If you feel the need to post a reaction to the news, post a comment on the youtube video. Don't bring it here. This thread is for a discussion on the topic, and your post better have substance to it. Low content posts will be met with moderator action.
Here is a good post by someone with experience in escalation of force training. Read that too. This post might change your opinion of in the incident.
On January 26 2012 01:08 maartendq wrote: I still don't get why police officers world wide don't get extensive training in martial arts like Jiu Jitsu or Aikido, or just any martial art that specializes in dealing with weapons like knives, crowbars etc. With extensive, I mean black belt level, not just once in a week. It would give those officers way more confidence to deal with situations such as these. Ideally, police officers are never in shock at anything happening to them. Being in shock leads to irrational decision-taking, which is almost always a bad thing.
And tazers are just nasty. I never understood why these things were ever made legal in the first place.
Do you know what's the basics of self-defence against a knife (or other weapon) in Jiu Jitsu or Aikido? Run away. Hardly something you'd expect police officers to do. Anyway, when they finally do teach you how to defend yourself against a knife it's 99% bullshit. Knife > bare hands 99% of the time, also the techniques are very unreliable in real life situation. In a situation where someone actually knows how to handle a knife, bare hands lose 100% of the time (with a proper knife stance it's impossible to disarm you without giving you ample opportunity to thrust your knife several times at least).
Perhaps you should go tell that to the Japanese police. Those guys are trained intensively in abovementioned martial arts, and then some.
What people don't seem to realize is that these martial arts were once rather effective on battlefields, when people were swinging swords, daggers and whatnot at your face. Those arts were used by people whose job it was to kill others. They have enormous potential but you need to TRAIN yourself (and stop looking at silly youtube videos). Of course, in an age where every other Joe invents his own training system because he thinks he's awesome, good and experienced teachers are few and far between. Actually, it wouldn't be bad if those schools were attacked by others once in a while to test how good they were, but we like to believe we're more civilized nowadays.
It would be ironic that martial arts that were once known for their battlefield effectiveness would advise you to "run away" when somone produces a knife, wouldn't it, especially since both have quite a few disarmament techniques in their repertoire.
I'm not saying that extensive martial arts training should replace guns, batons or tazers (though I consider the latter to be way too prone to abuse to be allowed to be legal), but they may give officers a healthy dose of confidence many of them seem to lack.
On January 26 2012 01:08 maartendq wrote: I still don't get why police officers world wide don't get extensive training in martial arts like Jiu Jitsu or Aikido, or just any martial art that specializes in dealing with weapons like knives, crowbars etc. With extensive, I mean black belt level, not just once in a week. It would give those officers way more confidence to deal with situations such as these. Ideally, police officers are never in shock at anything happening to them. Being in shock leads to irrational decision-taking, which is almost always a bad thing.
And tazers are just nasty. I never understood why these things were ever made legal in the first place.
Do you know what's the basics of self-defence against a knife (or other weapon) in Jiu Jitsu or Aikido? Run away. Hardly something you'd expect police officers to do. Anyway, when they finally do teach you how to defend yourself against a knife it's 99% bullshit. Knife > bare hands 99% of the time, also the techniques are very unreliable in real life situation. In a situation where someone actually knows how to handle a knife, bare hands lose 100% of the time (with a proper knife stance it's impossible to disarm you without giving you ample opportunity to thrust your knife several times at least).
Perhaps you should go tell that to the Japanese police. Those guys are trained intensively in abovementioned martial arts, and then some.
What people don't seem to realize is that these martial arts were once rather effective on battlefields, when people were swinging swords, daggers and whatnot at your face. Those arts were used by people whose job it was to kill others. They have enormous potential but you need to TRAIN yourself (and stop looking at silly youtube videos). Of course, in an age where every other Joe invents his own training system because he thinks he's awesome, good and experienced teachers are few and far between. Actually, it wouldn't be bad if those schools were attacked by others once in a while to test how good they were, but we like to believe we're more civilized nowadays.
It would be ironic that martial arts that were once known for their battlefield effectiveness would advise you to "run away" when somone produces a knife, wouldn't it, especially since both have quite a few disarmament techniques in their repertoire.
I'm not saying that extensive martial arts training should replace guns, batons or tazers (though I consider the latter to be way too prone to abuse to be allowed to be legal), but they may give officers a healthy dose of confidence many of them seem to lack.
I would also like to add that... how many criminals do you really think know a "proper knife stance" or any technique at all? I'm pretty sure most criminals with weapons are barely trained, if at all.
On January 25 2012 15:27 Curu wrote: Dunno if it's been posted already but this immediately came to mind:
Justified IMO. If you blatantly disregard multiple warnings and make any indication you are going for a weapon you deserve to be shot.
(Warning the video will make you feel like shit afterwards)
Oh fuck. Why did I watch that? Thats going to ruin my whole afternoon. Really disturbing to listen to someone get shot, almost worse than actually seeing it.
On January 26 2012 02:01 LeKiNGG wrote: - People who say they could have shot in the legs or arms or just ignorant, sadly. With a 9MM handgun, its near impossible in a situation of stress like this one to shoot from 10 feet away exactly in the hand or the legs. Even if you shot him in the legs, in can very easily kill him if he runs out of blood. It happened in the past thats why you shoot in the chest now. I mean... shooting in a moving hand which is handling a crowbar and the guy also moves, without any chance of the bullet not hitting him and perhaps killing somone else on the other side of the street?? Who would take that risk... no one.
- An important part missing in the video is what the two police officers were saying to the suspect. If you tell someone to dont cross a line 20 times, but the guy still goes along, gives you a good indication of his intentions, but we cant hear anything ont he video.
1. They were in a triangle position, Suspects body was perpendicular to Cop 1 (taser cop), while Cop 2 had a full view of his body and was following everything closely. He had a shot to the legs or shoulders. If anyone argues that that is impossible in real life, that is equal to saying that these cops are not getting the right training. He is literally 2 feet away, a properly trained cop could hit bullseye from that distance, especially one as wide as a human being flat in front of him. I see this as a failure in training, or there was too much nerves to react properly and do as he is trained, instead reacting on adrenaline and summoning an primal response of defense no matter what (which is also part of proper training).
2. If I were a criminal, Id rather be shot on the legs and rish death by blood loss than being shot in the body and be dead any second.
3. Yes, hearing the audio would give us much light on much of the disagreements we have in this thread.
Hey everybody, when you attack a cop with a crowbar and other cops have guns pointed at you, YOU WILL GET SHOT NO QUESTIONS ASKED. Do you think any cop is gonna care enough to aim for legs or arms? NO! The risk of missing and harming an innocent bystander(which there were PLENTY of) is way too high and this fool will not be the cause for anyone other than himself to get hurt, and that is the officer's primary responsibility. He got shot 5 times and still didnt fall to the ground, this probably means he is trying to fight back. Here is a quick lesson: When a cop shoots you WITH A TASER, you fall to the ground whether you got shocked or not, cause at this point you are officially busted. However, if a cop shoots you WITH A GUN AND NOT A TASER, its time to fall down fast yo. Like really, fall down and stay down and hope your life can be saved at that point because the cop already doesnt care whether you live or die, hes waiting to finish you off if you try anything else. Good job on the cop's part and its such a fabulous thing that nobody else was injured throughout this whole ordeal.
Everyone who is saying that it was excessive, it wasn't really. In that situation you probably would have done the same thing, he was like two feet away from both of the officers and clearly just two seconds away from cracking his partner's skull in. A clear cut case of self defense. Sadly in our pathetic justice system some socialists will call for the cop's resignation, saying he "shot a few too many times."
@Keyboard Warrior: If you were a criminal, then you should be well aware that charging a cop with a weapon could result in your death. Asking to be "shot in the leg" is stupid.
Like in the video above where the cop died, if he would have shot the "vietnam vet" when he reached for the weapon, it would have been frowned upon for excessive use of force. Even if he had shot him when he got the weapon, same thing. But he didn't, and he died. And nobody can claim that the guy couldn't have had a weapon at his belt, and retaliated whist on the ground.
I don't get it, does ANYONE READ THE THREAD ANNOUNCEMENT? There is a post there from someone who actually knows what they're talking about explaining why they were that close, why he fired so many times, why he fired at the chest. I get it, I'm sorry for the victim as well. But if there was even a 5% chance that he harmed anyone else, then f**k it. His funeral.
On January 26 2012 02:01 LeKiNGG wrote: - People who say they could have shot in the legs or arms or just ignorant, sadly. With a 9MM handgun, its near impossible in a situation of stress like this one to shoot from 10 feet away exactly in the hand or the legs. Even if you shot him in the legs, in can very easily kill him if he runs out of blood. It happened in the past thats why you shoot in the chest now. I mean... shooting in a moving hand which is handling a crowbar and the guy also moves, without any chance of the bullet not hitting him and perhaps killing somone else on the other side of the street?? Who would take that risk... no one.
- An important part missing in the video is what the two police officers were saying to the suspect. If you tell someone to dont cross a line 20 times, but the guy still goes along, gives you a good indication of his intentions, but we cant hear anything ont he video.
1. They were in a triangle position, Suspects body was perpendicular to Cop 1 (taser cop), while Cop 2 had a full view of his body and was following everything closely. He had a shot to the legs or shoulders. If anyone argues that that is impossible in real life, that is equal to saying that these cops are not getting the right training. He is literally 2 feet away, a properly trained cop could hit bullseye from that distance, especially one as wide as a human being flat in front of him. I see this as a failure in training, or there was too much nerves to react properly and do as he is trained, instead reacting on adrenaline and summoning an primal response of defense no matter what (which is also part of proper training).
2. If I were a criminal, Id rather be shot on the legs and rish death by blood loss than being shot in the body and be dead any second.
3. Yes, hearing the audio would give us much light on much of the disagreements we have in this thread.
1. Yes, a cop should be able to hit a bullseye from that distance. Doing it on the range, or in simulation of situations like these, is completely different from actually doing it in situations like these. If he misses the guy's knee or leg, the ricochet can kill random bystanders and his partner is probably dead from skull trauma. You can bitch all you want about his training (which was probably not that great, we need a lot of cops in this country and we can't spend very much money on them), but it's extremely easy to second guess someone from your office chair. I'm willing to be you haven't been in his situation?
2. If you were a criminal you don't get to say where you would "rather" be shot. If you attack a police officer with a deadly weapon, you will be shot. Police officers are trained to shoot the center of mass. You do the math.
3. Agreed, audio would give a better picture, but we don't have it. I think it's safe to say the suspect knew they were trying to subdue him when he got hit in the face with a taser dart, but maybe that's just me.
The criminal knew what he was getting into, he should have known full well that he would have been shot. You never charge someone who has a loaded gun, whether they're a freedom loving civilian (gun owner), a cop, or a terrorist/criminal like this guy.
Justified IMO. If you blatantly disregard multiple warnings and make any indication you are going for a weapon you deserve to be shot.
(Warning the video will make you feel like shit afterwards)
Oh fuck. Why did I watch that? Thats going to ruin my whole afternoon. Really disturbing to listen to someone get shot, almost worse than actually seeing it.
Wow. That really made me feel like shit. But totally relevant to this thread, so, thanks for sharing
Just one question though. You didn't really address the fact that he got tazered in the face and was still OK, showing he probably had some drugs or basically a higher than average resistance to pain. Are the police supposed to take this into account or not? You say that he took 5 shots later and therefore the next 5 shots were probably uncalled for since the first 5 shots should buy the police enough time to do something else other than to just shoot again, but what if (assuming he could still move, and was not simply falling to the ground) he wasn't stunned enough, and brought out a gun and shot, possibly killing someone? Though shooting someone should stun them enough, it's not always a guarantee is it? Perhaps after the first 5 shots, if while spinning around he was going to take out a gun and shoot, and even though the police began shooting him again, and probably hitting him with at least another shot first, what if the suspect got 1 shot out anyways, if the pain wasn't enough to stop him, and it happened to hit someone in the head?
There is a study on tasers which deal with this, I even saw it on Discovery channel. I'll see if I can find it im my computer. There are a lot of factors to consider - general health, body mass, age, and as many say, presence of drugs or alcohol in the system. Im saying this from a behavioral psychology position and with the audioless video that we have. To answer, after the first 5 shots, the suspect was at least 10 feet away, hunched, his back towards the police. Is this an aggressive reaction? Factor 1: Audio. Factor 2: What was doing at that time (obscured from viewers). If he was saying something like "Fuck You Pigs, Im superman You cant kill me But I will kill you!" then perhaps more shots were necessary. And like I posted last page, if he was threatening with his hands, like attempting to spear the cops or reaching for his pocket, then they might have been necessary, like I also said. We have limited information so we cant say with certainty. But if ha was agonozing in pain, hands to his chest, and no visible threat, the cops are very well in position to jump at him and tackle him.
While I think you bring up good points, I have to disagree with this. Have you tried shooting a gun before? You'd be surprised at how difficult it is to be accurate enough to hit a precise location even only a few feet away. And then you have to factor in your target can move very quickly.
And what part of the body were you thinking that would disable him without killing him? A knee? An elbow? Any limb can be moved extremely quickly independent of the body. Even at 5 feet away, I wouldn't be surprised if an officer missed most of his shots against a dodging aggressive opponent if he's aiming for a knee or elbow. And even if you do hit one of his limbs, it may not be fully incapacitating.
Let's face it, this ain't the movies or a cartoon. The only rare case that an incapacitating shot can be taken over a self-defense body shot is if you've got a trained sniper at a safe concealed distance that can shoot the weapon out of the criminal's hand while he is stationary. (Which does happen) Otherwise, you aim for the body.
They should be trained police officers. If they have shooting skills as much as I have, this country can go to hell right this moment. He had his hands clutched to his chest, holding the crowbar. The shoulder or the legs are big targets. I have to trust my said professor when he says that police officers are trained at this. My suspicion is that his primal response took over his training.
Just one question though. You didn't really address the fact that he got tazered in the face and was still OK, showing he probably had some drugs or basically a higher than average resistance to pain. Are the police supposed to take this into account or not? You say that he took 5 shots later and therefore the next 5 shots were probably uncalled for since the first 5 shots should buy the police enough time to do something else other than to just shoot again, but what if (assuming he could still move, and was not simply falling to the ground) he wasn't stunned enough, and brought out a gun and shot, possibly killing someone? Though shooting someone should stun them enough, it's not always a guarantee is it? Perhaps after the first 5 shots, if while spinning around he was going to take out a gun and shoot, and even though the police began shooting him again, and probably hitting him with at least another shot first, what if the suspect got 1 shot out anyways, if the pain wasn't enough to stop him, and it happened to hit someone in the head?
There is a study on tasers which deal with this, I even saw it on Discovery channel. I'll see if I can find it im my computer. There are a lot of factors to consider - general health, body mass, age, and as many say, presence of drugs or alcohol in the system. Im saying this from a behavioral psychology position and with the audioless video that we have. To answer, after the first 5 shots, the suspect was at least 10 feet away, hunched, his back towards the police. Is this an aggressive reaction? Factor 1: Audio. Factor 2: What was doing at that time (obscured from viewers). If he was saying something like "Fuck You Pigs, Im superman You cant kill me But I will kill you!" then perhaps more shots were necessary. And like I posted last page, if he was threatening with his hands, like attempting to spear the cops or reaching for his pocket, then they might have been necessary, like I also said. We have limited information so we cant say with certainty. But if ha was agonozing in pain, hands to his chest, and no visible threat, the cops are very well in position to jump at him and tackle him.
While I think you bring up good points, I have to disagree with this. Have you tried shooting a gun before? You'd be surprised at how difficult it is to be accurate enough to hit a precise location even only a few feet away. And then you have to factor in your target can move very quickly.
And what part of the body were you thinking that would disable him without killing him? A knee? An elbow? Any limb can be moved extremely quickly independent of the body. Even at 5 feet away, I wouldn't be surprised if an officer missed most of his shots against a dodging aggressive opponent if he's aiming for a knee or elbow. And even if you do hit one of his limbs, it may not be fully incapacitating.
Let's face it, this ain't the movies or a cartoon. The only rare case that an incapacitating shot can be taken over a self-defense body shot is if you've got a trained sniper at a safe concealed distance that can shoot the weapon out of the criminal's hand while he is stationary. (Which does happen) Otherwise, you aim for the body.
They should be trained police officers. If they have shooting skills as much as I have, this country can go to hell right this moment. He had his hands clutched to his chest, holding the crowbar. The shoulder or the legs are big targets. I have to trust my said professor when he says that police officers are trained at this. My suspicion is that his primal response took over his training.
You really think they are taught to shoot someone in the leg when they make a move to attack the police? I can see this being the case in some situations but given how this played out they would have taken a risk aiming for the legs when they were as close as they were. A bullet through his leg would not have stopped him from lunging forward and swinging the hammer. You can argue about how they approached him or the amount of shots, but saying the cop should have shot him in the leg as the situation played out is pretty silly.
On the contrary, my dear Keyboard Warrior, if you were to read the post in the announcement, you will find out that it is in fact his TRAINING that takes over as a primal response. That is what it is. They are trained to take DOWN the target and make SURE that he stays there.
You're saying they were probably not thinking when firing the second volley? I agree. The suspect might have simply been twitching in what appeared to be a move of aggression. It does not matter, I'm pretty sure you're not thinking in times like that. Be it untrained, a cop, or freaking rambo, you do what you've been trained to do.
That's why I'm saying, you're all discussing things that are clearly explained already.
1. Yes, a cop should be able to hit a bullseye from that distance. Doing it on the range, or in simulation of situations like these, is completely different from actually doing it in situations like these. If he misses the guy's knee or leg, the ricochet can kill random bystanders and his partner is probably dead from skull trauma. You can bitch all you want about his training (which was probably not that great, we need a lot of cops in this country and we can't spend very much money on them), but it's extremely easy to second guess someone from your office chair. I'm willing to be you haven't been in his situation?
2. If you were a criminal you don't get to say where you would "rather" be shot. If you attack a police officer with a deadly weapon, you will be shot. Police officers are trained to shoot the center of mass. You do the math.
3. Agreed, audio would give a better picture, but we don't have it. I think it's safe to say the suspect knew they were trying to subdue him when he got hit in the face with a taser dart, but maybe that's just me.
I really dont get this "you are not a cop so you dont know what you are talking about" argument. This is a forum where people discuss opinions freely, hopefully with some degree of intelligence and solid logic. There are a lot of information available to us to assess the situation objectively, whether we are police officers or not. On the first point, you cant overemphasize it - training.
2. I doubt you read the post to which I replied. I was only suggesting that if the two options are available and equally effective, the cop should choose for the nonlethal one. I didnt say "Ok I'll assault a cop with a crowbar, but please shoot me on the toe and not anywhere else."
AND I did say the suspect posed enough threat to warrant lethal force. I was only considering all the other contingencies that could have led to a less deadly outcome, and that is by pointing out the mistakes made by the cops.
But you're not acknowledging the fact that the cop was not "thinking", he was simply falling back on his training. You can assess a situation beforehand, but not after the first shots were fired. You do not have the option to choose in those 2-3 seconds, because your brain draws a blank. If you do not believe that, then you were never a witness to exaggerated violence, not to mention part of it.
I once saw someone get stabbed, repeatedly, and I just froze there, I couldn't even gather a thought much less take action in any way. So saying that the cop could chose a non-lethal approach after shooting 5 times is not a valid argument.
They should be trained police officers. If they have shooting skills as much as I have, this country can go to hell right this moment. He had his hands clutched to his chest, holding the crowbar. The shoulder or the legs are big targets. I have to trust my said professor when he says that police officers are trained at this. My suspicion is that his primal response took over his training.
Let me quote the article I linked earlier here. It was about knives but the same principles apply to guns in this case:
In the eyes of the law, a knife is a deadly weapon. It's use on another human is classified as lethal force. And the only time you are justified in using lethal force --- in most states --- is when you are "in immediate threat of death or grievous bodily injury." In other words, if it is bad enough where you have to use a knife on someone, it is bad enough to kill them. If you are at a point where you are just trying to wound someone, you are not in enough danger to justify using a knife.
This is the ghost of the old "shooting him in the leg" misconception so many people had. People would shoot an intruder and then tell the police that they were only trying to wound him. This left them open to all kinds of criminal charges and civil litigation --- from the person they had shot. There is a natural hesitation to take another human life. However, when this manifests in seeking to "wound" someone in order to make them "go away" you end up in a very dangerous legal grey area.
TL:DR version: From legal standpoint, if you're shooting someone it is better to shoot to kill than to wound.
I've also wrote about it in my thesis about counter-terrorism. While in an ideal world it would be better for counter-terrorists to just incapacitate terrorists, who then would be eligible for fair trial and all, in real world it is better that they shoot them dead as fast as they can. Most of the time it is much easier and faster to kill someone than incapacitate him, in tight situations, where other people are endangered, that require split-second decisions the choice is obvious.
First of all, the man holding the crowbar was a major moron who 90 % has him self to blame. I also think that the same man in the same situation with 3 other police officers would more than 90 % of the time survive as well. I also personally know what happens when adrenaline kicks in and someone experiences some happenings for the first time. Time fly's by and instinct/training or the lack of both kick in. Different countries, different cultures all have a different approach to what is ok and what is "accepted" withing the population and this can vary locally as well. I don't know if the Usa has a higher percentage of so called killings due to what many in the world would call police brutality. I do think that the police generally have a to big "playing room" within the law. This situation: I think more experienced(don't know if he/they are inexperienced in these situations) would of handled the situation better but this is "ok" because eventually as a police officer you don't want to be the reason why one of ur partners , ur self or some innocent civilian gets seriously injured or killed due to a soft spot and trying to rescue the criminal.
Lethal force was the correct choice here. I can't understand why people think otherwise.
Your average police officer, despite being trained very well, is not in a life or death situation every day. This suspect could of/would of killed the mans partner if he hadn't fired. For those of you who say "He could of shot him in the arm or the leg" I am amazed....
First of all, they tased the man IN THE FACE. He wasn't phased at all. Obviously pain isn't affecting the man very much at all. What if your shot in the arm passes clean through and the perp is able to take a swing at your partner with that crowbar? Or what if, even worse, you aim for the arm, miss, and accidently hit someone else, or give the man more time to hurt your partner?
Cut these cops a break, they are putting their lives on the line to protect other people. The mans a hero in my book for doing that.
EPT
