Louisville police release body cam video: 'He's down! Get the officer!"

I can’t imagine what it’s like to have your worst possible day at work scrutinized by the whole world but that’s basically what this is. And as you’ll see in the longer video below, police also recognize it as a brave and heroic day at work for these officers who ran toward the gunshots at the very real risk of their own lives.

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There are two body cam videos that were released today. The first is from trainee officer Wilt and the second is from his training officer Galloway. Wilt and Galloway arrived at the scene in a marked car and were immediately fired on by the suspect. They backed the car up and then Galloway went to the trunk to retrieve his rifle while Wilt covered him.

The front lobby of the building had stairs that were about 4-5 feet tall outside. Galloway led the way up the stairs with Wilt following but because of the reflections on the glass, neither officer could see inside. However, the suspect could see out and he fired several shots at them, one of which hit Wilt in the head. Wilt went down and Galloway tumbled and then scrambled down the steps. Galloway realized Wilt had been hit but because of the glass, he still could not see where the suspect was inside the lobby. He waited for three long minutes until backup arrived. Another group of officers tried to get to officer Wilt and were fired upon by the suspect.

However, that was where the suspect made a fatal mistake. He fired through the glass at the approaching officers and at that point, officer Galloway could finally see him. He fired three shots and killed the suspect. But he wasn’t sure at first. “I think I got him down. I think he’s down,” he announced. Then he yelled, “Yank him down the stairs!” referring to officer Wilt, but it seems the other officers on the far side of the steps couldn’t hear him.

Galloway started climbing the stairs and the officers on the other side yelled to warn him, “He’s firing from inside here!”

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“I know! He’s down! Get the officer!” Galloway replied. He then entered the building and approached the suspect’s body which wasn’t moving.

Here’s the video as it was presented by the police a short time ago. This includes all the preliminary explanations plus follow up comments on each video. However, the body cam footage itself is not terribly clear because the camera is basically recording it off a television in the room. There’s a clearer, direct feed of the body cam video below. Note that police have blurred out both officer Wilt and the suspect so there’s no blood and none of the other victims are visible in either of these videos. This first clip also includes a bystander video shot from across the street.

This video is just a direct feed of the slides shown by the police plus the body cam footage. The footage starts 35 seconds into this clip.

Police also have the livestream video that the suspect posted to Instagram but for obvious reasons no portion of that is being released to the public.

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