Cops not prosecuted for gunning down hobo, riots

[JOD]

Originally Posted By: OVERK1LL
/quote]

Isn't the stun gun only for non-lethal-force situations?



If he was running around like a lunatic without a knife, they'd probably have stunned him. But because he was carrying a weapon capable of deadly force and refused to put that weapon down, he was shot instead.



I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. If he was "running around like a lunatic WITH a knife", then I'd agree; but he wasn't running. He was barely moving. And yes, I'm fully aware that I have the benefit of not dealing with it in real-time, but IMO the use of deadly force did not appear justified, and I do believe the video offers significant insight. I can't see a reason why a stun guy wouldn't have been appropriate in that situation (I thought that was the entire reason for those things).

I'm not sure if what they did was "criminal", but I don't think it was appropriate, either--and I'm willing to bet that a civil jury is going to feel the same way.

 

[Tempest]

Originally Posted By: dwcopple
http://www.cnn.com/2012/08/16/us/michigan-police-shooting/index.html?iref=allsearch

Quote:
"It appeared to be a firing squad dressed in police uniforms," Jewel Hall told CNN from her hometown of Albuquerque, New Mexico. "There was another way. They did not have to kill him. He had not done anything. He was not violent. He was not a murderer. He was not a criminal."

Yeah, that's why he was holding a knife on cops in a highly aggressive stance.

The guy started to move and then made a quick move back. Looks like a perfectly clean shoot to me. The article says that he was moving toward an officer out of view of the camera, as well.

Quote:
"I'm stunned that six human beings would stand in front of one human being and fire 46 shots," Jewel Hall said. "I just don't understand that. It's a lot of pain in that because it only takes one shot, so the question is why?"

Yeah, because the cops have a hive mind and think as one....

 

[Tempest]

Originally Posted By: Artem
I never understood why cops always have to shoot to kill... Why not shoot him in the arm that's holding the knife? Shoot him in both legs so he falls down and tackle him.

They are trained shooters yet it seems as if they always close their eyes, turn their heads and just open fire until the clip is empty

You'd think that some situations like this, death can be avoided and the criminal can be subdued with just a few NON-LETHAL properly placed shots so he can later be charged after he gets out the hospital.

Just my

I take it that you have absolutely no experience with firearms of any kind?

 

[chiks]

Originally Posted By: dwcopple
will ensue. Google Milton Hall. He is a local hobo that had a knife out and was making a scene in a public parking lot. Four police officers fired on him 46 times even though he never made a move at them. The prosecutor has chosen not to press charges.

Rev. Al Sharpton was brought in last week to speak on this of course. :rollseyes: Immediately after the news got out, shots were fired at a local hospital and it was put on lock-down with workers getting armed security escorts to their vehicles. I'm sure this isn't the last of it...


COPS - Bunch of wussies.

 

[chiks]

Originally Posted By: Astro14
There is more to this story than is being reported....and the Monday-morning QBing is rampant.

You have to judge the application of lethal force by what a reasonable man would do, in the same circumstances, knowing what the officers knew at the time. You can't apply new information, things that were learned after the shooting, to the decision at the time - those facts weren't known in the second in which the cops had to make a shoot decision.

So, for lethal force to be justified, the threat has to be present. There are 3 parts to the threat: ability, opportunity, and intent...and all 3 must be present for a threat to be real.

So, an old lady in a wheel chair next to me saying that she is going to kill me lacks ability, but has opportunity and intent, ergo no threat. Put a gun in her hand, and she meets all 3 parts: she is a threat. Or, put a US Marine with an M-4 near me: clear ability and opportunity, but as he smiles and says "Good morning, Sir" - there is no intent and he is not a threat. All 3 parts of the threat "triangle" must be present.


Spasm is right on the 21 foot rule, a man with a knife can charge and stab you before you can draw and shoot if he is inside of 21 feet. The hobo with a knife could easily meet all 3 parts of the threat triangle...particularly if the officers directed him to put down the weapon and he did not comply. Non-compliance is part of determining intent.

Man with knife approaching 21 feet meets the ability and opportunity factors - the question becomes intent. If a police officer directs an individual to drop his weapon - and that individual does not comply - then intent to do harm can't be ruled out...and the shooting becomes justifiable self-defense on the part of the officer.

If we found out later that the hobo with a knife was mentally unstable, that still doesn't rule out the intent to do harm...if we further find out that the hobo was weak, or crippled - then I am sympathetic to the poor soul, but the officer could not know the limitations on the physical capabilities of the hobo at the time of the shooting, and it has no bearing on the shoot decision.

Descriptions like "gunned down" are inherently biased - they connote a judgement on the merits of the shooting. It's poor reporting, though it makes good rhetoric, to describe a police shooting with words that pre-suppose judgment.

We are not in a position to judge the officers in this case. We don't have all the facts, we don't know all the details, and the reasonable thing is to avoid judging the situation. The only thing that we can say for certain is that the loss of a life is always a tragedy.


u must be a lawyer or a cop supervisor.
Nothing justifies 46 shots....even if he was bin laden holding a knife.

 

[Tempest]

Quote:
Nothing justifies 46 shots....even if he was bin laden holding a knife.

How many are justified?

 

[JOD]

Originally Posted By: Tempest
Quote:
Nothing justifies 46 shots....even if he was bin laden holding a knife.

How many are justified?


enough to stop the threat, a threat which frankly seemed minimal. Unloading 46 shots in a public area is a massive public safety hazard, much more than the thread that guy posed. Only someone looking to apologize for the police's actions can't see that.

 

[frank2009]

When a police officer says "drop the knife", just do it or suffer the consequences. Rule # 1 is sign out at end of tour. The other rules don't matter as much.

 

[antiqueshell]

Originally Posted By: frank2009
When a police officer says "drop the knife", just do it or suffer the consequences. Rule # 1 is sign out at end of tour. The other rules don't matter as much.


Agree. The ONLY reason this story is getting so much exposure is because the suspect is black. If it was a white hobo we wouldn't even know about this event.

 

[CourierDriver]

Internal affairs will be all over this one, plus their fellow officers will be asking,,u shot 46 times, and on and on. Politics will most likely get them fired and a trial, imho.

 

[mechtech2]

Reminds me of the famous Rodney King incident.
The videos of the cops beating the guy were originally used by their DEFENSE, not the prosecution! [non edited version]
My point is that we only know a slice - a part - of what went on.

But 46 shots? It's beyond embarrassing!

 

[PandaBear]

I have no sympathy of an adult with good communication skill and language skill that got shot by police when were told to drop a weapon (or weapon look alike) and refuse to do so.

My main concern is, for 46 shots, there will be some misses and what happen if they shot a bystander? That's probably not justified and more dangerous than not shooting.

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: antiqueshell
Originally Posted By: frank2009
When a police officer says "drop the knife", just do it or suffer the consequences. Rule # 1 is sign out at end of tour. The other rules don't matter as much.


Agree. The ONLY reason this story is getting so much exposure is because the suspect is black. If it was a white hobo we wouldn't even know about this event.


I sadly agree with this. And you noticed the people praying were all black, the people interviewed....etc. I do believe there is some racial motivation behind the outrage over this.

 

[refaller]

I suppose if it was your brother and the cops shot 46 stinking times you would blame him for not listening. Sure, he should have listened, but 46 times. Good night.

ref

 

[JOD]

Originally Posted By: PandaBear
I have no sympathy of an adult with good communication skill and language skill that got shot by police when were told to drop a weapon (or weapon look alike) and refuse to do so.


Given that the guy was mentally ill, I'd hardly consider him to have "good communication skills"? I understand that the police don't have his medical history in front of them, but I still maintain that the threat doesn't merit the response.

As far as the racial implications mentioned by others, I'm not sure I agree. While it's not an analogous situation by any means, the Kelly Thomas beating was national news as well. If the police are videotaped killing someone, it's going to make the national news.

 

[Tempest]

Originally Posted By: PandaBear
I have no sympathy of an adult with good communication skill and language skill that got shot by police when were told to drop a weapon (or weapon look alike) and refuse to do so.

My main concern is, for 46 shots, there will be some misses and what happen if they shot a bystander? That's probably not justified and more dangerous than not shooting.


Their training protocol might get them off. A local cop here (Sergent) was kicking a suspect in the face repeatedly while the suspect was being held down by 4 other cops. The DA let it go because "their training allowed them to kick perpetrators".

 

[Trajan]

Originally Posted By: Boomer
You never aim at arms or legs. A trained shooter shoots for the largest target, the chest. The intent is to protect yourself and drop the individual fast. Aiming for limbs causes misses that go flying off to God knows where and the probability of hitting the limb is low due to adrenalin, target movement, etc.


Yep. Leave the shooting the weapon out their hand etc for movies.

 

[MuzzleFlash40]

Here we go agian. People Monday night quarterbacking on a situation that 99% know nothing about. Did they fire too many rounds? I dont know I wasn't there. But I have been through the training, and even during training sessions you fire more than the shots needed due to the "excitement" of the situation. So during a life or death situation you might fire 10 rounds even though 4 or 5 would do the job. Since you have multiple Officers thats where you have 46 rounds. A taser? Not on your life! I'm not getting close enough to you to deploy a taser if you are holding a knife. Sometimes the taser barbs dont stick and if that heppens i'm toast. You can judge what happens all you want, and it is your right as an American. But understand that you don't know what your talking about until you lace up my boots and do my job. I will always come home to my family. At the end of every encounter i'd rather be tried by 12 than carried by 6!

 

[Astro14]

I am encouraging everyone who is ready to render judgment on the officers' actions to consider the reasonable man test that I explained earlier.

Mentally ill? Is that proven, or was it claimed by others after the fact? More importantly, was it known to the cops on the scene? Very likely not, and therefore, not a reasonable factor on which to judge their actions.

Further, you can see the video, but what things are missing from the video that were seen by the officers present? Again, we can't know what the officers saw, we only know what we saw from the camera's angle, and those things are therefore not a reasonable standard on which to judge the actions of the officers.

I'll admit, 46 shots seems like a lot, but one of the basic tenets of combat shooting is that you fire until the threat is ended...until one of the legs of the threat triangle is removed (generally, the ability)...how long did they perceive the threat to exist?

Finally, training is extremely important. I had a great deal of extremely realistic training before I flew any airplane (simulators) - I had training (though still good) before I carried a weapon and while the sophistication, the realism was not quite as good, it still was excellent in helping me recognize the threat triangle, and pointing out how the adrenaline degraded my aim.

FWIW, I have flown the F-14 in combat, landed on aircraft carriers at night, and I am very used to performing under exceptional pressure, but I found that while shooting the M-4 and M-9 in video simulators during my first experience with realistic engagement scenarios, my heartrate soared as the adrenaline push hit, my aim was degraded and I did not shoot to my usual (high) standards of accuracy. Further, I could not recall things that were present in the simulator as my concentration, awareness and vision were affected - I was "boresighted", with narrow focus on aspects of the scene before me. As I experienced additional realistic, scenario-based weapons training, my performance improved. The training and experience of combat shooting training helped me perform better under that simulated pressure, but in my first few times, I struggled, even though at the time, I was a combat-experienced fighter pilot, whose concentration, awareness and vision are generally well above average.

Human beings respond relatively poorly under pressure - but most people are unaware of their own life-or-death situation performance, since they have never truly experienced it. So ask yourselves: How many times have you been shot at? How many times have you been in a gunfight? How many times have you been threatened with lethal force? How can you possibly know what it's like without those experiences? How can you possibly know how you would respond? And please spare me the keyboard courage and bravado that seems to run through internet fora if you do answer...

And finally, ask yourselves this: How well did the police department prepare these officers to respond in this situation? Did they get the sophisticated (and very expensive) training that the DoD and others provided me? That training allowed me to respond more accurately, more quickly, and more effectively in each subsequent event, but it that kind of training isn't available to everyone. Did these officers get the training they should have had to respond appropriately?

 

[Astro14]

Originally Posted By: chiks
Originally Posted By: Astro14
There is more to this story than is being reported....and the Monday-morning QBing is rampant.

We are not in a position to judge the officers in this case. We don't have all the facts, we don't know all the details, and the reasonable thing is to avoid judging the situation. The only thing that we can say for certain is that the loss of a life is always a tragedy.


u must be a lawyer or a cop supervisor.
Nothing justifies 46 shots....even if he was bin laden holding a knife.


I see, so you disagree with my point: that we should reserve judging since we don't know all the facts.

Clearly, you see yourself as able to make that judgement...and equally clearly, you see yourself as fit to judge me, though we've never met, and you don't know my background, so you are justified in choosing the ad hominem attack...

Do I have that about right?

I hope that you are never judged by the standard which you have just set in this thread.

Wait, check that, I hope you ARE judged someday by your own standard: rush to judgement, using incomplete facts as well as using facts that were unknown to those in the situation.