Greenville sheriff releases body camera footage of K-9 stabbing | Greenville News

GREENVILLE — Deputies first attempted to use a Taser and BB gun to subdue a suspect wanted after he stabbed a police dog with a knife and fled to a nearby bank, where he was later shot and killed by officers, according to a video released by the Greenville County Sheriff's Office.

Three body camera clips were made public June 27 on YouTube as part of the sheriff's office's community information policy, which posts curated accounts of major incidents involving deputies 45 days after they occur.

Body camera footage is not subject to public records laws in South Carolina, although law enforcement can choose to release whatever they want.

On May 13, deputies and agents from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security waited near Woodlawn Cemetery on Pine Knoll Drive for a wanted suspect, James Edgar Hopkins IV, 51.

When Hopkins arrived, carrying a gym bag and unaware that law enforcement was waiting for him, the officers confronted him and asked him to show his hands and get on the ground. When Hopkins did not comply, a deputy deployed his police dog, named Micky.

Hopkins then pulled out a knife and stabbed the dog multiple times.

The deputy who deployed his dog rushed to pull him away while other deputies, some brandishing their firearms and others with a Taser or BB gun, began rushing toward Hopkins.

As Hopkins began to flee across the street, officers fired the Taser and BB gun, but that did not stop him. The deputy whose dog was stabbed turned with his pistol and fired two distant shots at Hopkins, missing him as he fled.

Deputies caught up with Hopkins across the street in a bank parking lot and asked him to drop the knife again.

“If you want to kill me, do it,” Hopkins said in the video.

At point-blank range, two deputies then fired eight shots at Hopkins from their rifles in the parking lot.

Hopkins was handcuffed and taken to the hospital, the sheriff's office said. Sheriff's Office spokesman Lt. Ryan Flood declined to comment on Hopkins' current condition, deferring to the state's law enforcement division. He is presumed to still be alive.

The police dog that was stabbed was rushed into surgery and has since recovered. A video posted by the sheriff's office on Facebook on June 26 shows him running and training.

Hopkins faces charges of aggravated breach of peace, cruelty to a police dog and resisting arrest with a deadly weapon, according to a SLED press release issued earlier this month.

First recent use of less-lethal methods to subdue armed suspect

The shooting is notable for the sheriff's office, which has consistently led the state in the number of officer-involved shootings in recent years. So far this year, the office has seen four shootings, three of them fatal. Last year, the office experienced four shootings.

In none of these previous shootings, until this one, have officers deployed less-lethal methods to subdue a suspect, such as a Taser or a bullet gun before shooting him.

Flood declined to say how often deputies deploy less-lethal methods during deputy-involved shootings.

On June 16, a man was fatally shot by a deputy after a disturbance in a West Greenville neighborhood. Sheriff Hobart Lewis later said deputies “must have shot him.”

SLED is continuing its investigation to determine whether the deputies were justified in shooting Hopkins. The sheriff's office's internal affairs department has cleared the deputies and said they were justified in using deadly force, according to the video.