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The true crime category has a new medium, or perhaps even a completely fresh vocabulary and structure: officer-worn camera recordings. Faces of victims, observers and potential offenders appear suddenly to the cameras, at times in the intense brightness of headlights or flashlights as the police arrive, their faces and voices eloquent of wariness or fear or anger or suspiciously contrived innocence. And we often incidentally glimpse the faces of the officers themselves, one standing by blankly while the other asks the questions with what occasionally seems like remarkable hesitation – though maybe this is because they are aware they are being recorded.

A Growing Trend in Documentary Filmmaking

We have already had the Netflix true-crime documentary American Murder: Gabby Petito, about the killing of an social media personality by her boyfriend, whose primary focus was officer recordings and in which, as in this film, the police seemed extraordinarily lax with the perpetrator. There is also the acclaimed short film Incident by Bill Morrison, made exclusively of officer footage. Now comes a new film by Geeta Gandbhir about the grim case of a Florida mother in a city in Florida, a woman of colour whose children reportedly bothered and tormented her neighbor, Susan Lorincz. In 2023, after an escalating series of neighbour-dispute incidents in which the authorities were summoned multiple times, the accused shot Owens dead through her locked door, when Owens went to the neighbor's residence to confront her about throwing objects at her children.

The Investigation and Legal Context

The arresting officers found proof that Lorincz had done internet searches into the state's self-defense statutes, which allow residents and others to shoot if there is a reasonable belief of threat. The movie constructs its narrative with the body cam footage generated during the repeated police visits to the scene before the killing, and then at the horrific and chaotic crime scene itself – introduced by 911 audio material of the caller contacting authorities in a dramatically trembling voice. There is also police cell footage of the individual which has a chilly, queasy fascination.

Portrayal of the Accused

The documentary does not really suggest anything too complex about Lorincz, or any extenuating circumstance. She is clearly unstable, although the kids are heard calling her a derogatory term, an hurtful taunt. The film is showcased as an illustration of how self-defense regulations lead to senseless and tragic violence. But the reality of firearm possession and the second amendment (that historic American constitutional privilege that a late commentator 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 surprised 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? Could it have been easily accessible and prepared? 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 possessing a firearm so normal it would be like asking about microwaves or bread heaters?

Detention and Consequences

For what appeared to her local residents a very long time, Lorincz was not even arrested and charged, only held and even provided accommodation away from home for the night (another point of comparison, incidentally, with the a prior incident). And when she was ultimately formally arrested in the detention area, 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 jury’s verdict is saved for the end titles. A deeply sobering picture of American crime and punishment.