city’s Beauregard Town neighborhood, pushed protesters into the street, then arrested hundreds of them for being in the street.
In October 2017, the police department and sheriff’s office settled a class action lawsuit by activist DeRay McKesson, and other protestors who had been arrested, agreeing to pay $136,000 and expunge their arrest records at no cost.
