Footage of deadly shooting played to jurors in Hollis Daniels capital murder trial
The jurors' faces betrayed no emotion as they sat, eyes trained on one of two television screens set up in the courtroom that played the video of the last moments of Texas Tech Police Officer Floyd East Jr.'s life.
For about a half-hour, jurors watched intently as each frame brought them excruciatingly closer to the moment Hollis Daniels III, then a 19-year-old sophomore at Texas Tech, shot the officer in the briefing room of the Texas Tech Police Department where East was filling out paperwork for Daniels' arrest on a misdemeanor drug charge.
Daniels kept a somber expression as the video played.
The video, which was recorded on East's body worn camera, was quiet for the most part. Then, Daniels, now 24, could be heard asking the officer about his children before racking the slide of the pistol he smuggled into the police station and shooting East in the head.
A juror jumped back as Daniels fired the gun. That was followed by noises from the defendant grabbing the officer's body worn camera as he ran away.
Daniels, who pleaded guilty to capital murder, faces either life in prison without parole or the death penalty, in East's slaying.
East's family, who had been at the courtroom since Monday when testimony began in the trial, was led out of the courtroom before the graphic video was played.
Television screens were set up facing away from the courtroom gallery as the video would have showed the shooting in vivid detail.
The third day of testimony of Daniels' trial also shed light on one of the biggest mysteries in the case: How was the 19-year-old Seguin native able to smuggle a firearm into the police station after he was arrested and handcuffed in his dorm room, and why he was uncuffed.
About a week after the shooting, Texas Tech administrators said Texas Department of Public Safety investigators were going to review the campus' safety and security policies and practices.
The administrative review will analyze Tech police procedures during Daniels’ arrest on a drug charge and events leading up to the shooting, according to A-J Media files.
The DPS review was expected to answer key questions in the case, including how thoroughly Daniels was searched and why he was not handcuffed at the time of the shooting inside the campus police station.
However, a month later, Daniels was indicted in the charge and 137th District Judge John McClendon, who is presiding over the trial, issued a media gag order that barred any agency investigating the shooting from providing information about the case to the media. The order cited concerns that any more publicity the high-profile shooting would garner would result in moving a potential trial outside of Lubbock County.
That information was provided on Wednesday, as Tech Police Sgt. Tyler Snelson continued his testimony from the day before.
Snelson, who was a corporal in 2017, told jurors he and East were the police officers who took the shots fired report from Daniels' roommate that day.
He said Daniels was away when they arrived at his dorm room and got someone to open his room.
Footage from Snelson's body worn camera from that day were played to jurors. The video showed the officers unable to find any evidence of the shooting in Daniels' bedroom. Instead, their attention shifted to the prescription pills and marijuana paraphernalia lying in plain view in the room.
As the officers documented the evidence for a potential drug charge, Daniels arrives and initially identified himself to officers using the name of one of the roommates who made the report to East and Snelson.
Daniels apologized and used his real name, and Snelson patted him down. Snelson demonstrated to jurors with prosecutor Barron Slack how he patted down Daniels and said there was no way he would have missed the .45 caliber pistol.
After the pat down, the officer tells Daniels to sit on the couch of a common room and interviews him. The couch was never searched.
During the interview, Daniels appeared calm and forthcoming, appearing to play the role of a naïve college student to disarm and placate the officers into thinking he wasn't a danger.
Daniels could be hearing denying having a weapon or being in his dorm when his roommates said they heard the gunshot form his room, saying he was detained at a traffic stop on Indiana Avenue by Lubbock police investigating the theft of his friend's pistol.
However, the officer catches him lying a few times, particularly with the contents of a full pill bottle found in his pants.
Ultimately, East determined there was enough cause to arrest Daniels on a drug charge and can be seen handcuffing the defendant's hands behind his back and searching him again.
However, Daniels is told to sit back on the couch as officers look for his ID in his bedroom.
Meanwhile, Daniels could be seen moving around and fidgeting on the couch, which is when he likely secreted the .45 caliber pistol he stole from a friend the night before into his pants.
Throughout the encounter, Daniels never leaves the couch and had an officer with him the entire time.
Snelson could not definitively say that the couch was where Daniels hid the gun he stole the night before. But as East walked the handcuffed student the out of his dorm room, Snelson said Daniels was already armed with the loaded gun.
Lubbock police detective Thomas Bonds was called to admit video from East's body cam and backseat cameras.
Portions of videos of East's body camera and the back seat camera were played to the jury and Daniels could be seen in the back seat of East's patrol vehicle fidgeting with something.
A loud thump erupts as Daniels continues to fidget and East asks Daniels about the noise. The defendant tells the officer that it was just his handcuffs banging against the molded plastic backseat.
However, Lubbock Police Detective Thomas Bonds, who testified about the video, tells jurors that it was actually a gun falling out of Daniels' pants as he tries to move it. Moments later, Daniels can be seen moving the gun to the front of his pants waistband before he is taken to the briefing room inside the Texas Tech Police Department headquarters.
As the ride ended, East asked Daniels about his goals.
"I want to have a radio show," Daniels replied. "I think this is probably going to drop me out of school, unfortunately."
Snelson told jurors he saw East and Daniels in the department's briefing room to prepare the arrest paperwork. Snelson said Daniels was uncuffed at East's discretion, saying officers typically remove handcuffs from cooperative and calm arrestees.
East also placed his body camera on a desk and positioned it so both he and Daniels were in the same frame, Snelson said.
Before the trial ended for the day, jurors heard from a handful of police officers who played a role in arresting Daniels on campus.
Texas Tech Police Capt. Amy Ivey told jurors she and another officer headed to the C-1 parking lot near the Jones Stadium after reports of a person matching Daniels' description was seen in the area.
She said the spotted Daniels in the parking lot, exited their vechicles armed with rifles and ordered the defendant to stop and lay on the ground.
"He stood and just spaced us," she said.
Second later, she said Daniels ran away, heading to the site of the former Lubbock Municipal coliseum where more officers chased him, eventually taking him to the ground.
As Daniels was being handcuffed Ivey said he began cursing at the officers, telling them, "---- the police" and "You know you want to shoot me."
She said Daniels also spat at another officer.
Ivey said once Daniels was in arrested, he was handed over to the Lubbock Police Department, who took the lead on the investigation.
Other officers who responded to the scene said they found what they believed to be the murder weapon hidden in a colorful box in a drainage area near Marsha Sharp Freeway near the Texas Tech Police Headquarters.
Easts' body worn camera was also found in pieces nearby.
After the shooting, Daniels' dorm room was searched a second time. Investigators with the Lubbock Police Department's Identification Unit found evidence consistent with the shots fired call Daniels' roommates reported to Tech PD.
Jurors were shown pictures of bullet damage on the floor of the room.
Detective David McGowen told jurors he believed the bullet shattered and fragments from the bullet struck parts of a wall and Daniels' bed frame.
Investigators would later find pieces of the bullet around the room and a spent .45 caliber shell casing in the trash can.
This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: Video of deadly shooting played in Hollis Daniels capital murder trial
