A month after a man was killed during a Houston police pursuit off Highway 6, his family is challenging the department's account of that night and demanding to see more of what happened. The man who died has been identified as Ibrahim Abbasway.
The dispute now centers on video. The family and their attorney went to Houston Police Department headquarters expecting to be shown the full footage, but say they were met with only about six minutes of what they are calling edited video, and add that they are not even sure the department has dash cam footage.
Police have laid out their version of events. HPD says Abbasway was in a stolen car alongside two other people on July 1st, traveling down Highway 6 moments after a crash, and that he was pronounced dead at the scene.
The case has produced serious charges. One of the suspects originally detained at the scene, Stephen Molina, is now facing three felony charges, including unauthorized use of a vehicle, evading arrest and murder for the death of Abbasway, and his bond was denied.
The family tells a very different story about how Abbasway died. They are adamant that a police cruiser is the vehicle that struck theirs and ultimately caused his death, saying a first cruiser stopped and avoided the crash while the cruiser behind it struck him.
According to the family, what could be heard on the body camera was not how fast police were traveling but how fast they believed the suspect was going, which was 120 miles an hour. They say Abbasway had gotten out of the vehicle and was on foot when police hit him, and that he was knocked over the bridge and pronounced dead at the scene.
Their grievances extend to how they were treated afterward. The family says the coroner's office told them Abbasway lay at the scene for six hours, and that they were never contacted by the police department, learning what had happened only from the coroner's office later, after the father spent days trying to find his son.
Key questions remain unanswered. The family is still waiting on Houston police to release the full video, and the department has not yet detailed its policy on when officers decide to begin, continue or end a pursuit.