Anthony Scott lowers his voice and his eyes fill with tears when he talks about his younger brother.
Walter Scott was killed April 4, 2015, but sometimes his brother still speaks to him as if they’re in the same room: “Walter, you really got us going through these things but we want the best outcome for you and your case.”
The case he’s referring to is the murder trial of now-ex officer Michael Slager. A jury was seated this week in Charleston, South Carolina, and opening statements are set to begin Thursday morning.
Walter Scott was shot in the back while running away from Slager. After amateur footage of the shooting emerged, Slager was arrested, fired and charged with murder. And now as the trial begins more than 18 months later, those few seconds of cell phone footage may be key to the prosecution’s case.
Anthony Scott and his family now struggle with his brother’s legacy: Those few final moments of his life, captured on a short video, and viewed by countless people who never knew him.
“When you see this… man running away, after being tased, running for his life and then being gunned down the way he was gunned down, it was totally traumatic. I don’t think some of my family members are prepared to handle that,” Scott said.
The defense wants to exclude it, arguing the “video showing the shooting of Walter Scott taken by a passerby is ‘highly prejudicial,'” defense attorney Andy Savage argued Wednesday in a motion filed in court.
Scott insisted it is essential the jury see and hear that the case is “not built on Walter’s past but rather, it is built on what happened that day,” Scott said.
What happened that day is “indicative of a bigger problem across the country,” Scott says. “South Carolina made a quick move in developing and equipping police officers of the state with those video cameras… and I believe that what happened with my brother helped to push that along faster.”
He says he feels a bit safer, but that “it’s scary to be stopped on a traffic stop and… It ends up in a deadly confrontation that doesn’t work out well for the civilian side of it.”
At the end of the day, Anthony Scott insists he and his family see peace as the number one priority for Charleston, with this trial and the impending Dylan Roof trial encompassing the city. Roof is being tried for the fatal shootings at an African-American church in the coastal city that left nine dead. Both of those trials are a “tremendous hit for Charleston,” Scott said.
No matter the outcome of the Slager trial, the Scott family will still be saying goodbye to their beloved son and brother.
“We’re not doing well, you know, we miss him a whole lot.”