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The real-life crime genre has a new medium, or perhaps even a whole new language and grammar: police body cam footage. Countenances of those harmed, observers and possible perpetrators loom up to the cameras, at times in the intense brightness of vehicle beams or flashlights as the police arrive, their faces and voices eloquent of caution or fear or indignation or dubiously feigned naivety. And we often incidentally glimpse the faces of the officers themselves, one standing by blankly while the other conducts the inquiry with what occasionally seems like extraordinary diffidence – though perhaps this is because they are aware they are being recorded.

A Growing Trend in Non-Fiction Cinema

We have previously seen the Netflix true-crime documentary The Gabby Petito Case, about the killing of an social media personality by her partner, whose primary focus was officer recordings and in which, as in this film, the police seemed surprisingly lenient with the suspect. There is also Bill Morrison’s Oscar-nominated short Incident, composed entirely of body cam film. Now comes a new film by Geeta Gandbhir about the tragic incident of Ajike Owens in Ocala, Florida, a woman of colour whose children reportedly bothered and antagonized her neighbor, Susan Lorincz. In 2023, after an escalating series of neighborhood conflicts in which the police were summoned multiple times, the accused shot Owens dead through her locked door, when Owens went to the neighbor's residence to address her about throwing objects at her children.

The Police Inquiry and State Laws

The arresting officers found evidence that the suspect had done online research into the state's self-defense statutes, which allow householders and others to shoot if there is a significant presumption of danger. The documentary builds its story with the officer recordings captured during the multiple officer calls to the location before the shooting, and then at the disturbing and disordered incident site itself – prefaced by 911 audio material of Lorincz contacting authorities in a dramatically trembling voice. There is also police cell footage of Lorincz which has a disturbing, unsettling appeal.

Depiction of the Suspect

The film does not really imply anything too complex about Lorincz, or any extenuating circumstance. She is clearly unstable, although the children are heard calling her “the Karen”, an hurtful taunt. The production is presented as an illustration of how “stand your ground” laws generate unnecessary and heartbreaking bloodshed. But the fact of gun ownership and the second amendment (that historic American constitutional privilege that a deceased pundit famously claimed made gun deaths a necessary cost) is not much emphasized.

Officer Questioning and Gun Culture

It is possible to watch the police interrogation scenes here and feel astonished at how little interest the officers took in this point. When did she buy her gun? Did she receive any instruction on handling it? Had she ever had occasion to fire it before? Where did she store it in the house? Could it have been easily accessible and prepared? The authorities aren’t shown asking any of these surely relevant questions (though they could have inquired in footage that didn’t make the edit). Or is gun ownership so commonplace it would be like asking about kitchen appliances or bread heaters?

Detention and Consequences

For what appeared to her neighbors a very long time, the suspect was not even taken into custody and indicted, only detained and even provided accommodation away from home for the night (another parallel, by the way, with the Gabby Petito case). And when she was ultimately officially taken into custody in the holding cell, there is an extraordinary sequence in which the individual simply declines to rise, will not extend her arms for the cuffs, not hostilely, but with the courteously pathetic demeanor of someone whose psychological state means that she just can’t do it. Had the kid-gloves treatment up until that point led her to think that this might actually work?

Final Outcome and Judgment

It didn’t; and the panel's decision is saved for the end titles. A very sombre picture of U.S. justice and consequences.