TIMMONSVILLE, SC (WBTW) – In mid-April Reverend Jerrod Moultrie, president of the Timmonsville NAACP branch, claimed he was racially profiled by a Timmonsville police officer. The police department released body cam video that contradicted Moultrie’s claim, and now the NAACP says there may be more to the story.
Moultrie posted a status on Facebook on Apr. 13 that said he was racially profiled by an officer during a traffic stop. He has since removed the post from social media, but through a copy of the post, News13 learned that Moultrie said he was pulled over by the officer because he was driving a Mercedes-Benz in a “nice neighborhood.”
Moultrie then gave his version of the story. Moultrie said the officer stopped him because he didn’t use his turn signal, and said the officer then asked if Moultrie had drugs in his car.
Moultrie said the officer persistently asked him why he was in that neighborhood. According to his post, Moultrie said the officer took his license and registration, and when he came back, the officer said his tags were registered to another vehicle.
Moultrie said he told the officer he had just bought his Mercedes-Benz, and is in the process of transferring information.
Toward the end of his Facebook post, Reverend Moultrie said the officer told him, “I am doing you a favor tonight [by] not taking you to jail or writing you a ticket.”
Body cam video released by the Timmonsville Police Department shows a stark contradiction to Moultrie’s version of the events, but, according to a press release from the NAACP Wednesday morning, Moultrie claims two officers were involved in the traffic stop, and the police department only released one officer’s body cam.
Malik Russell, director of communications for the NAACP, stated in the release that the organization continues “an internal investigation into the report of racial profiling levied by the President of the Timmonsville, South Carolina Branch of the NAACP (Moultrie) against a Timmonsville police officer in connection with a traffic stop on the evening of April 13, 2018.”
The release goes on to say that Moultrie addressed apparent contradictions between the body cam footage and his account of the incident by claiming that two different police officers questioned him after his car was stopped.
According to Moultrie, the body cam footage captures the arrival of the second police cruiser on the scene, but does not capture his interaction with the officer who conducted the initial stop – in a separate vehicle – and who interacted with Moultrie before the second police cruiser arrived, the press release states.
Russell says the NAACP is conducting an internal investigation and wants “full disclosure of all relevant information regarding the incident.”
The release also says that racial profiling in relation to Moultrie’s traffic stop “concerns the reasons for stopping a particular vehicle at a particular time, not whether the officer conducting the stop (or any other officer on the scene) is impolite.”
“The officer in the body cam footage states that the reason for the stop was [Moultrie’s] failure to signal for a turn. Whether that justification is a pretext for racial discrimination is an issue separate and distinct from whether any officer displayed racial bias against Rev. Moultrie during the stop,” the release reads.
Russell did not indicate how long the internal investigation would take or what actions could potentially be taken concluding the investigation.
News13 has reached out to the Timmonsville Police Department to ask about a second officer being involved in Moultrie’s traffic stop. According to Lt. Andrew LeGette with Timmonsville police, a South Carolina state trooper was at the scene for backup, but never approached Moultrie. The only law enforcement officer who made contact with Moultrie was the one Timmonsville police officer from whom the department released body cam footage, adds Lt. LeGette.
