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Source: Federico Candoni / EyeEm / Getty

In a video released Monday, Danquirs Franklin appeared to be placing a gun on the ground at the time a Charlotte-Mecklenburg police officer fatally shot him last month.

Per The Charlotte Observer, CMPD released body-worn camera footage of the March 25 confrontation between Franklin and Officer Wende Kerl. Kerl shot and killed Franklin in the parking lot of a west Charlotte area Burger King. The body cam footage shows that she and another officer instructed Franklin to put the gun down more than 15 times in the roughly 40 seconds before he was shot.

The gun is not visible during that span of the video.

Franklin appeared to have pulled out the gun and was holding it, though he was not pointing it at anyone before Kerl fired her gun.

The 27-year-old Franklin is shown squatting next to an open car door. Another man sits in the passenger seat and Kerl is standing less than a car-length away from Franklin. The male officer yells at him to put the gun down and Kerl yells at Franklin as well. Moments later, Kerl fires two shots, killing Franklin.
Moments after he’s shot, he turns his face toward the officers and told them, “You told me to…”
The video cuts out as he slumps over. It is all the body camera footage that was recorded at the shooting.
According to 911 calls, two women called and said they saw a man with a gun at the Burger King.
“A customer came up here and he walked behind the counter to fight an employee,” said the first 911 caller, who was inside the restaurant. “He got a gun! He got a gun!” she said, adding that he was pointing it at employees.
It is unclear if this latest officer-involved shooting will evoke memories of the violent protests of 2016 after the killing of Keith Lamont Scott and how no charges were filed against the officer involved. However, community activists are cautious.
“It’s sad it had to take the city being afraid of another uprising for them to really hear us,” Kass Ottley told The Observer. “The reception was really different. It’s a tiny step. There’s so much to get done and we’re running out of time.”

Body Cam Footage Shows CMPD Officer Shooting, Killing Danquirs Franklin  was originally published on 1053rnb.com