Seattle Police Department on Wednesday fired a police officer who made insensitive remarks and laughed in the aftermath of a 23-year-old Indian student’s death.
Jahnavi Kandula was hit by a speeding police vehicle, driven by Seattle police officer Kevin Dave as she was crossing the street on January 23 last year.
The cop was driving at a speed of more than 119 kmph on the way to report a drug overdose call and Kandula was thrown 100 feet into the air, resulting in her immediate death.
Bodycam footage showed officer Daniel Auderer laughing after the crash and said, “Uh, I think she went up on the hood, hit the windshield, and then when he hit the brakes, flew off the car…But she is dead.”
After making these comments, Auderer “laughed hard for four seconds,” the department’s Disciplinary Action Report said.
Auderer’s body-worn camera also captured him saying, “Yeah, just write a check. Just, yeah (laughter). USD 11,000. She was 26, anyway. She had limited value.”
When asked at an Office of Police Accountability interview about his comments that Kandula had “limited value”, Auderer claimed he was “ridiculing the city attorneys who would be tasked with litigating a potential wrongful death lawsuit.”
In an internal email, Interim chief at the Seattle Police Department, Sue Rahr said that the hurt Auderer’s words have inflicted on Kandula’s family “cannot be erased. The actions (of) this individual police officer have brought shame on the Seattle Police Department and our entire profession, making the job of every police officer more difficult.”
Rahr said that as the leader of the organisation, it is her duty to uphold the high standards necessary to maintain public trust. “For me to allow the officer to remain on our force would only bring further dishonour to the entire department. For that reason, I am going to terminate his employment,” she said in the internal email.
(With inputs from PTI)
Jahnavi Kandula was hit by a speeding police vehicle, driven by Seattle police officer Kevin Dave as she was crossing the street on January 23 last year. Andhra Pradesh States News India: Top News India, States News, States News Headlines, Online State News India, State Politics news
