This still image from the body camera video released by West Valley City Police shows an apartment resident trapped between flames and his own window, just before police helped him escape to safety. The expense of storing body camera footage has become a concern for departments evaluating whether to keep them.
WEST VALLEY CITY — Body cam video from two officers who helped evacuate a burning apartment complex during a two-alarm fire shows the tense situation as flames roared and residents escaped to safety.
In the first body camera clip, viewers see the perspective of Officer Oscar DeLeon. Flames are visible in a second-story window as DeLeon approaches a man standing at a window there.
“Hey, whose car is this one?” DeLeon asks as he directs a fellow officer to use his cruiser to knock down a fence and park under the window so the man can jump to his car’s roof.
“Right here! Let’s go. Let’s go!” DeLeon shouts, urging the police cruiser through the fence.
Next, he and other officers encourage that man, who appears to be trapped between flames in the second-floor apartment and his window, to jump to safety on top of that police car.
“Let’s go, come on,” DeLeon says, reaching toward the man above him. “I gotcha, I gotcha. Jump!”
Multiple officers can be seen positioning themselves under the window, offering to help catch the man. Eventually, they help him lower himself to the ground and ask him if he is all right.
“Put your shoe on, and let’s go,” DeLeon says after the man is safely down. It appears he fled his apartment with just one shoe on.
In the second clip, viewers are watching the perspective of Officer Joshua Cook, who was the first officer on the scene and the first to report the fire. Cook’s body cam shows him driving his cruiser through the fence while DeLeon and other officers assist the man in the second-floor apartment.
“Am I clear?” Cook shouts after the rescue is complete.
“Go, go, go, go!” another officer shouts, giving Cook the go-ahead to back his cruiser away from the window.
“OK, I can’t see!” Cook responds.
The fire, a two-alarm blaze, appears to have destroyed most of the apartment building’s roof. Investigators believe an electrical problem in one of the apartments started the fire.