KC police release video of Belcher encounter a few hours before shooting

A Kansas City police video of officers talking with Jovan Belcher hours before he killed his girlfriend and took his own life appears to show a cordial encounter in which officers had no cause to suspect the Kansas City Chiefs player was doing anything other than sleeping in his car — which is not a crime.

The 10-minute dash cam video shows officers approaching Belcher’s black Bentley, which was parked in the 700 bock of Armour Boulevard at 3:05 a.m. last Saturday. The officers were responding to a caller who said a man had been sleeping in the car for about two hours.

The officers tap on the window to awaken Belcher and ask him what was he is doing. The audio does not begin until nearly five minutes into the video. Belcher’s responses are difficult to hear, but he appears to be telling officers he is the rightful owner of the expensive car that had temporary tags.

“It’s nice,” says an officer at the passenger side of the car. “I’m not saying you stole it. I like it, dude, it’s nice...What do you do? Oh, really?”

Police say Belcher told them he was waiting for his girlfriend who lived in the building. One of the officers tells Belcher he should go inside.

“You just need to go upstairs,” the officer says. “We’re trying to cut you a break here.”

Police later said officers asked Belcher to call his girlfriend and Belcher made a call from his cellphone. A short time later, a woman opened the apartment building door and let Belcher inside. Two women later verified to detectives that Belcher stayed at the apartment until 6:30 a.m., when they woke him. The women told police that Belcher had asked them to wake him so he would not be late for a team meeting later that morning.


Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/12/07/3954952/kc-police-release-video-of-belcher.html#storylink=cpy

the video: