Brittany Busco, Mariah Rivera, Stephen Bouchard

2/25/17

Crime, Justice, & Society

Professor Charb

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 Keith Lamont-Scott Case

Keith Lamont-Scott was a 43 year old African American residing in Charlotte, North

Carolina. He appeared to be a normal man on the outside, married with seven children and had

held the position of head of mall security at the Eastridge Mall in Gastonia, NC. While he

seemed like a normal man, on the inside he was anything but normal. Scott had suffered a brain

injury after being in an accident. This accident took a toll on Scott, rendering him incapable of

communicating properly and limiting him from staying in the sun for long periods of time. This

brain injury proved to be traumatic and would eventually lead to his death.

Officer Brently Vinson is a 25 year old African American, known for being a natural

leader by his football coaches in high school. He had went to Liberty University and had studied

Criminal Justice, eventually becoming an officer for the Charlottte-Mecklenberg Police

Department. He is very well respected by those around him, whether it be fellow officers or

citizens. It would be two years into his occupation as a police officer that he would have to make

the difficult decision to shoot a man who posed a threat to him and his fellow officers. His

decision to shoot would lead to much controversy in social media.

On September 20th, 2016 before 4pm, Officer Vinson and a fellow officer were waiting in

the shade in their police vehicle for a different target. As Vinson and the other officer were

waiting outside the Village at College Downs apartment complex when Scott had pulled up

alongside them. The officers weren’t that concerned about Scott until they had noticed he

appeared to be rolling a blunt in the front seat of his car. They dismissed the act since they were

originally at the complex to find someone unrelated to Scott and had to stay on task with their

main concern.

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 A few moments after Vinson noticed Scott rolling the blunt, he saw Scott hold up a gun.

Since Scott was in possession of a gun in public, this gave the officers probable cause to arrest

Scott for the drug violation and to investigate why he had a gun with him. The officers made

sure they were being cautious when they were approaching Scott. They made sure they had all

of their equipment and had on vests that would identify themselves as police officers. The

officers drew closer to Scott, instructing him to drop the weapon and get out of the car. While

Scott complied to get out of the car, he refused to drop the gun.

Scott’s wife was at the scene, telling the officers that he was just reading a book waiting

for their son to get out of school. She filmed the whole interaction, stating that he has a

traumatic brain injury but that didn’t excuse Scott refusing to drop the gun. Scott was given

nearly ten commands to drop the gun from numerous officers. Vinson had noted that Scott’s

movements made him appear to be an “imminent physical threat” to himself and his fellow

officers. Deciding it was either Scott or him, Vinson shot at Scott four times. Officers called for

medical attention for Scott, as the gunshot wounds proved to be fatal. Before the ambulance

arrived, the officers had immobilized Scott and seized the gun from him and took notice of the

ankle holster he was wearing. Terrifying enough, the gun was loaded. While medical attention

arrived fast for Scott, he would not survive the shots.

Officer Vinson would then have to go under a two month administrative paid leave of

absence due to an investigation on whether he was justified for shooting Scott. While Scott’s

family had made previous statements on what they said Scott was doing, none of what they said

was found to be true. There was no book found at the scene, only a gun and a marijuana blunt

were recovered which appealed to Vinson’s statements on what Scott was doing at the

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apartment complex. With all of the statements and evidence collected, fifteen prosecutors had

ended up agreeing that Vinson had made a lawful split-second decision to shoot Scott. The

prosecutors made their decision based on the legal definition of what justifies the use of deadly

force for self-defense. It was declared that Vinson had acted lawfully when he had shot Scott

due to his concern for his fellow officers and the public’s safety. The evidence given to the

prosecutors also led them to believe that Scott was dangerous to those around him. Scott had

bought the gun eighteen days before the incident because “he was having problems with his

wife and her family, specifically his nephew.” There was also one bullet found in the chamber of

the cocked gun with the safety off. With his temper and impatience, Scott’s therapist said that

“something had to give.”

Given all of this information, our group feels as though we were given enough

information to give our feedback on the confrontation. Mariah has stated that her opinion of

the Keith Lamont-Scott case is that officers had acted with too much force. She believes that

they should have addressed Keith and asked what he was doing in the car, have him step out of

the vehicle and instruct him to drop the gun. But instead of shooting him since he was resisting,

they could have tased Keith or used pepper spray on him. She believes that Officer Vinson could

have acted in a different way.

Stephen had a different view on what had happened to Scott. He believes that the

shooting of Scott by Officer Vinson was that Vinson was justified in shooting Scott. Scott did

have a firearm and he refused to drop the weapon. Officer Vinson was in the right for shooting

Scott. Stephen took notice in the fact that Scott did reserve fast medical attention from officers

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and EMTs. He feels as if Vinson did not Scott, then the situation could have been a lot worse off

than what actually happened.

In Brittany’s opinion, she sided more with Stephen than with Mariah. She agrees with

Stephen in the fact that Officer Vinson was justified for shooting Scott. Scott was seen as a

threat and would not comply with the officers when they had instructed him to drop the

weapon. Being a Psychology major, Brittany understands most of the consequences a brain

injury can have on a person. Scott was definitely acted in an unusual manner due to his brain

injury but it was in a threatening manner and needed to be dealt with immediately. While

Brittany would have wanted Scott to be tased, like Mariah preferred, she felt as though since the

gun’s safety was off and a bullet was in the gun, if they had tased Scott then he could have

reacted violently. If he had reacted violently to the taser, an officer or a bystander could have

gotten injured so Brittany feels as though Vinson was in the right for shooting Scott.

Brittany had also taken the time to interview her boyfriend, a twenty year old African

American named McCoy, on his take on the confrontation. McCoy had taken some time to

reflect on the entirety of the situation and then came to the decision that he believed Vinson

was right to have shot Scott. He did not feel as though there was a Blue Lives vs Black Lives

matter at all. He believed that Officer Vinson had made a smart decision to shoot him because

other people or the officers could have gotten hurt. The reason Brittany interviewed McCoy was

to see if a fellow African American would justify Vinson’s actions or not.

After Officer Vinson was justified for shooting Scott, riots took place in Charlotte. There

was two nights of rioting, looting, and then nearly a week of demonstrations. There was over a

couple dozen of arrests and one man was even killed in uptown Charlotte due to all of the

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rioting. With all of the destruction taking place, the Governor had decided to declare a state of

emergency. This is when Brittany turned to McCoy again, wanting to know how he felt about

the uproar since our group felt as though it was unnecessary. McCoy had agreed with the group,

seeing the riots as pointless because there was nothing they could do to bring Scott back to life

or change the fact that all the evidence given to the prosecutors was valid. He did not

understand why people would try to blow the situation out of proportion because Scott was a

danger to the public. We all felt as though there was no need to turn the confrontation and the

results of it into a Blue Lives vs Black Lives scenario, especially since Officer Vinson is African

American as well.

The city of Charlotte had given a statement saying, “We recognized that for some

members of our community, this news will be met with different reactions. No matter where

you stand on the issue, the events surrounding the Scott shooting have forever changed our

community, and we intend to learn from and build a stronger Charlotte because of it.” This

statement was strong and well worded because if anything was seen as remotely racist or

biased, there would have been more rioting. Many people viewed the case differently, some

saw Vinson as a hero who was making hard but lawful decisions to protect the community while

others saw Scott as a helpless black man who was gunned down by a police officer. No matter

how people look at it, the facts remain facts. Scott was shot and killed due to Vinson strongly

believing that Scott held a threat to himself and the officers around him. Scott may have had a

brain injury but his behavior startled the officers enough to feel threatened by his presence. In

the end, Officer Vinson would return to his duty of protecting his community and Scott would

be laid down by his family, haunting the people of Charlotte.