OPINION

DANA D. KELLEY: Dash-cam microcosm

Count me among the many fans of police car dash-cams. When violent situations unfold on video, it serves as powerful evidence of both what happened and what didn't.

No verbal description can ever do justice to events as captured by the camera's cold, unblinking eye.

Sometimes it's the speed: how quickly an incident can go from normal to out of control. Other times it's the behavior: people doing things you wouldn't think they could do, or maybe anyone could do.

All times, there's the authenticity of unscripted moments and unwitting actors, giving unpredicted performances at often unanticipated times.

Last week, a local news outfit acquired a Jonesboro Police Department traffic stop dash-cam video through the Freedom of Information Act and posted it on Facebook.

It's about the length of a half-hour TV episode or newscast, with impressive interactive credentials. The latest Facebook counts listed more than 51,300 views and 1,100 comments.

The plot summary basically goes like this: A woman driving an upscale SUV is pulled over by police, and a heated argument develops at the driver's side window of her vehicle, resulting in officers pulling her from the driver's seat, without realizing the gear shift is not in "park."

After one of the officers jumps in to quickly stop the rolling vehicle, the woman is handcuffed and dragged in front of the police car (and the dash-cam). She is fully enraged, and her protests are peppered with expletives.

This doesn't become a deadly or even a dangerous incident. In the end, there are citations but everyone walks away peaceably if not happily.

Identities are unimportant, so I'm not listing them. What's most instructive about the event and its footage is the full spectrum of interpretations and reactions by the people who commented.

Everybody saw the same video. But not everyone saw the same thing.

Some, most perhaps, saw a clear-cut example of disorderly conduct and insubordination by the woman driver. She was annoyed and combative from the start, noncompliant and uncooperative.

Others saw an equally clear-cut case of police misconduct and heavy-handedness. The officers were impatient and harassing, and over-reacted by manhandling an innocent woman over a busted headlight.

It all reminded me of one of the countless quotable gems from the typewriter of H.L. Mencken: "Democracy is the art and science of running the circus from the monkey cage."

Our republic isn't technically a democracy, but we can assent to the term in its broadest sense derived from its Greek roots, which are demos (the people) -kratia (rule). I don't know whether anybody has ever equated self-government with herding cats, but if so it was a disservice to the feline species.

"We the people" is a small phrase with colossal scope, admired as an abstraction but experienced in close proximity--which, as the dash-cam microcosm luminously demonstrates, always spans multiple individual perspectives.

It's a loose piece of research, to be sure, but reading through 1,100 written reactions to a commonly viewed event constitutes something akin to a survey or focus group series.

Some of the commenters more sympathetic to the driver refer to their own experiences involving alleged police misconduct. Several hint at a "more to the story" aspect because the driver and one of the police officers evidently know each other. There are also posts accusing police of persecution because the driver is an animal-rights activist.

Most posters supportive of the officers are aghast that anyone would not immediately provide "license and registration" after several requests, and simply shocked at the disrespectful screaming fit full of f-bombs that the driver directed at the police.

Some claim the driver's activism wanders into lawlessness, with accusations of her stealing animals in the name of "rescuing" them.

Undoubtedly there is some background that precedes the dash-cam video, and there are at least two sides to every story. It's not always easy to know what to believe among the rumors, innuendo and misinformation--whether on a national stage involving powerful politicians or on a side street in Jonesboro featuring average folks.

The dash-cam footage offers one disturbing teachable moment. The officers restrain the driver's hands behind her back, but don't really search her. A few minutes into the video, her back facing the dash-cam, the driver clandestinely slips one hand out of her cuffs.

The officer doesn't see her do it.

She keeps her hands behind her back as if she is still handcuffed, and the officer is visibly startled when she suddenly gestures with her free hand. Nothing happens, thankfully. But with a different driver, under different circumstances, it could have produced a dreadfully different outcome.

The comments reveal a good deal of amusing wit, too. The police car radio is playing music the entire time, which the dash-cam speaker picks up.

"When is the soundtrack coming out?" one viewer wrote.

Bewildered over the car not being put in park when first pulled over, another wrote: "It's a traffic STOP ... not a drive-thru."

One person summed it up appropriately: "I'm new to this area, but I'm learning lots just by these posts."

Add "education on democracy" next to the advantages of dash-cams.

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Dana D. Kelley is a freelance writer from Jonesboro.

Editorial on 06/09/2017

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