Shelby Police Officer Karson Hyder Fired and Charged After Doorbell Video Shows Him Punching Cherrie Moore During Arrest

The 22-year-old officer was suspended in hours, fired in a day, and charged with assault inflicting serious injury, and Cherrie Moore’s family has now retained civil rights attorney Ben Crump as the state reviews the case.

A doorbell camera in Shelby, North Carolina captured something the department could not explain away. On Friday, May 29, footage showed Shelby police officer Karson Hyder throwing 34-year-old Cherrie Moore to the ground, straddling her, and punching her repeatedly in the face while she cried out in pain and asked him to stop. Moore did not appear to be fighting back. A second officer stepped into frame and tried to pull Hyder off, saying he had her, before the punches finally stopped and Moore was handcuffed and lifted to her feet.

The video spread across social media within hours, and the response was immediate. Protests formed in Shelby that same day. By Friday night, Hyder had been placed on administrative suspension while internal affairs opened an investigation. By Saturday morning, he was fired. 

Shelby Police Chief Brad Fraser did not soften it. He called the officer’s actions disturbing and inappropriate, and said plainly that the inappropriate use of force would not be tolerated by him, the department, or the city. The findings were turned over to the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation for an independent review of any criminal violations, a step that keeps the case out of the hands of the same department that employed him.

On Monday, June 1, the accountability moved from administrative to criminal. Hyder, who is 22 years old, turned himself in to the Cleveland County Detention Center and was charged with assault inflicting serious injury. He was released on a $10,000 secured bond. According to a warrant, Hyder grabbed Moore by the arm, pushed her to the ground, and struck her in the face with a closed fist.

The department’s account of how the encounter began is its own. Fraser said officers were conducting a criminal investigation, tied to a breaking and entering call, when they came upon a woman they described as suspicious. A warrant alleged that Moore fled on foot and resisted, grabbing and ripping the officer’s uniform. What the warrant does not capture, and what the video does, is a 34-year-old woman pinned to the ground taking closed fist blows to the head from a man sworn to protect the public.

Moore’s family has said the footage was devastating to watch. Her uncle described seeing his niece thrown to the ground, and the detail that has stayed with people is her size. She weighs around 90 pounds. Moore told the officer during the arrest that she was off her mental health medication, and her attorney has said she is recovering and receiving treatment. A small woman in mental health crisis being beaten during an arrest is exactly the kind of moment that has driven a decade of reckoning over how police handle the most vulnerable people they encounter.

There is more to come. Moore was initially charged with breaking and entering, resisting a public officer, and assault on a government official, but the resisting and assault charges have since been dismissed. Court records also show that Hyder and Moore had a prior encounter before this one. And the family has retained Ben Crump, the civil rights attorney whose presence on a case tends to signal that it is headed for a national stage. Crump is scheduled to hold a press conference in Shelby on Tuesday.

What separates this case from so many others is the speed. Suspended in hours, fired in a day, charged within three. That pace does not undo what the camera caught, and it does not heal what Cherrie Moore is recovering from. But it is a different response than the silence and delay that families in these situations have come to expect. The doorbell camera did what too many official accounts have failed to do. It told the truth in real time, and this time the system moved.