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Not only should they be charged, but there needs to be a law or sentencing guideline that gives out a minimum of 20 years for cops who shoot unarmed people.
Lethal force should be a LAST resort, not the first resort.
Not only should they be charged, but there needs to be a law or sentencing guideline that gives out a minimum of 20 years for cops who shoot unarmed people.
Lethal force should be a LAST resort, not the first resort.
I almost just stayed out of this topic as I knew there would be a lot of ignorant and ill-informed comments in here. Like this one. You clearly do not understand the job of LE or you would not make a comment such as this. While I believe that every once in a while a bad seed makes it onto a police agency but the vast majority are there to do the right thing. Some may become jaded over the years thanks to society and how so many behave but they plug on, just maybe not as nice as they should be. But there are people out here who commit crimes and unfortunately some will be shot and killed by LE due to the actions of the criminals. We had a case once where a guy held up a liquor store with a handgun and fled on foot. He was spotted by an officer and when he approached the criminal reached into his jacket. Now what the hell would you do in a situation beside pee your pants or run? If trained you'll already have your weapon out and you likely would shoot this guy. This officer did and the guy died that night. No weapon was found on him yet witnesses observed the robbery and even observed this shooting. The firearm was found a short distance away later that night. But the bad guy either wanted to die at the hands of LE, suicide by cop-look it up, or he was hoping he could get the officer to duck and hide giving him time to flee. Guess we'll never know.
I almost just stayed out of this topic as I knew there would be a lot of ignorant and ill-informed comments in here. Like this one. You clearly do not understand the job of LE or you would not make a comment such as this. While I believe that every once in a while a bad seed makes it onto a police agency but the vast majority are there to do the right thing. Some may become jaded over the years thanks to society and how so many behave but they plug on, just maybe not as nice as they should be. But there are people out here who commit crimes and unfortunately some will be shot and killed by LE due to the actions of the criminals. We had a case once where a guy held up a liquor store with a handgun and fled on foot. He was spotted by an officer and when he approached the criminal reached into his jacket. Now what the hell would you do in a situation beside pee your pants or run? If trained you'll already have your weapon out and you likely would shoot this guy. This officer did and the guy died that night. No weapon was found on him yet witnesses observed the robbery and even observed this shooting. The firearm was found a short distance away later that night. But the bad guy either wanted to die at the hands of LE, suicide by cop-look it up, or he was hoping he could get the officer to duck and hide giving him time to flee. Guess we'll never know.
Ok. I'll give you that one.
What about the one where the guy has his hands in the air, clearly no threat?
Or the one where the cop shoots the guy and doesn't know why? Can't a guy reach for his wallet to retrieve his driver's license when the cop requests it?
Cops need to be held to a higher standard. If that means making an example out of a few so be it. There needs to be some kind of deterrent to discourage trigger-happy, tough-guy cops from murdering unarmed people.
There are a number of factors that make policing in the US different to places like Europe indeed American police are primed to expect guns, as is pointed out in the Article below along with numerous other differences.
Having served on a Grand Jury, I can assure you that we were in nobody's pocket. But you cannot indict someone who has not broken the law and, in many states, the laws are written in such a way that it can be very hard to indict an LEO who has shot someone. That was certainly the case in Missouri.
If you want more accountability then you need to start with the legislature.
I'm not blaming people on Grand Juries. I just believe the system is inherently rigged to protect those working in it. Grand Juries hear from the DA, but not from the accused or their attorneys- it's one sided.
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Lethal force should be a LAST resort, not the first resort.
This is so right.
Cops and those who worship them seem to want to fall back on they have the right to shoot... Just because you have the right to do something doesn't mean you always have to do it or should do it. As a school principal I had the right to suspend MANY, MANY more kids than I ever did, but I used judgement and looked for the best ways to solve issues. Sometimes a suspension was necessary; other times there were alternate ways to solve the issue.
I almost just stayed out of this topic as I knew there would be a lot of ignorant and ill-informed comments in here. Like this one. You clearly do not understand the job of LE or you would not make a comment such as this. While I believe that every once in a while a bad seed makes it onto a police agency but the vast majority are there to do the right thing. Some may become jaded over the years thanks to society and how so many behave but they plug on, just maybe not as nice as they should be. But there are people out here who commit crimes and unfortunately some will be shot and killed by LE due to the actions of the criminals. We had a case once where a guy held up a liquor store with a handgun and fled on foot. He was spotted by an officer and when he approached the criminal reached into his jacket. Now what the hell would you do in a situation beside pee your pants or run? If trained you'll already have your weapon out and you likely would shoot this guy. This officer did and the guy died that night. No weapon was found on him yet witnesses observed the robbery and even observed this shooting. The firearm was found a short distance away later that night. But the bad guy either wanted to die at the hands of LE, suicide by cop-look it up, or he was hoping he could get the officer to duck and hide giving him time to flee. Guess we'll never know.
It's also ignorant and uninformed to imply that most of us are saying that cops should never shoot a perp. That's the viewpoint of virtually no one in this thread.
What most of us are saying is that too many American citizens are being shot by the police.
And what I am saying is that as long as the police see the American people as their enemy, that enemy will see the police as their enemy.
My hope is that people like you will get stopped by a LEO and you'll make just one wrong ill-conceived move and that the officer will begin to reach for his gun and you'll soil your undies. Then you'll understand.
How many police shootings are justified compared to unjustified?
Obviously one unjustified is too many, but policemen are human beings just like everyone on here, and human beings make mistakes. I wonder who here has never made a mistake in their work? Then when you identify yourself, I will log you off as a liar.
So we now want to put policemen in prison if they make a mistake?
"But if they make a mistake, people die." Yes, that is true. That is the nature of their work. If they are too slow to pull a trigger, they and/or other innocent people may be killed. If they are too fast to pull the trigger, an innocent person may be shot and killed. It is a problem with no easy answer.
IF they hesitate to shoot someone and he shoots and kills four innocent people nearby because the policeman hesitated, will we imprison them for that too?
Of course usually the hesitation means the policeperson is dead, not just imprisoned.
If we start jailing them for making a mistake, no one in their right mind would ever be a policeperson. Who would take that risk in addition to the substantial risk of being injured or killed? Why jail the policeman? Why not jail the person who failed to train them properly?
If there is clear cut evidence that policeperson intended to kill the victim regardless of a threat, i.e. they just wanted to kill someone for kicks, then higher charges make sense. However jailing police who make a judgment error while murderers and rapists walk out in six months does not make any sense at all. It just makes people feel better about the trendy concern.
If it can be said they acted recklessly, maybe. That is a fine line between making a mistake and being actively reckless.
Trendy concerns always seem to result in bad law.
Where were all these people five or ten years ago, when far more people we getting shot in police enconters?
Imagine EVERYDAY on your job, there is a chance God forbid, you make a horrible mistake, you could go to jail or at the very least vilified in public. Would you still want that job?
Police officers sometimes have to make split second decisions that may cost someone their lives - or their own. The rest of us normally do not have to deal with that. It is easy for the rest of us to sit back and say "well the cop should have done that", but we ourselves were not there and were not in their shoes.
God knows I'm not always on board with law enforcement, and some of my posts on this site reflect my distrust of law enforcement....but. There are so many on here who seem to think the job of police officer is no different from a cashier at the local hardware store. Really ? Do you think the cashier goes to work every day with anywhere near the responsibility of the cop ? Do you think if the cashier makes a mistake, and the till is short $20.00 at the end of their shift that they will be tried, and if convicted of their mistake go to jail for 20 or more years ? Does the cashier go to work each day knowing that a great number of the people they will be "professionally" interacting with today are having a VERY bad day in their lives....perhaps their worst day ever ? Does it register that people having a very bad day and perhaps caught committing a crime might be much more volatile, unpredictable, perhaps violent and dangerous and likely have a gun ? Maybe they do, maybe they don't. So your choice, as a cop is to think, do I feel lucky today ? He's waving something around in a threatening manner, I keep yelling for him to stop, put his hands up, and drop that shiny thing in his hands, but he refuses and keeps waving his hands around and moving about. If I guess gun, and shoot him and I'm wrong, I get 20 plus years in jail. If I guess no gun, and I'm wrong, I could be dropped right on this sidewalk right where I'm now standing. If I guess right, my critics will say I was just doing my job. If I guess wrong, my family will be mourning me....either in a box, or in a cell.
I think all police shootings should be thoroughly investigated. However, I cannot fathom the amount of arm chair experts I see posting about how the cop did the wrong thing....from the comfort of their recliner after reading several news reports and digesting the contents of the evolving event. Sure....how hard is it to get rich in the stock market when you can see the future a few days in advance. When you can't see the endgame ahead of time, life gets a lot more challenging.
Not only should they be charged, but there needs to be a law or sentencing guideline that gives out a minimum of 20 years for cops who shoot unarmed people.
Lethal force should be a LAST resort, not the first resort.
It would hardly be murder - 1st or 2nd degree. The burden of proof would be far too high. In fact prosecutors who file murder charges against negligent cops are doing a disservice to the public because no jury is going to convict a cop of murder if he testifies he thought his life was in danger. Most of the these guys (like the Freddy Gray cops) just go back on duty.
What should happen in cases of obvious wrong (like Freddy Gray or Tamir Rice) is the cop(s) should immediately be suspend without pay for dereliction of duty. This could easily be decided by the Police Commandant or a panel set-up to review police conduct. After they are fired the Prosecutor could review the evidence and decide whether to press charges.
Such action would send the message that cops who are trigger happy or take revenge on suspects will not be tolerated. The Justice department should set-up guidelines on police training and Internal Affairs management.
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