A federal judge said Monday that he was inclined to rule in favour of news media companies seeking video of a fatal police shooting in a Los Angeles suburb two years ago.
Judge Stephen V. Wilson said significant public interest weighs in favour of unsealing footage from three police-car cameras of the shooting of Ricardo Diaz-Zeferino.
The footage was evidence in a lawsuit that the city of Gardena, California, settled for $4.7 million with Diaz-Zeferino's family and another man who was injured.
The hearing comes at a time of heightened scrutiny in shootings by officers and amid an ongoing debate over whether footage shot on an increasing number of police cameras should be made public.
Wilson said he'd rule in the next few days. Attorneys for Gardena asked him to stay any ruling against them so they can appeal.
A lawyer for The Associated Press, the Los Angeles Times and Bloomberg argued that the public has constitutional right to see the video.
Attorneys for the men who were shot also asked to release the video, saying it would allow the public a chance to determine what happened early the morning of June 2, 2013, when a report of an unlocked bicycle stolen from outside a pharmacy was erroneously relayed by dispatchers as a robbery, raising the possibility suspects could be armed.
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