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The true crime genre has a new medium, or perhaps even a completely fresh vocabulary and grammar: officer-worn camera recordings. Countenances of those harmed, observers and potential offenders loom up to the cameras, sometimes in the intense brightness of vehicle beams or flashlights as the police arrive, their expressions and tones eloquent of caution or fear or anger or suspiciously contrived innocence. And we often catch sight of the faces of the law enforcement personnel, one waiting impassively while the other asks the questions with what occasionally seems like remarkable hesitation – though perhaps this is because they are aware they are being recorded.

An Emerging Pattern in Non-Fiction Cinema

We have previously seen the Netflix real-life crime film The Gabby Petito Case, about the slaying of an Instagram influencer by her partner, whose main point of interest was body cam footage and in which, as in this film, the police seemed extraordinarily lax with the perpetrator. There is also Bill Morrison’s Oscar-nominated short Incident, made exclusively of body cam film. Now comes a new film by Geeta Gandbhir about the tragic incident of Ajike Owens in a city in Florida, a woman of colour whose children allegedly harassed and antagonized her white neighbour, Susan Lorincz. In 2023, after an escalating series of neighborhood conflicts in which the authorities were summoned multiple times, Lorincz shot Owens dead through her closed front door, when Owens went to Lorincz’s house to address her about throwing objects at her children.

The Investigation and State Laws

The arresting officers found evidence that the suspect had done online research into the state's self-defense statutes, which permit householders and others to shoot if there is a reasonable belief of threat. The documentary constructs its narrative with the body cam footage captured during the multiple officer calls to the location before the shooting, and then at the disturbing and disordered incident site itself – introduced by emergency call recordings of Lorincz contacting authorities in a melodramatically shaky voice. There is also jail video of the individual which has a chilly, queasy fascination.

Depiction of the Suspect

The film does not really imply anything too complicated about Lorincz, or any extenuating circumstance. She is clearly unstable, although the children are heard calling her “the Karen”, an ugly jibe. The production is presented as an example of how self-defense regulations lead to unnecessary and heartbreaking bloodshed. But the fact of gun ownership and the second amendment (that historic American constitutional privilege that a late commentator notoriously said made firearm fatalities a price worth paying) is not much emphasized.

Officer Questioning and Gun Culture

It is feasible to watch the police interrogation scenes here and feel surprised at how little interest the officers took in this aspect. When did she buy her gun? Where (if anywhere) did she train in its use? Was this the first time she discharged the weapon? Where did she store it in the house? Could it have been easily accessible and prepared? The police aren’t shown asking any of these undoubtedly important questions (though they could have inquired in footage that didn’t make the edit). Or is gun ownership so normal it would be like asking about kitchen appliances or bread heaters?

Detention and Consequences

For what appeared to her local residents a extended period, Lorincz was not even arrested and charged, only held and even offered a hotel stay away from home for the night (another parallel, by the way, with the a prior incident). And when she was finally formally arrested in the holding cell, there is an remarkable scene in which Lorincz simply refuses to stand, refuses to put her wrists out for the handcuffs, not aggressively, but with the politely self-pitying air of someone whose mental health means that she is unable to comply. Had the kid-gloves treatment 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.