HEMPSTEAD, Texas — Texas authorities Tuesday released several hours of footage showing Sandra Bland during her three days in jail, saying they wanted to dispel rumors that she was dead before arriving there.
Waller County Judge Trey Duhon said such conspiracy theories — including one that Bland’s mug shot was taken after her death — have prompted death threats against county officials.
“Because of some of the things that’s gone out on social media, this county has been literally attacked,” he said at a news conference, adding that the FBI is investigating the most serious threats.
“Sandra Bland was alive and well” until she was found hanging July 13 in her cell at the Waller County Jail, Duhon said. Authorities have ruled that Bland’s death, three days after her arrest during a confrontational traffic stop, was a suicide.
The released video shows her arriving at the jail, being questioned by a jailer filling out forms, making phone calls, getting her mug shot taken, sleeping in her cell and being taken in and out.
She’s calm when she arrives at the jail, sometimes smiling and at one point putting her head in her hands. The jailer let her use the phone at the booking desk instead of the pay phone in her cell, and she was seen talking with animation during some of the calls. The video has no audio.
Authorities have said Bland — a black 28-year-old from suburban Chicago — hanged herself with a garbage bag, a finding that her family has questioned, saying she was happy. She was in custody for allegedly assaulting the white state trooper who pulled her over for an improper lane change.
The death has garnered national attention amid increased scrutiny of police treatment of blacks in the wake of several high-profile police-involved deaths.
