A video has emerged that shows moments before St. Louis Detective Luther Hall was beaten up while he was working as an undercover cop during Stockley protests in 2017. Hall was asked to go undercover during the protests that took place in September 2017.
As part of the assignment, he had to blend in, record and livestream back to headquarters. But later Hall realized that no one back at headquarters was watching the footage provided by him.
Phone video shows people running and windows and flower pots getting broken. In the video, the police are seen macing protestors from cars, reported KMOV.
It shows Hall first walking then running alongside protestors until his video partially captures what happens next. A report said "as officers were making arrests, officer Hall was knocked to the ground striking the concrete." Prosecutors had a different version of the incident.
Officers, believing Hall was one of the Black protestors, assaulted him and left him injured. While Randy Hays has pleaded guilty, officer Steven Korte has been acquitted.
On June 7, former officer Dustin Boone will stand trial. According to court documents filed earlier this month, prosecutors mentioned text messages from before and after the attack, where Boone constantly sent family and colleagues messages using the n-word. Prosecutors said that the texts show "Boone's animosity towards African Americans, and that Boone's actions were ... willful and not the result of mistake or accident."
A judge said on Wednesday that the text messages can be used during Boone’s re-trial next month. Boone's attorney has requested the judge to keep his texts out of court, asking that the evidence is "highly prejudicial" and that the jury would "form a negative opinion about the defendant."
Prosecutors are also trying to produce a video evidence against former officer Christopher Myers, who was acquitted for the beating, but is being re-tried on charges claiming he destroyed Hall's phone to cover up the attack.
The incident left Hall with a hole in his lip that required to be stitched closed. He also suffered injuries to his jaw and neck that later needed spinal fusion. He wasn't able to eat solid food for weeks due to which he lost 20 pounds, reported CBS News.
