A video that captured the brutal arrest of a Black college student pulled from his car and beaten by officers in Florida h
as led to an investigation and calls for motorists to consider protecting themselves by placing a camera inside their vehicles.
William McNeil Jr. captured his February traffic stop on his cellphone camera, which was mounted above his dashboard. It offered a unique view, providin
g the only clear footage of the violence by officers, including punches to his head that can’t clearly be seen in officer body camera footage released by the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office.
Since McNeil had the foresight to record the encounter from inside the vehicle, “we got to see firsthand and hear firsthand and put it all in context what dri
ving while Black is in America,” said civil rights attorney Ben Crump, one of several lawyers advising McNeil.
“All the young people should be recording these interactions with law enforcement,” Crump said. Because what i
t tells us, just like with George Floyd, if we don’t record the video, we can see what they put in the police report with George Floyd before they realized the video existed.”
McNeil was pulled over that day because officers said his headlights should have been on due to bad weather, his lawyers said. His camera shows him asking th
e officers what he did wrong. Seconds later, an officer smashes his window, strikes him as he sat in the driver’s seat and then pulls him from the car and punches him in the
head. After being knocked to the ground, McNeil was punched six more times in his right thigh, a police report states.
The incident reports don’t describe the officer punching McNeil in the head. The officer, who pulled McNeil over and then struck him, described the force this w
Watch More Image Part 2 >>>
ay in his report: “Physical force was applied to the suspect and he was taken to the ground.”
But after McNeil posted his video online last month and it went viral, the sheriff’s office launched an internal investigation, which is ongoing. A sheri
ff’s office spokesperson declined to comment about the case this week, citing pending litigation, though no lawsuit has been filed over the arrest.
McNeil said the ordeal left him traumatized, with a brain injury, a broken tooth and several stiches in his lip. His attorneys accused the sheriff’s office of trying to cover up what really happened.