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The real-life crime category has an innovative format, or perhaps even a completely fresh vocabulary and grammar: officer-worn camera recordings. Faces of victims, witnesses and potential offenders appear suddenly to the cameras, sometimes in the harsh glare of headlights or torches as the police arrive, their faces and voices expressing wariness or panic or indignation or suspiciously contrived innocence. And we frequently catch sight of the expressions of the law enforcement personnel, one standing by blankly while the other conducts the inquiry with what occasionally seems like extraordinary diffidence – though maybe this is because they know they are being recorded.

A Growing Trend in Documentary Filmmaking

We have previously seen the Netflix real-life crime film The Gabby Petito Case, about the killing of an Instagram influencer by her boyfriend, whose primary focus was officer recordings and in which, as in this film, the police seemed surprisingly lenient with the perpetrator. There is also the acclaimed short film Incident by Bill Morrison, composed entirely of officer footage. Now comes a new film by Geeta Gandbhir about the tragic incident of Ajike Owens in Ocala, Florida, a African American woman whose four young kids reportedly bothered and antagonized her white neighbour, Susan Lorincz. In 2023, after an increasing number of neighbour-dispute incidents in which the police were repeatedly called, Lorincz fatally shot Owens through her closed front door, when Owens went to the neighbor's residence to confront her about hurling items at her children.

The Police Inquiry and State Laws

The arresting officers found evidence that the suspect had done internet searches into Florida’s “stand your ground” laws, which allow residents and others to shoot if there is a significant presumption of threat. The documentary constructs its narrative with the officer recordings generated during the multiple officer calls to the location before the killing, and then at the horrific and chaotic incident site itself – introduced by 911 audio material of Lorincz contacting authorities in a melodramatically shaky voice. There is also jail video of the individual which has a disturbing, unsettling appeal.

Depiction of the Suspect

The documentary does not really suggest anything too complicated about Lorincz, or any extenuating circumstance. She is obviously disturbed, although the kids are heard calling her a derogatory term, an ugly jibe. The production is showcased as an example of how self-defense regulations lead to senseless and tragic violence. But the fact of gun ownership and the second amendment (that longstanding U.S. legal right that a deceased pundit famously claimed made firearm fatalities a necessary cost) is not much highlighted.

Officer Questioning and Gun Culture

It is possible to watch the police interrogation scenes here and feel astonished at how minimal concern 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? Was it just on the couch, loaded and ready? The police aren’t shown asking any of these surely relevant questions (though they may have done in recordings that didn’t make the edit). Or is gun ownership so normal it would be like asking about microwaves or toasters?

Arrest and Aftermath

For what seemed to her local residents a very long time, the suspect was not even arrested and charged, only held and even provided accommodation away from home for the night (another point of comparison, by the way, with the a prior incident). And when she was finally officially taken into custody in the holding cell, there is an remarkable scene in which the individual simply refuses to stand, refuses to put her wrists out for the handcuffs, not aggressively, but with the courteously pathetic demeanor of someone whose mental health means that she just can’t do it. Did the gentle handling up until that point encouraged her to think that this could be effective?

Conclusion and Verdict

It didn’t; and the panel's decision is revealed in the end titles. A deeply sobering portrayal of U.S. justice and consequences.