David MacMain was interviewed and quoted in a June 20, 2019 article in The Washington Post regarding the accuracy and reliability of videos of police use of force incidents, and why they only tell part of the actual story of what occurred:
Experts caution that video footage of police shootings can remain incomplete and, even if capturing an entire incident, might not definitively answer what an officer saw at that moment.
“The officer’s judged by what he or she reasonably sees or perceives,” said David J. MacMain, a former Pennsylvania state trooper and attorney who represents law enforcement officers in civil cases.
MacMain also said that when videos are released publicly, the encounters are dissected in a different way than officers perceive them while they unfold.
“We all get to look at it 20 times over and replay and zoom in and zoom out,” MacMain said. “Officers have to make split-second decisions, and we all get to critique it over the next four, five, six, seven months.”