Louisville mayor wants body camera footage of Clifton police shooting released 'as soon as possible'

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Less than a week after Louisville Metro Police officers shot and killed a man in the Clifton neighborhood, the city's mayor is hopeful the department will give an update on the investigation soon.

Officers shot and killed James Monti, 47, on Frankfort Avenue Thursday, Aug. 3. At the scene that night, LMPD Chief Jacqueline Gwinn-Villaroel said officers were called to the 2000 block of New Main Street, off Frankfort Avenue, just before 10 p.m. on a report that shots had been fired. Shortly after arriving on scene, police reported that shots were being fired at them.

Police fired back, hitting Monti, who later died at University of Louisville Hospital.

LMPD is investigating itself in the shooting, not Kentucky State Police. KSP has statewide jurisdiction and investigates police shootings throughout the state at the request of local law enforcement agencies. In July 2020, former Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer announced that KSP would conduct independent investigations into LMPD shootings in an effort to improve public trust following the police killing of Breonna Taylor.

Previously, LMPD released body camera footage, names of officers involved, photos and employment files of officers within 24 hours of a police shooting.

The last time Louisville police shot and killed a person was June 19, when an undercover officer fatally shot a man police said was trying to rob him in the Portland neighborhood. KSP investigated the case, releasing body camera footage from the shooting 10 days later.

The last time LMPD investigated itself was in February, when an officer accidentally shot two teenagers in the city's Chickasaw neighborhood. At the time, the department said KSP "instructed LMPD to conduct the investigation" in that case. LMPD released body camera footage from the shooting nearly two weeks later.

Last week, Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg spoke about LMPD investigating itself in this case. He said the policy his administration inherited "did involve" KSP taking the lead on the investigation.

"But this is not the first officer-involved shooting this year," Greenberg said. "It has been done both ways already this year and so for this particular event, right now, LMPD is taking the lead in this investigation."

But the mayor didn't answer questions about whether or not LMPD is reversing its policy about investigating itself.

Monday, Greenberg said he expects LMPD to provide an update on the Clifton shooting investigation soon.

"I hope that we will be releasing body camera footage in the very near future. I want that to be released as soon as possible," he said. "I think that's incredibly important when you have situations like this that the public see and understand what happened."

LMPD has yet to release any information about when the body camera footage might be released, or when the next update might be.

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