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The true crime category has an innovative format, or perhaps even a completely fresh vocabulary and grammar: police body cam footage. Countenances of those harmed, witnesses and potential offenders appear suddenly to the cameras, sometimes in the intense brightness of vehicle beams or flashlights as the officers approach, their faces and voices expressing caution or fear or indignation or suspiciously contrived innocence. And we often incidentally glimpse the faces of the officers themselves, one waiting impassively while the other conducts the inquiry with what sometimes seems like extraordinary diffidence – though maybe this is because they know they are being recorded.

A Growing Trend in Non-Fiction Cinema

We have previously seen the streaming service real-life crime film The Gabby Petito Case, about the slaying of an Instagram influencer by her partner, whose primary focus was officer recordings and in which, as in this film, the police seemed surprisingly lenient with the perpetrator. There is also the acclaimed short film Incident by Bill Morrison, composed entirely of officer footage. Now comes a new film by Geeta Gandbhir about the grim case of Ajike Owens in a city in Florida, a African American woman whose four young kids allegedly harassed and antagonized her neighbor, a local resident. 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 closed front door, when the victim went to the neighbor's residence to address her about hurling items at her children.

The Police Inquiry and State Laws

The investigating authorities found proof that the suspect had done internet searches into Florida’s “stand your ground” laws, which permit residents and others to use firearms if there is a significant presumption of danger. The documentary constructs its narrative with the body cam footage captured during the repeated police visits to the scene before the shooting, and then at the horrific and chaotic crime scene itself – introduced by 911 audio material of Lorincz contacting authorities in a melodramatically shaky voice. There is also police cell footage of Lorincz which has a disturbing, unsettling appeal.

Portrayal of the Accused

The film does not really suggest anything too complicated about Lorincz, or any extenuating circumstance. She is clearly unstable, although the children are heard calling her “the Karen”, an hurtful taunt. The production is presented as an example of how “stand your ground” laws generate senseless and tragic violence. But the fact of firearm possession and the second amendment (that historic American constitutional privilege that a deceased pundit notoriously said made gun deaths a price worth paying) is not much emphasized.

Officer Questioning and Gun Culture

It is possible to watch the officer questioning segments here and feel surprised at how minimal concern the officers took in this aspect. At what time did she purchase the firearm? Did she receive any instruction on handling it? Had she ever had occasion to fire it before? How was the gun kept in her home? Was it just on the couch, loaded and ready? 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 gun ownership so normal it would be like asking about microwaves or bread heaters?

Arrest and Aftermath

For what seemed to her local residents a very long time, Lorincz was not even taken into custody and indicted, only held and even provided accommodation away from home for the night (another parallel, incidentally, with the Gabby Petito case). And when she was ultimately formally arrested in the holding cell, there is an remarkable scene in which the individual simply declines to rise, refuses to put her wrists out for the cuffs, not hostilely, but with the courteously pathetic demeanor of someone whose mental health means that she is unable to comply. Had the kid-gloves treatment up until that point led her to think that this might actually work?

Conclusion and Verdict

It didn’t; and the jury’s verdict is revealed in the end titles. A deeply sobering picture of U.S. justice and consequences.