The Daily Beast added more disturbing details to the Alton Sterling shooting tonight.
They are reporting that mere minutes after two Baton Rouge cops gunned Sterling down outside of a convenience store, police entered the store and removed the surveillance video. They had no warrant and the owner of the store, Abdullah Muflahi, did not consent to them removing it.
The officers have been identified as Blane Salamoni and Howie Lake, Muflahi showed reporters from the Daily Beast the cabinet where the hard drive was. They report:
"All that’s left of the storage unit is a sole barren wire. That wire went out to surveillance cameras on the front of the building. One of the cameras would have had a direct line of sight to where Sterling was standing when he was tasered, tackled, shot and killed by police."
Thankfully, these cops were caught on multiple cell phone videos, so there is little dispute as to what happened. Sterling was pinned down, unarmed, and shot at point blank range while laying on his back.
After realizing that his video had been taken, Muflahi asked for a warrant, but he was told a warrant would be provided. He says he has not yet received a warrant, over 48 hours later.
The Daily Beast did some digging and found that the police never even filed an application for a warrant, according the D.A.’s office and the court. Why file for one when you already have the evidence you want to destroy? Now the District Attorney has come up with another story - the FBI has the hard drive. Uh huh. After they tried to wipe it clean?
I would like to say that I have hopes for prosecution, or at least charges, but with the DA appearing to be in the pocket of the cops and the pathetic history of our courts prosecuting cops that slaughter unarmed black men, I am not optimistic.
