Body camera video shows two Florida police officers dragged by suspect in a car

MOBILE, Ala. (WALA) - Police body camera video out of Fort Walton Beach, Florida is quick, but intense. It showed nine seconds of a nightmare for two Fort Walton Beach Police officers.

Chief Robert Bage said the officers were pulling Antonio Betts over for not yielding when they noticed he had a knife and drug paraphernalia in the car.

“The driver did not have his driver’s license or insurance card with him so the driver was trying to get someone to text a picture of the insurance card. While the driver was doing that, the officers were running the name that he had given to them and it pulled up a picture of someone who didn’t match the driver of the vehicle so they knew there was probably something wrong with the situation,” said Chief Bage.

Police said they asked Betts to step out. When he refused, police said they tried to pull him out and the rest, played out on the body cam clip.

Betts appeared to step on the gas while the officers were hanging on.

One of them managed to break free, but the other was still tangled up.

A police report said in those moments, Betts told one officer, “You’re going to die today”.

Thankfully that didn’t happen. The officer was able to stop the car, Bage said, and Betts was tased and arrested.

Bage said, “It’s just one of those things where mere inches or just a little bit different of a situation could have turned out a lot worse for the officers involved.”

The chief said his officers only had some minor cuts, bumps and scrapes and were back on the job that same day.

As for Betts, he’s looking at seven new charges, including attempted felony murder and aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and police said that’s on top of some probation violation warrants.

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