Looks justified to me. If he didn’t get the pizza, and then never ate anything ever again, he would die of starvation— therefore, he reasonably feared for his life.
Or if, deprived of the pizza, he had no choice but to eat Popeye’s chicken instead, he would risk salmonella poisoning or choking on a bone. Frankly, that he was able to show such restraint is worthy of a commendation.
Steophan, you’re good at this… let’s hear a few of your excuses.
I considered asking for cites on this - that the police are trained to just shoot anytime they feel scared - but I don’t think it is necessary.
My father taught me not to break the law, or run from the police. My mother taught me to look both ways before I crossed the street. As I mentioned, my judo sensei taught me not to startle someone pointing a gun at me. (Fortunately, what my father taught me made it unnecessary to use the advice my sensei taught me.)
I grant you, most of the people, black or white, who wind up getting shot resisting arrest or fleeing didn’t have the benefit of their father, or even a father figure like my honored sensei. But I would hope that even those folks had a mother who taught them to not to be too fucking stupid, and to stand still and show your hands when the cops catch you busting windows at night.
A forlorn hope, apparently.
Remember the scene in The Jerk, where the Steve Martin character’s father takes him out before his great pilgrimage, and shows him a can of shoe polish and then points to a pile of excrement? “Son - this is shit. And this is Shinola.”
That’s the kind of training they need. So, apparently, do many Dopers. If they had received it, maybe we wouldn’t have this thread, filled with so much of what you-all apparently think is shoe polish.
Regards,
Shodan
I’m not helping because a cop shot me thinking that the turtle was a gun and he was afraid for his life.
…do you? Really?
There are just under 18,000 different police entities in the United States. Do they all have the same level of screening? Does a policeman on the beat in New York get the same screening as a Sheriff elected to serve his county? What training did Joe Arpaio get? And was it more or less training than a cadet with the LAPD?
Timothy Loehmann, the officer that killed Tamir Rice, was in the process of getting fired from the Independence Police Department for being “an emotionally unstable recruit with a lack of maturity and inability to perform basic functions as instructed during a weapons training exercise”: but he quit before they did so. The Cleveland Police Department did not review his personnel file and hired him. Is that the level of screening you deem acceptable?
You can’t claim “we do that already” when in reality some police departments have rigorous screening processes and some have nothing at all.
Strawman. I don’t think anyone is expecting “mistake free police.” But I think it is entirely disingenuous to characterize this as a mistake. The police did not mistakenly aim their weapons at Clark and they did not mistakenly pull the trigger. If they didn’t correctly identify the object in Clark’s hand as a phone that was not a “mistake” but a failure to do the basics of their job.
It would depend on the “mistake” that they made. If they forgot to dot the “i” in a report I think we could probably let that slide.
Shodan, I do know the difference between shit and Shinola.
Shinola has it’s uses.
You don’t.
Of course not, this thread is filled with cites. If you had to ask for one, then that would be a foolish mistake on your part.
Too bad they didn’t teach you not to be a shitty ass troll.
My parents taught me to be skeptical, and to not always believe the authority figures side of the story, especially when the other sid can’t tell the story, because they are dead.
Actually, no I don’t. Is that what you base your life philosophies on, comedies from the 70’s?
Ah, the training that they need is to have great and unquestioning respect and deference for authority figures, never question them, never complain when their rights are violated, and never expect them to improve.
And the guy shot in his backyard. Was he breaking the law? Running from police?
Gonna stop you right there. Despite about a million TV shows where the hero cop shoots a fleeing suspect, it’s not actually legal for cops to do so.
Cite? 'Cuz I read this and my dog started howling.
Or when some random dude, who turns out to be a cop, approaches you in your own back yard while you’re talking on the phone?
What training do you think the pizza guy was lacking? I mean, the police roughed him up, so he must have not been taught some crucial piece of information that would have allowed him to not get roughed up, right?
This back and forth is like a mild version of what would happen if the Protect and Serve & Bad Cop, No Donut subreddits ever collided.
If you expect that the police are very likely going to shoot you and perform cpr on your body as you bleed out, you are still obligated to stand on place and let them do their thing. You are not entitled to try to escape the consummation you so justly deserve.
The dead guy in this case fled when the officers confronted him on the sidewalk. They pursued him. He fact that he was in his own back yard was not one that they could know or, really, that could be relevant to them.
I am not sure how much we know for certain about what happened. We know what the officers have told us. Their account is granted the most weight, because they are police. If there are other witnesses, contrary accounts will typically be given less weight without other evidence. Live actual video (which some municipalities have tried to outlaw in deed).
Treating police testimony as gospel seems like it might be somewhat problematic. I get what that is the case, but there is still a huge risk involved. If they can kill the primary witness and fabricate whatever story they need to to make it look like they had to, well, I feel like they should be tasked with providing more substantial justification than just their own word.
This guy was never taught that when a cop harasses you while you are sitting on your mother’s porch, you need to make sure that you “Yes Sir, No sir” him, in the most respectful way possible. To not give the cop that is on your property harassing you the utmost deferment is grounds for assault and arrest.
This girl here didn’t get the lesson. You can see as she is being thrown around the classroom, the rest of the students are keeping their eyes forward, ignoring the peace officer properly conducting his duties.
These girls needed extra special handling. They could have been hiding a gun in their voluminous bikinis.
And of course, we need to teach our dogs to allow cops to enter into our homes when we aren’t home without barking.
I think, technically, it was his grandmother’s back yard, but yes. He was identified (IIRC by the police in the helicopter) as the one who was smashing windows, and then you can see him running. He hadn’t been convicted (in that particular instance - he had previous convictions for robbery and domestic abuse), if that is what you mean.
Here you are correct, more or less. It’s the fleeing felon rule, and in general, it is not the case that police can always shoot you if you run away. So, you are right, and I accept the correction. Of course, Stephon Clark was not shot while running away, but FWIW.
I can’t find anything specific about Stephon Clark being raised by a single mother, although his brother says he was staying with his grandmother, and AFAIK his father has not come forward to comment. Since 72% or so of black children in the US are born to a single mother, and since most live in homes with a father absent, and since a clear majority of those who engage in criminal behavior lack a father, it’s a fairly safe bet that “most of the people, black or white, who wind up getting shot resisting arrest or fleeing didn’t have the benefit of their father”.
I am not sure why you included the “or”. The police didn’t select Clark at random to point guns at him.
But yes - if someone in a cop uniform points a gun at you and screams “Show your hands”, then you are well advised to stop, show your hands, and stand still.
Regards,
Shodan
How do you know this?
I like this part of the story: “In a letter released Friday, Hill criticized city council’s action, accusing it of pursuing “a politically motivated witch hunt” in how it handled the matter.”
Hill is the attorney for the Greensboro Police Officers Association.
You’d think maybe, he would say something like “This is not how we train our officers, and these two are not indicitive of our police force” or something.
Nope, the city council was on a “witch hunt” :rolleyes:
To quote a wise man:
He doesn’t appear to be running away in the video. The family is doing its own autopsy, and I expect we will hear about it if the wounds are in the back. I don’t think they will be found to be so - call it a hunch.
Regards,
Shodan
I’m still awaiting an answer to this question.
Am I correct that the gun-wielding corporal is the same asshole who showed off with a ninja roll a few minutes earlier?
I took that as a trip and a barely recovered face plant, but it looks to be the same guy.
You seem awfully comfortable making assumptions and speculating when it’s in favor of the cops, but very critical of any assumptions or speculating that goes against them.
Seems unfair to me. I’ve probably got biases too… Do you recognize that you might have some of your own?