A Cincinnati county prosecutor released body cam footage of a police officer's "senseless" shooting of a motorist in the head—footage that paved the way for the University of Cincinnati police officer's murder indictment Wednesday.

Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters said Officer Ray Tensing "purposely killed" a 43-year-old motorist named Samuel DuBose on July 19. The officer, whom the university said had jurisdiction on the streets adjacent to the school, pulled over the motorist because the vehicle he was driving did not have a front license plate.

"I’ve been doing this for 30 years," Deters told a news conference. "This is the most asinine act I've ever seen a police officer make, totally unwarranted." The county prosecutor added that Tensing "purposely killed him."

The filmed incident, in which a white officer is accused of killing a black man, comes amid intense public scrutiny about the use of force by police officers in the wake of several high-profile shootings across the nation. Those incidents have prompted a movement of sorts for police to wear body cams and use dashcams in a bid to provide the public a level of accountability that otherwise would not have existed.

And in the Cincinnati case, DuBose's death would likely have been swept under the rug without the body cam footage.

The county prosecutor released the footage Wednesday following calls by DuBose's family to do so. The Associated Press had sued to get the short film, too, but the prosecutor released it ahead of any court ruling about it.

The university police said that the officer pulled over the motorist after following him briefly just south of campus.

According to the tape, the officer asks for the motorist's driver's license and instead is handed a small bottle of booze after a brief back and forth between the two. Suddenly, the officer yells "stop" and shoots the man in the head after the motorist begins making a getaway in the car, according to the tape. The vehicle then crashes into a pole up the street.

According to a tape of his radio call to dispatch, the officer yells "shots fired, shots fired."

"I almost got run over by the car," he said. "He took off on me. I discharged one round. Shot the man in the head."

A university officer who got to the scene immediately after the shooting wrote in his report that Tensing said "he was being dragged by the vehicle and had to fire his weapon." Another officer said he had witnessed Tensing being dragged.

But Deters, the county prosecutor, told the news conference that Tensing's account of the incident was fabricated.

"He fell backward after he shot," Deters said.

The officer, who surrendered Wednesday, faces a maximum life term if convicted.

Stewart Mathews, the officer's attorney, said an indictment was unwarranted but expected nevertheless "given the political climate."

Listing image by Officer Ray Tensing