NEW ROCHELLE, NY — Alexa Watts is the woman who shot video of a police incident in New Rochelle where a white police officer drew his weapon on black youths in which she claimed the youths had guns pointed out that because they were having a snowball fight. She can be seen shooting the video in NRPD Dash Cam video obtained under a Freedom of Information request by Talk of the Sound.
She declined to be interviewed for this article. She was angry that her previous encounter with a reporter did not go as she had planned. Watts spoke with Thomas Laforgia, a freelance reporter whose article based on his interview with her appeared in The New York Daily News. http://m.nydailynews.com/new-york/new-rochelle-police-face-lawsuit-gun-incident-article-1.2111761
Watts did post comments on social media explaining what she saw that day, her reaction to the media coverage once the video went viral and comments to the press made by Deputy Commissioner Anthony Murphy.
“I don’t want media attention,” she told Talk of the Sound in refusing a request for an interview. “Tom [Laforgia] dishonored my wishes by publishing my full name for his story.”
EDITOR’S NOTE: LaForgia denies Watts’ claim. LaForgia has provided Talk of the Sound with an audio recording of his interview with Watts which he says makes clear that Watts understood that the interview was on the record and that her name would appear in the story. Her name and association with the video was made public by Watts herself: Watts Instagram account is WattsWorld. her gmail account which appears online is wattsalexa0@gmail.com, her name and photograph appear throughout her Instagram page.
Watts did address the issue on an exchange with her Instagram followers (shorthand and typos cleaned up for readability without altering the meaning; read the original here)
“I didn’t makeup the fact that there was a snowball fight,” she wrote. “How could I make that up right on the spot. I posted to my Instagram of which only has like 169 followers I didn’t post it on Facebook. I didn’t send it to a reporter, someone else did. No one is trying to embarrass the community. I didn’t ask for all this attention.
“I wasn’t lying and I’m not trying to cause mischief. No one contacted me to even ask for what exactly happened people just started posting it everywhere.”
“As they were walking home they were throwing snowballs at each other that is what was happening the cop showed up as they were walking and throwing snowballs at each other. Maybe he didn’t realize that what they were doing because the situation escalated so quickly but I was walking with them and that’s what they were doing. I wasn’t lying.”
Watts initially posted two video clips to Instagram. They were picked up and posted to Twitter and Facebook and forwarded to Talk of the Sound which ran a story that was picked up by media outlets around the world and went viral on social media where the video was viewed over 1 million times.
Her Instagram account and the videos are still online: