Source: NBC News / NBC News
A Cincinnati, Ohio police officer is in hot water after being caught on video using the N-word. She claimed to investigators afterward that she wasn’t referring to all African-Americans at that moment.
According to reports, Officer Rose Valentino was attempting to pull into the parking lot of the police department’s district office in the West Price Hill neighborhood on April 5th. She got agitated because of the traffic backup due to parents picking up children from Western Hills University High School nearby. Her body camera was on, capturing her putting on sirens to compel drivers to move. Valentino then rolled down her window and shouted at a driver, who was Black, to move their vehicle. A 16-year-old student walking by flipped her off, and Valentino then furiously rolled up her window. “Oh, I hate them so much,” she said, punching the steering wheel. “I hate this f—–g world. F—–g n*****s, I fucking hate them.” The officer cut off her body camera afterward.
The footage, according to local news network WKRC, was not found until police were combing through the department’s body camera logs in response to a discovery request. Valentino was brought in to speak to the Internal Investigations Section and claimed that she doesn’t have any racial biases. According to documents detailing the interview, she also claimed that ‘[expletive] [N-words]’ was not intended to refer to all African-Americans, but was specifically and narrowly in reference to the teenager walking down the sidewalk after school.” Valentino went on to state that she was “desensitized to racially offensive language by music and hearing people talk on the street.” She also claimed it was part of a “mental episode.”
The interim City Manager, John Curp, released a statement upon the release of the video: “I agree with the Chief’s decision to suspend the officer’s police powers while the disciplinary hearing process is ongoing. Officer Valentino will not be on city streets in uniform, wearing a badge, or carrying a firearm.” It’s not Valentino’s first scandalous act – the officer had been reprimanded for showing body camera footage from a homicide case to family members in 2019 and was arrested the following year for assaulting her brother and sister-in-law. Valentino was also named in a federal lawsuit against the city in 2019 by a Black realtor and homebuyer for racial discrimination.
