Ohio, US: New video shows police shooting pregnant woman accused of shoplifting
Sep 02, 2023
Ohio [US], September 2 : The Ohio police has released new footage of the incident in which a 21-year-old pregnant woman, Ta’kiya Young, was fatally shot dead by a cop after she was accused of shoplifting at a grocery store in Columbus last week, CNN reported on Friday.
CNN reported the video showed a Blendon Township police officer approaching Ta’kiya Young’s driver side window outside a Kroger Grocery Shop in Westerville, Ohio, and repeatedly telling her to get out of the car.
A second officer, who is also wearing a body camera, then steps in front of the sedan.
“They said you stole something….get out of the car,” the officer at the window is seen telling Young in the newly released video.
“I didn’t steal,” Young can be heard saying as the two argue back and forth with her window slightly ajar.
Police previously said a grocery store employee had notified officers that a woman who had stolen bottles of alcohol was in a car parked outside the store.
At one point, Young is heard saying, “You gonna shoot me?”
CNN reported, Young can then be seen turning the wheel of the car as the officer next to her window continues to urge her to exit the vehicle.
A few seconds elapse and then the officer standing in front of the hood of the car fires through the windshield.
After the shot, the officers ran alongside the car yelling at the driver to stop.
The car rolls onto a sidewalk between two brick columns and into a building.
Officers call for backup and break the window to reach the driver, who appears to be slumped over to one side.
Brian Steel, executive vice president of the Fraternal Order of Police Capital City Lodge #9, said, “A weapon is not just a firearm. A weapon is also a 2000-pound vehicle that somebody puts in gear and is driving at you.”
“I understand why it could be justified but, again, I don’t make that decision,” Steel told reporters Friday, referring to the shooting. He said he assumed the officer believed he could not get out of the way of the vehicle quickly enough, the publication reported in its report.
The woman, 21-year-old Ta’kiya Young – whose death her family called a “criminal act” and “gross misuse of power and authority” after seeing the footage – was later pronounced dead at a hospital.
