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Video: Body camera footage of disputed police confrontation with RI FF

Providence City Public Safety Commissioner Steven M. Paré said he does not believe officers racially profiled Firefighter Terrell Paci, who was on duty during the incident

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By Laura French

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Police have released body camera footage of officers’ encounter with a black firefighter who said he was racially profiled while on duty.

The video shows two Providence police officers approaching a red sedan parked outside a fire station with their guns drawn, and Providence Firefighter Terrell Paci can be seen opening the passenger’s side door, saying “You’re really doing this to me?” and “I’m a Providence f---ing firefighter.”

Providence Public Safety Commissioner Steven M. Paré held a news conference over Zoom on Tuesday to announce the results of an internal review of the incident, saying he does not believe racial profiling was a factor but that one of the officers will be disciplined for failing to activate his body camera during the encounter, according to the Providence Journal.

According to Paré, Paci was sitting in the passenger’s side seat of the vehicle wearing a Providence Fire Department T-shirt and hat and a woman was sitting in the driver’s seat. Paci initially said he was a police officer before identifying himself as a Providence firefighter, which Paré said he believes was an accident during a stressful situation. The officers performed a search of the car after the initial encounter.

Officials say Officers Matthew Sandorse and Nathaniel Colicci were searching for suspects in an armed robbery on June 3 who were described by the robbery victim as two Latino men in a red car. Paré told reporters he did not believe race was a factor in the officers’ decision to approach Paci and that they approached him based on the description of the car.

Paré also said that the officers should not have searched the vehicle after realizing that Paci and his companion were not suspects in the robbery but that the search was legal. Colicci’s body camera recorded the incident and Sandorse will face disciplinary action for failing to turn his body camera on, the commissioner said.

Paci said in an interview with WPRI-TV at a protest two days after the incident that he believed he was racially profiled and that a Providence police sergeant had come to the fire station a few hours after the encounter to apologize.

Following Paré's news conference, Providence Fire Fighters IAFF Local 799 released a statement saying Paci’s account matched the body camera footage and that police owed him an apology. The Providence Fraternal Order of Police Lodge #3 released a statement after the conference saying Paci’s main allegations against the officers were “wholly disproven” and that the firefighters’ union owed officers an apology for “inflammatory statements.”

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