“Come to me! Come to me!” the deputy can be heard commanding Savannah, according to newly released audio of the encounter. Seconds later, the deputy can be heard frantically calling for others.
“Hey! Stop!” the deputy is heard saying. “Stop shooting her, he's in her car!” Stop! “
It was too late, Savannah was fatally shot.
Now, newly released video and audio recordings from the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department, obtained through a public records request before the department posted it online, reveal that more information has been put into this death over the past 18 months. A long-standing question has been clarified. Grew some new ones.
The sheriff's department declined further comment on the incident Tuesday, referring questions to the California Department of Justice, which is investigating the shooting. The department previously said it would investigate whether responding officers followed shooting procedures. The state Department of Justice declined to discuss the case Tuesday and referred reporters to a 2022 news release announcing the investigation.
Hours after the Sept. 27, 2022, shooting in the high desert city of Hesperia, the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Office, citing preliminary information, described Savannah as a “participant” and said that when approached by officers, He suggested that shots may have been fired. my father's car.
The recordings offer a glimpse into how lawmakers on the ground and in the air viewed the unfolding scene differently, and how confusion arose about Savannah's role.
An Amber Alert was issued for the teenage girl before the shooting, and a pursuit ensued on the highway after she was found west of Barstow. According to the video, a gas station clerk called police to report that he sold Savannah two sodas and then saw her get into Graziano's pickup truck.
San Bernardino County Sheriff Shannon Dicus said at a news conference the day of the incident that Graziano was speeding down the highway when he fired at police cars, disabling one. Graziano sometimes reached speeds of more than 113 mph on the highway, according to a radio representative.
The pursuit was well underway and a deputy radioed that he saw shots fired through the passenger window. Helicopter units reported seeing shots fired from the driver's side window.
Witnesses driving on the highway also reported seeing shots fired from the passenger side.
“It must have been someone else because someone was still driving the truck,” the witness said, according to an audio recording released by the sheriff's office.
In a produced video compiled by the sheriff's department, the department said this does not confirm shots were fired from the passenger side and that investigators are still looking into whether shots were fired.
Graziano unsuccessfully attempts to scale the embankment and finds himself trapped, and a gunfight begins. Savannah, wearing a plate vest and tactical helmet, got out of her father's car as bullets flew.
According to audio recorded on the belt recording of a deputy who was near the girl, the deputy could be heard calling for Savannah to come to him. However, as the girl approaches, other deputies begin firing. The deputy yelled that Savannah's father was still in the car and ordered him to stop shooting at her.
“She's okay! He's in the car…please stop,” the deputy said. He was too late. Savannah suffered fatal injuries and was taken to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead. Her father died at the scene.
The release of the Graziano shooting video comes as the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department is already under intense scrutiny over last month's shooting in which deputies killed a 15-year-old boy with autism.
Ryan Gainer attacked police with a gardening hoe, then shot and killed two officers in his home. Footage of the encounter was released on March 13, prompting rebuke from Gaynor's family as well as anger from the community.
“We understand,” DeWitt Lacy, the Gaynor family’s attorney, told The Washington Post in March. “It may have been unsettling for the police officer, but it doesn't make sense.” [they] He ends up shooting a 15-year-old. ”
Although there was body camera footage of the Gaynor shooting, San Bernardino County sheriff's deputies did not have that technology in 2022. Only aerial video footage of the Graziano incident exists, taken from a helicopter. After several delays, the department implemented a body camera program, becoming the last sheriff's department in the area to do so.
