Three police officers in Wilmington, N.C., have lost their jobs after the discovery of one of them saying in a video recording that it would take a civil war to eliminate Black people. While spewing the n-word, the officer also said  he was willing to “slaughter” them with an assault rifle he planned to buy.

The Wilmington Police Department fired Cpl. Jessie Moore, and officers Kevin Piner and Brian Gilmore after an audit of the video. 

The officers had been accused of standards of conduct violations, criticism and use of inappropriate jokes and slurs, the Associated Press reports.

“When I first learned of these conversations, I was shocked, saddened and disgusted,” Police Chief Donny Williams said at a Wednesday (June 24) news conference, on his first official day in his position. “There is no place for this behavior in our agency or our city and it will not be tolerated.”

The remarks came during a monthly audit on June 4 in which officials say they discovered a two-hour long video from Piner’s police vehicle camera that was classified as an “accidental activation” local station WWAY reported. In the footage, Piner was heard making racist comments about African Americans and recent nationwide protest marches. 

Further in the video, Piner and Gilmore are heard talking about protests in Wilmington and Piner offensively criticizes other officers and their handling of protesters. Later on, Piner and Moore are heard in a phone conversation with Moore using racial slurs, including the N-word and other racial comments, including some about a Black magistrate. Piner is also heard using slurs in the video.

According to a police report, in one part of the audio, Piner is heard saying that he is “ready” for a “civil war” and that he would be purchasing an assault rifle because society would be close to “martial law” and said that soon “we are just gonna go out and start slaughtering them “f*****g n*****s.” 

In another, Moore was heard talking about an arrest he had made of a Black woman, who he referred to as the N-word, saying she “needed a bullet in her head.”

After a review, each officer admitted their voices were the ones heard in the video and did not deny they were the ones who made the comments. The Wilmington City Council voted to make public the personnel files on each of the officers, which are normally kept private. 

The terminated officers will not be allowed to work for the city of Wilmington again.

Deborah Maxwell, the president of the New Hanover County, N.C., NAACP branch told WWAY she was satisfied with the city’s handling of the situation.

“Remember they did this,” she said. “Not anyone else. It was an internal cam on a car. It wasn’t Deborah the citizen who called them. So then we must commend them for taking care of their own business which took care of us.”