New Horry County police dash cam video from what started as a shoplifting call and turned into a 10-mile police chase was released Saturday by the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division.
ABC15 News filed a Freedom of Information Act request to obtain the video.
On Nov. 10, 2015, police were called to the Walmart around 10:30 a.m. off Highway 544.
The video shows police talking with 26-year-old Laquandra Borden of Sumter and then allowing her to look through her Jeep.
When Borden gets in the driver seat, she starts the vehicle with the officer hanging on to her. She drives forward, hits a police car and then attempts to back up with two officers hanging off of the vehicle.
Retired New Jersey police chief and member of the Coastal Carolina Shields John Comparetto said at that moment, police had every right to pull their weapons.
“The law allows us to draw our weapon when we feel our life is in danger, and someone dragging someone or taking off with someone hanging across them in the car, their life is in danger,” he said. “There would be nothing improper about drawing our firearm.”
The video shows her backing into a sign and then leading police on the chase.
During the chase, pieces of the woman’s car fly off, but she keeps on driving.
Police even tried to put out stop sticks, but she instead drives in the opposite lane, into traffic, for a while before going into the correct lane again.
Finally, around 35th Avenue in Myrtle Beach, another officer stands in the roadway with a gun drawn, and the woman stops.
Police swarm the vehicle and pull her out of the car. She is handcuffed on the ground before being taken on a stretcher to the hospital.
15th Circuit Solicitor Jimmy Richardson said SLED has since reviewed the incident and the video.
“When SLED did a complete and thorough report, we looked over it and reviewed it, and it did appear that it was reasonable,” Richardson explained.
Richardson said once a police officer is in fear for his life or someone else’s, the officer is allowed to use deadly force.
“It basically comes down to this: Did that officer act reasonable, as a reasonably prudent person in that situation?,” he added.
Since the video was released on Saturday, it has been viewed nearly a half million times on our ABC 15 News Facebook page, where some are criticizing the officers’ use of force and others wishing they had done more initially.
However, Comparetto said officers are trained to increase the use of force as the situation progresses.
“We have to do an escalation of force,” he said. “We’re trained to start with the minimum amount of force and escalate it as the needs arise. You know everybody in America wants a kinder, gentler police force, and there are consequences to these actions, and here’s a perfect example of the consequences.”
Borden is charged with hit and run; five charges of shoplifting; criminal conspiracy; assault of a high and aggravated nature; two charges of first degree assault and battery; and two property crimes.
She was booked in J. Reuben Long Detention Center on Nov. 11, 2015 and posted the $120,000 bond on Nov. 23, 2015.
