Bodycam footage from a brand-new Netflix documentary is forcing viewers to press pause on the film due to how intense and upsetting it is.
Netflix is well known for producing true crime documentaries that leave viewers shocked and lead to viewers revisiting the cases behind them.
This most recently happened with Netflix’s Amy Bradley documentary, which saw the FBI revisiting the case after renewed interest in the 1998 cruise ship disappearance.
Now, however, Netflix’s newest hit documentary is a sobering look at the 2023 shooting of Ajike Owens.
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Owens was shot by her neighbour Susan Lorincz, someone who described herself as the ‘perfect neighbour’.
Lorincz claimed she was defending her home under Stand Your Ground laws, and her arguments of self-defense are shown in footage from The Perfect Neighbour. She was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 25 years in prison.
The documentary focuses on the events leading up to and immediately following Lorincz’s shooting of Owens using police bodycam footage and recordings from witnesses accessed under freedom of information requests.
Sitting at a perfect 100 percent on Rotten Tomatoes critics have praised the thoughtful and shocking documentary, with the doc’s director Geeta Gandbhir saying she wanted to ‘flip the bodycam footage on its head’.
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She said in an interview with Variety: “Police bodycam footage is usually used to surveil communities.
“It’s used to defend the police. For people of colour and for vulnerable communities, it’s used to criminalize us.
“To dehumanize us. It’s a tool of surveillance, and I wanted to take it and flip it back, subverting it to show this beautiful community as it was before.
“Like really use the footage – and we shouldn’t have to do this – to humanize the people in that community.”
One particular section of the documentary however has been leaving viewers devastated.
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Bodycam footage from the incident shows the moment that Owens family are informed that she has been shot, including her children.
One viewer posted to Reddit about how shocking they found it that the footage shows how this can happen in any given neighbourhood.
In the comments below this one viewer said: “When the dad had to tell the children their mother wasn’t coming back… worst ever.”
Another commented: “It was horrible wasn't it. One of the most upsetting things I've seen on TV, it's like we were just there. I had to stop for a bit.”
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The footage is heartbreaking, featuring her children being informed by their father that Ajike had died.
One viewer commented on another Reddit thread about the moment, saying: “Poor kids. Cried so much when they cried.”
One of Owens’ four children, Israel, was standing next to her when she was shot by her neighbour.
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Israel and Ajike had gone to her house in part to confront her for calling Ajike’s children racial slurs, something she admitted to in the arrest affidavit.
Speaking to USA Today, Ajike’s mother said the documentary was ‘more than just our pain and our tragedy and our suffering, and it's more than my daughter being murdered’.
She added: “It's a message about racism, bias, how guns in the wrong hands can turn deadly, weaponizing laws like Stand Your Ground.
“So I realized that I had a responsibility to share my daughter's story if I ever expected true change.”
A Perfect Neighbour is available to stream on Netflix now.
Topics: Netflix, True Crime, US News, TV and Film, Film, Documentaries
Michael Slavin