- Tuesday, May 06, 2025
The officer, Daniel Auderer, was heard saying the victim had “limited value” after one of his colleagues allegedly hit her while speeding, causing her death.
By: Shubham Ghosh
A POLICE officer in Seattle has come under the scanner after a recent bodycam footage revealed that he laughed and joked about the death of a young woman of Indian origin who was hit and killed by a police car.
The officer, Daniel Auderer, allegedly said that the victim had “limited value” and the city should “just write a check”, the New York Post reported.
According to the news report, the officer could be heard in the video talking about the probe into the accident involving the woman, Jaahnavi Kandula, a 23-year-old grad student, who was allegedly hit and killed by the former’s colleague Kevin Dave with his speeding vehicle in January this year.
“She is dead,” Auderer said before bursting out laughing. “No, it’s a regular person,” he added, referring to Kandula.
Also towards the end of the video, Auderer was heard saying, while bursting out into laughter, “Yeah, just write a check. Eleven thousand dollars. She was 26 anyway.”
“She had limited value,” he added.
Auderer, who is also the vice president of the Seattle Police Guild, said that he did not think a criminal probe was being undertaken, the Post added.
Speaking about the accident, Auderer also defended his colleague saying he was driving at 50 miles per hour (mph) which was “not out of control” and refused to admit that it was reckless.
However, as per a report which was released in June, Dave was actually driving at 74 mph in a zone permitting the limit of 25 mph while responding to a different “high priority call”, Seattle-based media outlet KIRO 7 reported.
Auderer reached the scene of the crash to conduct a drug test on the accused police officer.
Timestamps on the bodycam footage suggested that his call to another colleague about the incident happened on the evening of January 24, the Post report added.
The footage showed that Dave did not run his car’s siren continuously and hit Kandula, who was a student of master’s of science information systems at the Seattle campus of Northeastern University.
The victim was set to complete her graduation in December.
Dave reportedly performed CPR on the student but in vain. Video of the shocking footage of Auderer’s words came a day after the fatal accident was uploaded on the YouTube page of Seattle Police Department.
The Seattle Police Department released the video, including Auderer’s comments “in the interest of transparency” and said it will not issue any statement on the issue till the Office of Police Accountability completed its probe into the incident.
Seattle’s civilian-led Community Police Commission told the Post, “The people of Seattle deserve better from a police department that is charged with fostering trust with the community and ensuring public safety.”
