An internal investigation has been launched after bodycam footage purports to show a Seattle police officer laughing about a woman who was struck and killed by a patrol car.
In a new report, Officer Daniel Auderer was called to the scene where Jaahnavi Kandula, 23, was killed near her Northeastern University, where she was studying.
In the video, Auderer is heard stating that the Indian woman’s life had “limited value” and the city should “just write a check.”
When questioned about the comments made in the video, the officer said what he said was taken out of context.
Kandula was a graduate student at the university when she was fatally struck by a patrol car on Jan. 23. The Seattle Times reported at the time that the car was going 74 mph and the student’s body was thrown more than 100 feet.
When Auderer was called to the scene, bodycam footage recorded audio from a call he made to a fellow officer.
“But she is dead,” he is heard saying before laughing. “No, it’s a regular person. Yeah, just write a check,” he said with a laugh.
“Eleven thousand dollars. She was 26, anyway. She had limited value.”
On the other line was Mike Solan, the guild’s president.
Following the incident, the Seattle Police Department released a statement on Monday stating that an employee heard the remarks and was “concerned about the nature of statements.”
The case has since been escalated up to the chain of command and handed over to the Office of Police Accountability, the agency that investigates police misconduct, according to SPD.
In a written statement provided by conservative talk radio host Jason Rantz on KTTH-AM, Auderer is reported to have stated that he made the comments to
mimic how city attorneys might attempt to lessen responsibility for Kandula’s death.
“I laughed at the ridiculousness of how these incidents are litigated,” Auderer wrote in the statement, according to KTTH radio.
Meanwhile, community leaders have spoken up about the incident and the acts that followed.
Victoria Beach, the chair of the African American Community Advisory Council, said she “was shocked, had many emotions” and was “sickened about it I was very disturbed that somebody could laugh about somebody that died.”
This story is developing.
