Newly released bodycam footage shows the terrifying moment a Fort Smith, Arkansas, police officer was shot in the neck during a DWI investigation — an encounter that quickly turned into a high-speed pursuit and ended with the suspect being fatally shot by police.
The May 17 incident began around 1:23 a.m. near the McClure Amphitheater in Fort Smith, where officers were dealing with a group of juveniles when they noticed a white pickup truck stuck in a nearby ditch. Officer Kyle Newman approached the vehicle and began investigating the driver, 27-year-old Joshua Keller, for suspected driving while intoxicated.
The newly released footage shows Newman speaking with Keller for several minutes, conducting a field sobriety investigation and eventually telling him he was being detained.
Keller then became argumentative, got back into the truck and tried to leave, according to Fort Smith Police. When Newman attempted to pull him from the vehicle, police say Keller produced a handgun and shot the officer in the neck.
The bodycam captures the chaos that followed.
A gunshot is heard, Newman falls and can be seen bleeding while struggling to breathe. Despite being critically wounded, he returned fire toward the fleeing truck. Another officer at the scene heard the gunfire, fired at Keller’s vehicle and then rushed to help Newman.
WATCH THE VIDEO BELOW:
Keller sped away, triggering a pursuit onto Interstate 540.
Authorities said he reached speeds of up to 110 mph and at one point intentionally drove the wrong way on the interstate, creating what prosecutors later described as a serious threat to officers and other motorists.
The chase ended near the Grand Avenue exit after police vehicles made contact with Keller’s truck.
Officers Ryan Grayham and Dawson Tabor opened fire after the crash, according to the prosecutor’s later review. Keller died at the scene, and police recovered a handgun from inside his truck.
The Arkansas State Police investigated the officers’ use of deadly force.
On Sept. 3, Twelfth Judicial District Prosecuting Attorney Daniel Shue ruled that all four Fort Smith officers who fired their weapons — Newman, Billy Marts, Grayham and Tabor — were legally justified.
Shue said the officers were facing what they reasonably perceived to be an imminent threat of serious injury or death.
He also warned that if police had not stopped Keller at the end of the pursuit, the case could instead have ended with the death of an officer or an innocent driver traveling on I-540.
An autopsy later found Keller’s blood-alcohol concentration was more than three times the legal limit, according to local reporting.
Newman’s own survival became one of the most remarkable parts of the case.
He remained in critical but stable condition in the days after the shooting and spent weeks recovering from the neck wound before eventually returning home.
He has since returned to work with the Fort Smith Police Department and was awarded the department’s Medal of Valor and Purple Heart for his actions during the incident.
Fort Smith Police released the first batch of video on Sept. 14 but stressed that it represents only part of the evidence.
The department says a substantial amount of additional video still needs to be processed. An internal review is also underway to determine whether officers followed department policies and procedures. That review is separate from the prosecutor’s decision that the use of deadly force was justified
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