Current Affairs The " another shooting in America " thread

[PhilM]

Sorry but anyone that shoots someone in the back 7 times is not using any sort of dynamic risk assessment.

Really? I'm not being crass, but it's really easy to say that in such certainty without thinking of the wider possibilities, options or consequences.

Purely hypothetical: if you went into a room and an adult was on top of a child, with their back to you, with a knife actively trying to stab them to kill them.

You're stood over ten yards away and are armed: do you run over and try to detain? Do you reach for a baton, CS spray or Taser? Or do you shoot in them the back?

Sorry, I know what I'd do until they were no longer a threat and I say that unashamedly. Obviously, the events of the other day are a totally different scenario...

... but in that situation the use of lethal force would not just be justified, but arguably a necessity. It's a big step to take someone's life, but sometimes it's needed.

 

[Nymzee]

Really? I'm not being crass, but it's really easy to say that in such certainty without thinking of the wider possibilities, options or consequences.

Purely hypothetical: if you went into a room and an adult was on top of a child, with their back to you, with a knife actively trying to stab them to kill them.

You're stood over ten yards away and are armed: do you run over and try to detain? Do you reach for a baton, CS spray or Taser? Or do you shoot in them the back?

Sorry, I know what I'd do until they were no longer a threat and I say that unashamedly. Obviously, the events of the other day are totally different scenario...

... but in that situation the use of lethal force would not just be justified, but arguably a necessity. It's a big step to take someone's life, but sometimes it's needed.

But this guy opened a car door and leant inside to do something - no one knew what - not stood over someone trying to kill them.

Cute analogy but completely pointless.

 

[Tubey]

Really? I'm not being crass, but it's really easy to say that in such certainty without thinking of the wider possibilities, options or consequences.

Purely hypothetical: if you went into a room and an adult was on top of a child, with their back to you, with a knife actively trying to stab them to kill them.

You're stood over ten yards away and are armed: do you run over and try to detain? Do you reach for a baton, CS spray or Taser? Or do you shoot in them the back?

Sorry, I know what I'd do until they were no longer a threat and I say that unashamedly. Obviously, the events of the other day are a totally different scenario...

... but in that situation the use of lethal force would not just be justified, but arguably a necessity. It's a big step to take someone's life, but sometimes it's needed.

This is the part that truly baffles me. There are people on here who genuinely, with no semblance of irony, seem to believe the police cannot wait to shoot black people. Any excuse. Absolutely dying to do it.

That cop has been labelled a racist, a maniac, a murderer with quite literally zero evidence for any of it.

 

[Tubey]

But this guy opened a car door and leant inside to do something - no one knew what - not stood over someone trying to kill them.

Cute analogy but completely pointless.

But it's not! In both scenarios the shooter has one second to determine risk. What if that isn't a knife but something that looked like a knife? What if it wasn't a child but a doll and the guy was trying to cut something loose from it?

All determinations, all based on probabilities.

The probability in this case is that a man - ignoring police instruction, resisting arrest, throwing off a taser and then leaning into his car for some reason - is doing so for a reason, and the cop can reasonably assume that reason is to retrieve something to continue resisting. He had 1 second to decide whether he wanted to find out and possibly take a bullet in his head, or erase all doubt and go home to his family. He took the option any of us would have taken hand on heart in that scenario, whether you like to admit it to yourself or not.

 

[Connor]

Absolutely wild some of the thoughts being put out here

 

[Mr. White]

If you see somebody go into a car and your first reaction is to fill them full of bullets, you have absolutely no business being a police officer, let alone one with the ability to kill based on your split second reactions

Generally, what happens is that when a police office points a gun at you, they'll tell you to keep your hands up, and up where they can see them. So, just keep your hands up where they can see them.

If you reach into your pocket, you'll get shot. If you reach into your jacket, you'll get shot.... Likewise, if you turn around and reach towards where the officers can't see, into a vehicle for example, you'll get shot.

They don't have the luxury of waiting to see what weapon is pointing at them before they have to make a split second, life changing decision.

 

[Nymzee]

But it's not! In both scenarios the shooter has one second to determine risk. What if that isn't a knife but something that looked like a knife? What if it wasn't a child but a doll and the guy was trying to cut something loose from it?

All determinations, all based on probabilities.

The probability in this case is that a man - ignoring police instruction, resisting arrest, throwing off a taser and then leaning into his car for some reason - is doing so for a reason, and the cop can reasonably assume that reason is to retrieve something to continue resisting. He had 1 second to decide whether he wanted to find out and possibly take a bullet in his head, or erase all doubt and go home to his family. He took the option any of us would have taken hand on heart in that scenario, whether you like to admit it to yourself or not.

So you’re telling me, if you were that police officer, and the man opened the car door and leant inside, with zero knowledge of what he was getting/doing, you’d have shot him in the back 7 times?

 

[Nymzee]

I thought only yanks were mental but turns out the English are too.

 

[Khalekan]

But this guy opened a car door and leant inside to do something - no one knew what - not stood over someone trying to kill them.

Cute analogy but completely pointless.

Particularly as the bullet might very well pass right through the assailant and kill the child as well.

 

[d34noj]

They had more than one second come off it now.

Plus the cop in the other side could see what he was doing. Why didn't he shoot first?

Again being an idiot doesn't mean being filled by bullets.

The cops have to wait to see a weapon. They cannot presume he has reached or grabbed one.

Even if he grabbed a weapon he still would have had to turn his body and come up. They then could have reacted. They are trained and I bet the guy was no John Wayne.

Anyway there was no gun in the car and if they had suspected that they should have secured the vehicle and not let him back into it.

No they don't and yes they can. Police in America are legally entitled to shoot to kill a known felon if they feel in imminent danger.

You are filling this thread with 'what if's' - they could have reacted? How do you know? If they had suspected there was a gun? Who was there to secure both the car and the felon if 2 of them can't contain him? Even after being tasered?

Sorry mate but in America if you have a criminal record for firearms offences, resist arrest multiple times and reach into a car - I'd say thats being an idiot, and that's legal grounds to be shot.

Oh and the doors on the vehicle aren't transparent, so the other officer obviously couldn't see what he was doing could he.

 

[Nymzee]

What if a guy was leaning in to get his license? To turn a radio down? To grab a wallet? Are we now to assume it must be for a weapon and we must empty the clip into them.

 

[PhilM]

But this guy opened a car door and leant inside to do something - no one knew what - not stood over someone trying to kill them.

Cute analogy but completely pointless.

It's not pointless because you made the following black and white or binary statement:

Sorry but anyone that shoots someone in the back 7 times is not using any sort of dynamic risk assessment.

In that situation, would a dynamic risk assessment in that split second justify discharging a weapon even without warning? Even seven times? My point was yes.

In the situation we're talking about I am nowhere near as certain that it would be justified, but my point is that you can be justified to do so with a fair assessment.

It's like the ol' Andromeda* guidelines where here in the UK an officer could, without warning, justifiably and legally shoot you in the head with the intention to kill if...

... you're believed to be carrying an explosive device with the belief it will be used. Why is it allowed? A dynamic risk assessment says it's the best course of action.

*Clydesdale and Beach too, under Kratos. Now it's called something different.

 

[Nymzee]

Let’s just wait to hear some testimonies from the victim and the copper.

 

[Tubey]

So you’re telling me, if you were that police officer, and the man opened the car door and leant inside, with zero knowledge of what he was getting/doing, you’d have shot him in the back 7 times?

Absolutely, because you're ignoring the key point - that same man has resisted arrest, thrown off a taser, ignored police instruction and then went to reach into his car.

It didn't happen in a vacuum. He wasn't just standing there one second and then turn round and open his car door - he decided to ignore the police specifically to go into his car for a reason.

If it were me as that cop, I'm not waiting for him to turn around and see what the reason was. He could have been reaching for a chocolate bar, it wouldn't matter - he got told not to do it in a country where everyone and their mother has a gun. It turned out he had a knife, exactly in the area he was reaching, but it hardly matters, the cop was right to shoot him regardless.

 

[BlueTX]

It absolutely baffles me that people can't see it any other way than this.

Probably because those of a different view on the matter have seen similar incidents where the person disobeying orders in a similar manner wasn't shot so there is clearly room for a different judgment in such moments and we hold, as we should, a higher level of expectation in such moments for officers of the law.