This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Tuesday, December 6, 2016. I'm Caleb Brown.

Two high-profile police shootings have now ended in mistrials.

That's despite the evidence provided by a police body camera and a bystanders

camera. Matthew Feeney, a policy analyst at the Cato Institute, says even in cases where

the camera appears to tell the tale, it's no guarantee of a conviction.

Part of the reason we have jury trials is because it is your peers and even if you are technically and by all rights guilty a jury can acquit and in the case of Walter Scott the man who was shot in the back by a cop as

Mr Scott was running away from the cop.

Juries are free to decide based on their consciences.

Yeah, the jury system is not perfect,

but it's an enduring legacy of the Anglo-American system that we have come used to

and in this particular case it's important for listeners to remember this was not a

acquittal this is a mistrial the jury was unable to come to a unanimous verdict.

The reporting suggests that it was one holdout juror who was unwilling to convict on either murder or voluntary manslaughter charges, which did seem like

appropriate charges.

Listeners might remember this case because it was made very famous by bystander video.

Michael Slager, the police officer, pulled over Walter Scott for a broken tail light.

Walter Scott then fled the scene and a scuffle ensued. And as you said, while

Walter Scott was running away, Michael Slager shot Walter Scott five times, hitting him

three times in the back, once in the ear and once in the

buttocks. Had that incident not been filmed I think it's unlikely that the case

would have achieved anywhere near the amount of attention it did.

But depressingly I think this is another reminder that just because you capture an incident

...