Berger challenges Roberts to release shooting videos

Senate Republican Leader Phil Berger ratcheted up a feud Friday with Democrat Jennifer Roberts, challenging the Charlotte mayor to release all videos of last week’s police shooting before a new law takes effect Saturday.

The new law will require anyone, including a police chief or sheriff, to obtain a court order before law-enforcement dashboard camera and body camera footage is publicly released.

The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department said Friday night it will release more than two hours of video footage of the scene where an officer fatally shot Keith Lamont Scott, a reversal from the agency’s previous stance.

Critics say that by requiring a court order, the new law will make it harder for the public to see police videos. Roberts has called for a special legislative session to repeal the law known as HB 972, passed this summer with broad bi-partisan support. By spelling out guidelines for release of police camera and video recordings, it takes the discretion away from local law enforcement officials.

But Berger and others say it provides a clear-cut avenue for their release. An analyst with the University of North Carolina's School of Government said such records currently are not public records. They would be under the new law.

Roberts declined comment before CMPD’s announcement, other than to say “I’ll respond to (Berger) in time.”

Currently, law enforcement officials, not the mayor, have the video and the power to release it.

“For 10 days, you have ignored the fact that the City of Charlotte has been the sole custodian of this footage, and that it has been entirely within the city’s discretion to release it,” Berger said in a letter to Roberts. “Since today marks your final opportunity to do the right thing of your own volition and immediately release all videos to the public.”

Berger alluded to a column Roberts wrote for the Observer.

“You wrote, ‘The lack of transparency and communication about the timing of the investigation and release of video footage was not acceptable, and we must remedy that immediately,’ ” Berger said in his letter. “If you truly believe that, it is within your power to do so – and you should release all footage immediately.”

Berger’s letter comes days after he slammed Roberts’ call for a special session to repeal the law. On Monday he said her “complete failure in leadership illustrates the exact problem the law was designed to address: helping safeguard against when politicians like Jennifer Roberts make the wrong call like refusing to release all police footage related to this incident to the public.”

That statement came out a week after Roberts and the city council declined to rescind the ordinance involving LGBT protections that led to House Bill 2, a law blamed for the loss of major sporting events, convention cancellations and lost business. Berger and GOP leaders made rescinding the ordinance a condition for the possible repeal of HB2.

Republican lawmakers have blamed the Charlotte ordinance for being the root cause of all the HB2 cancellations.

This story was originally published September 30, 2016 at 11:07 AM with the headline "Berger challenges Roberts to release shooting videos."