On Thursday, Louisville police released two video clips of the arrest of golfer Scottie Scheffler. His car can be seen slowly crawling through the crash scene before a police officer chased him, smashed his windshield and pulled him out of the driver’s seat to handcuff him.
Scheffler was arrested around 6 a.m. last Friday while on his way to the PGA Championships. He was accused of injuring a police officer who was directing traffic at the scene of the accident. He was also charged with second-degree assault, third-degree criminal damage to property, reckless driving and failure to obey traffic officers’ signals.
The clips released Thursday – one from a dashcam and one from a fixed pole – tell only part of the story, but seem to support the notion that the situation was an overreaction. The initial interaction between Scheffler and the officer was not recorded because Detective Bryan Gillis did not have his body camera turned on, violating departmental policy. Police have taken “corrective action” against him, Police Chief Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel said Thursday.
The footage from the mast shows Scheffler’s car slowly rolling toward the entrance of the Valhalla Golf Club. Earlier that morning, a shuttle bus had struck and killed a pedestrian in front of the gate. A police officer can be seen pursuing Scheffler’s car and catching it just as it comes to a stop.
The dashboard camera footage shows Scheffler driving his black Lexus around a bus and the police officer running him over and arresting him.
ESPN reporter Jeff Darlington, who was at the scene, said Scheffler mistook the police officers for security guards. When officers asked him to stop and he didn’t, “the officer hung onto the vehicle. Scheffler then drove another 30 feet before stopping the car,” Darlington said.
Scheffler later said it was “a very chaotic situation” and “there was a big misunderstanding about what I was supposed to do. I never had any intention of disobeying any instructions.”
According to an incident report viewed by TMZ, the officer claimed he had “pain, swelling and abrasions on his left wrist and knee” and his $80 pants were ruined.
After being photographed and warming up in the prison, Scheffler made it back to the golf course in time.
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