Ololade Adeyanju/
A police lieutenant in Georgia, US has been moved to administrative duty after being heard on video during a traffic stop saying “we only shoot black people.”
Dash-cam video from a Driving Under Influence (DUI) traffic stop in July 2016 shows a white female passenger telling Cobb County police Lt. Greg Abbott she was scared to move her hands in order to get her cellphone because she didn’t want to get shot, WSB reported.
Abbott interrupts her and says, “But you’re not black. Remember, we only shoot black people.
“All the videos you’ve seen, have you seen the white people get killed?”
Cobb County police chief, Mike Register, said Abbott will remain on administrative duty pending an investigation, and that “no matter what context it was said, it shouldn’t have been said.”
“Lt. Greg Abbott is a highly respected 28-year veteran of the Cobb County Police Department,” Register said in a statement.
“He is cooperating with the department’s internal investigation and will continue to do so.
“His comments must be observed in their totality to understand their context.
“He was attempting to de-escalate a situation involving an uncooperative passenger.”
Register said that Abbott had been a good officer and that he had not received any racial bias complaints.
“We’re not making excuses. We’re meeting this head-on and we’re going to deal with it,” Register, who was not police chief during the time of the incident, told WSB.
“We are going to keep going forward to make sure we, as a police department, service the community in a most professional way – all segments of the community.”
Abbott 