MIDLAND, Texas — The City of Midland has released the body cam footage from the arrest of Tye Anders.
The 21 year old was arrested and charged with evading arrest after police say they tried to pull him over for running a stop sign, where he refused to stop.
The city said in a press conference on Wednesday that it would not be releasing the footage, but have since decided to release it.
Mayor Patrick Payton and City Councilman John Norman said they would not be putting the incident behind them and instead would work to have better communication.
A change of course came Friday when councilman Norman called a meeting at City Hall.
"This meeting was made up of some of my District 2 Advisory Committee, the Mayor, the Police Chief and other members of the City Staff and Community to discuss releasing the video," said Norman. "We know that every second of the video will be scrutinized and debated on social media for days. I don't have a problem with that at all. Because at my core, I believe that transparency builds trust," said Norman.
Anders and his attorney "believe and maintain that this was a stop based on racial profiling and there was no traffic violation."
Attorney Justin Moore plans to hold community meetings to discuss the situation, though no date or time has been given as to when those meetings will take place.
"I believe in transparency. Transparency builds trust. We want to put it out there and give people time to digest it and create their questions if they have questions coming into the town hall meetings," Councilman Norman said exclusively to NewsWest 9 when asked about the release of body cam footage.
The city released the video to its YouTube page Friday evening.
Midland District Attorney Laura Nodolf is now weighing in on the case after reviewing all dash cam and body cam video..
"There were no actions taken by any member of the Midland Police Department that would cause me any concern with moving forward with the case. As such, the charges filed against Mr. Anders will proceed forward in the normal fashion that any other criminal matter submitted to my office would follow," Nodolf wrote in a statement Friday night.
You can read the full arrest affidavit down below.
The first Community Conversation will take place on Thursday, May 28, 2020 6-8pm at the Martin Luther King Jr. Center in Midland.
You can watch the series of videos here:
Full length front camera footage can be seen here: https://youtu.be/lMLPnFDxdhU
Full length body camera footage can be seen here: https://youtu.be/DZg7GXp9hS4
Full length back seat footage can be seen here: https://youtu.be/9KHKPdsE9z8
Shortened length footage with captions can be seen here: https://youtu.be/hdBnXG-fm8M