Death of Daniel Shaver

Overview

Daniel Shaver was a pest-control worker who was fatally shot by police officer Philip Brailsford at a La Quinta Inn & Suites hotel in Mesa, Arizona in mid-January 2016.

Background

On January 18th, 2016, Shaver showed a scoped air rifle he had been using to exterminate birds as a pest control worker to two people in his hotel room in Mesa, Arizona and pointed the gun out his hotel window. After receiving a complaint from another guest, hotel management called the police to investigate. Police subsequently arrived and delivered orders to Shaver and his guests, noting that if they failed to properly comply they could be shot. While complying with the officer's request to crawl forward, Shaver reached toward his waistband leading Brailsford to open fire with an AR-15 rifle. Shaver, who was found to be unarmed, was shot five times and was killed almost instantly.

Developments

Body Camera Video

In March 2016, Brailsford was charged with second-degree murder. That month, Brailsford was terminated from the Mesa Police Department, who cited policy violations including having the words "You're Fucked" engraved on his rifle cover and unsatisfactory performance. Shaver's wife was told she could see the body camera footage of the incident if she did not speak about the footage to the press. Under the orders of Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Sam Myers, the motion was granted to seal the footage of the incident. In May 2016, portions of the video were released by Myers, omitting the moment when Shaver was shot. On December 7th, Brailsford was acquitted on all charges^[5], leading to the release of the full unedited body camera footage, in which now-retired Sgt. Charles Langley can be heard delivering various orders to Shaver prior to being shot by Brailsford (shown below). Within four days, the footage uploaded to YouTube by BNO News gathered more than 1.38 million views and 10,100 comments.

Online Reaction

The following day, Redditor SecretSnack submitted the video to /r/PublicFreakout,^[1] where it gathered more than 61,400 points (86% upvoted) and 15,100 comments. Also on December 8th, The Young Turks discussed the video (shown below).

That evening, a photograph of Brailsford reached the front page of /r/Libertarian,^[2] /r/FullCommunism^[3] and /r/Bad_Cop_No_Donut,^[4] referring to him as a "killer" and "murderer" (shown below).

Search Interest

External References