McKinney, Texas, Pool Party Video: Second Cop Showed Proper Procedure, Why Not Eric Casebolt?

The viral video of a pool party gone wrong in McKinney, Texas, has become a flashpoint for national controversy, dividing opinion sharply between supporters of Officer Eric Casebolt, the cop seen slamming a bikini-clad teenage African-American girl to the ground and then pulling a gun on two other teens who try to help her, and critics who say that Casebolt’s violent actions were not only dangerous and over-the-top, but motivated by the race of many kids at the party.

But one former police officer who has examined the video says that Casebolt’s out-of-control aggression, including a bizarre and seemingly unnecessary shoulder roll right out of Starsky and Hutch — seen just four seconds into the video — stands in stark contrast to the cool-headed response of another officer in the video.

The second officer kept a level head throughout and provides an example of how the situation could have been handled without controversy or violence against the teenagers at the pool party, according to former police officer Seth Stoughton.

The second officer, who has not been publicly named but whose badge visible in the video identifies him as “E. Grogan,” can be first seen around the 45-second mark.

While Officer Grogan can be heard calmly telling the kids, “I’m just saying, don’t take off running when the cops get here,” Casebolt is seen at the same time grabbing some of the teens roughly, pushing them to the ground and slapping on the handcuffs.

“Get your asses down on the ground,” Casebolt shouts, in a tone far removed from Grogan’s firm but calm approach. “Don’t make me f*****g run around here with thirty pounds of god-damned gear on in the sun because you want to screw around out here!”

“The two officers in this brief video represent two different policing styles, two different mindsets that officers use as they interact with civilians: the Guardian and the Warrior,” writes Stoughton, now a law professor at the University of South Carolina.

Casebolt, not surprisingly, represents the “Warrior” police mentality — a mentality that Stoughton says carries numerous risks. In fact, Casebolt was apparently so proud of his “warrior” approach that he posted the video of his controversial actions to his own YouTube channel.

“The wrong mindset can exacerbate a tense encounter, produce resistance, and lead to entirely avoidable violence. It can, and has, caused longterm damage to police/community relations,” he wrote on the news site Talking Points Memo.

“We shouldn’t be surprised that the kids Corporal Casebolt was yelling at weren’t eager to do what he was ordering them to do — no one likes being cursed at and disrespected in front of their peers, and people of all ages, especially teenagers, resent being treated unjustly,” he wrote.

The actions of Casebolt in the Mickinney, Texas, pool party video show “the avoidable results of an unnecessarily aggressive approach to policing,” the former cop writes — adding, “in the same video, we can see a few seconds of policing the way the way it should be done.”

[Image: YouTube Screen Grab]