# Cop shoot, kills teen after he skips out on check at IHOP **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [February 28, 2006, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478 "2006-02-28T17:38:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/181 "2006-03-01T22:20:56Z")
> [@Zabali\_Clawbane](#): > > I felt this post needed to have attention drawn to it. What will those of you who characterized the teens as “criminals” have to say if it it was indeed a huge misunderstanding, and they had left their payment on the table as one of the dead teen’s friends posited? :dubious: I just don’t see how such extreme actions in the attempt at apprehension were practical in this case. Hell, cops aren’t allowed in some states to go on high speed pursuits of speeders anymore. I think he should have gotten their tags, not moved into the path of the vehicle. For all we know, the kid who died thought his buddy, the driver had paid for everyone and he left thinking nothing was wrong. I’d say mea culpa. Although I did say in one of my earlier posts acknowledge it isn’t certain what happened either way. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/182 "2006-03-01T22:24:47Z")
> [@SteveG1](#): > > You made this slippery slope in post 96. I was applying your own logic to all crimes, using your yardstick - criminals bad - smash puny criminals. You said (see the above quote) that it doesn’t matter to you one bit whether the policeman was in danger or not. The “cop haters” are accused of jumping before all the facts are in. Aren’t the “criminal haters” jumping too? Maybe the pancake bandit was trying to run him down. Maybe not. Maybe if shooting at the van WAS justified, if the SUV or van was aimed at the cop, the driver who was actually driving should have been hit, and not some guy in the back seat. Gun control still means hitting what you aim at. Gun control does not mean firing all your rounds in the hope that you hit something. Pancakes are not worth a life. I’ve already addressed this, read my posts. I said that NO MATTER WHAT if a cop kills someone who isn’t a direct threat to 1) another member of society, 2) himself, it’s a bad decision, one the police shouldn’t be making. If that’s what happened **I have already said** I would view that as a bad thing. And I woud _still_ not mourn for the kid because the kid was a criminal, and I don’t mourn for scumbags even if the manner in which they died was reprehensible (see Jeffrey Dahmer.) Also, no one says pancakges are worth a life, that’s yet another strawman. What people are saying is that if the cop really was in danger then he was justified in using lethal force. And what I’m saying is, regardless of the appropriateness of the cop’s actions, there’s one less criminal in the world so the world is a slightly better place now. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/183 "2006-03-01T22:28:16Z")
> [@nyctea scandiaca](#): > > OK, Slacker, now that we have some more facts… > > From the passenger’s account, the cop certainly wasn’t being “attacked with an automobile.” > > –The officer was not directly in front of the Jeep when he began firing. > > –He opened fire from a distance of 20 to 30 feet. > > –The officer fired “first to the side, then head-on.” > > –The driver swerved to avoid striking the officer and collided with a parked car. > > –The police spokeswoman said “We said the vehicle was moving toward him. . . . Whether that was at an angle or straight on or what, we can’t get into that.” _( :rolleyes: Give me a fucking break!!)_ Oh, so one of the criminals says it was the cops fault. Perfect reason to condemn the cop, obviously they are a good source of unbiased and reliable information on this matter. > [@](#): > > Clearly, the cop did not follow this policy. A kid is dead. Can any of you posters defending the cop still justify his actions 100%?? Still no evidence as to whether or not he followed the policy. Just because someone is dead doesn’t mean he didn’t exhaust all other options. Why are you concluding A+B = X when we don’t have B yet? ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/184 "2006-03-01T22:30:25Z")
> [@Martin Hyde](#): > > What people are saying is that if the cop really was in danger then he was justified in using lethal force. Not if he put himself in danger without justification. If a cop throws himself in front of a moving vehicle in response to a dine and dash, lethal force is not justified. If he can’t get out of the way, he has to take one for the team. Society holds cops to a higher standard than teens with poor judgement. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/185 "2006-03-01T22:33:30Z")
> [@Fear Itself](#): > > Not if he put himself in danger without justification. If a cop throws himself in front of a moving vehicle in response to a dine and dash, lethal force is not justified. If he can’t get out of the way, he has to take one for the team. Society holds cops to a higher standard than teens with poor judgement. Yeah, obviously if the cop wasn’t justified in what he did he wasn’t justified, duh. We don’t know, yet, though. According to the earliest report we saw the officer said the car attempted to run him down, that’s different from a situation where the cop leaps out in front of a moving vehicle guns a’blazing. I don’t know what happened, it’s possible and even possibly probable that the cop acted inappropriately. But we don’t know, yet. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/186 "2006-03-01T22:35:27Z")
> [@Fear Itself](#): > > Not if he put himself in danger without justification. If a cop throws himself in front of a moving vehicle in response to a dine and dash, lethal force is not justified. If he can’t get out of the way, he has to take one for the team. Society holds cops to a higher standard than teens with poor judgement. Only when it conveniently fits one’s narrow little viewpoint, it seems. So, if I’m parked illegally and a cop is writing tickets (he’s just coming down and ticketing the line of cars and hasn’t gotten mine yet) and I start to pull away…should I expect him to dive in front of my car and start shooting? After all, I AM doing something illegal! And fleeing the scene! Obviously I deserve to die. -JOe ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/187 "2006-03-01T22:36:49Z")
> [@John Corrado](#): > > It may not be a “great tragedy” to you, but it’s a “great tragedy” to me, because this “criminal” you don’t mourn is the **nephew of one of my best friends.** And right now, he’s going crazy with shock and sorrow and trying to console his brother who lost his fucking son over a stack of fucking flapjacks. If he wasn’t the nephew of one of your best friends would it be a great tragedy to you? What if you had never even heard about it? I can’t be concerned with the death of every stupid kid in America who decides to do something criminal and ends up in the morgue. > [@](#): > > Aaron Brown was a criminal in the same way you are, Hyde, with the speeding you do and the taxes you may not have accurately reported and the bills you forgot to pay and all the other little shit that makes us all criminals. He skipped out on a less than $50 meal. He was not going to do hard time. He was a stupid teenager doing a stupid teenage thing like all fucking teenagers do. No, Aaron Brown was a thief. Someone who took that which was not his. Speeding isn’t criminal nor is making a mistake on your taxes (that is only criminal if you deliberately conceal.) > [@](#): > > And because of it, and because of the actions of a cop and the kid who was driving the car, Aaron is dead. Is that appropriate? Is that right? You can be smug and say that it doesn’t matter, one more stupid criminal dead, and all it does is show was a stupid, lazy, shit you are. How does it show I’m lazy? Yeah, it isn’t Aaron’s fault that his friend may have charged a cop, and it isn’t Aaron’s fault that a cop may have overreacted. But Aaron didn’t have to go out and be a thief that fatal night, he put himself there. > [@](#): > > Aaron Brown was not “by all accounts” a good kid. Except for that account where he was a thief. > [@](#): > > Someone who was loved and loved in return. So was John Gotti. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/188 "2006-03-01T22:38:03Z")
> [@Martin Hyde](#): > > According to the earliest report we saw the officer said the car attempted to run him down… Pretty convenient the way you are ignoring the latest eyewitness acoount that places the cop not in front of the vehicle, but to one side firing into the side of the car as the driver tries to avoid him. ---
**Author:** ![askeptic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/eb9ed0/32.png) [@askeptic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/askeptic)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/189 "2006-03-01T22:42:34Z")
> [@bup](#): > > If it were a bank robbery, and one of the robbers in the back seat of the getaway car got shot and killed, I don’t think the fact that he (yes, I’m assuming it’s a he) wasn’t driving makes him a bystander. > > Not that I’m defending the rent-a-cop/cop’s actions. Unless something comes out that changes the whole picture, he sounds like an asshole who turned the situation lethal when it didn’t need to be. > > But I don’t think passengers qualify as bystanders when a cop considers them suspects in some other crime than driving at a cop with intent to kill. The problem with your hypo bup is that it fails to distinguish between felonies and misdomeanors. These kids did not rob a bank they did not pay for a meal. Big difference, morally and legally. If I agree to go into a bank with you to throw waterballoons at the manager and then when we get in you pull out a gun and shoot him, am I guilty of the murder? NO. But if I go in to rob the bank with you and you pull out a gun and shoot somebody I will be guilty of murder. Same here. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/190 "2006-03-01T22:44:39Z")
> [@Martin Hyde](#): > > So was John Gotti. Yes, because a kid whose greatest crime is the old dine ‘n’ dash is just as bad as a mafia don. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/191 "2006-03-01T22:46:58Z")
> [@Martin Hyde](#): > > I woud _still_ not mourn for the kid because the kid was a criminal, and I don’t mourn for scumbags even if the manner in which they died was reprehensible…regardless of the appropriateness of the cop’s actions, there’s one less criminal in the world so the world is a slightly better place now. Ah, so the dead kid has already been tried and convicted posthumously, then? Or on what basis are you calling him a criminal? What bullshit anyhow. You don’t think there were positive traits of this kid that outweighed the fact that he might have skipped out on a bill? If the world would be a better place if every “criminal” were killed, it’d be a pretty empty world. Every person who’s ever sped, ever drunk alcohol underage, ever made an illegal left turn after the light turned red, ever littered, should be dead. We’d be better off. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/192 "2006-03-01T22:47:03Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > Yes, because a kid whose greatest crime is the old dine ‘n’ dash is just as bad as a mafia don. > > :rolleyes: I think we can just assume this cop was just one of a few bad apples. Oh, and so were the kids! So was Gotti. Wheeeeeee! ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/193 "2006-03-01T22:47:39Z")
> [@Fear Itself](#): > > Pretty convenient the way you are ignoring the latest eyewitness acoount that places the cop not in front of the vehicle, but to one side firing into the side of the car as the driver tries to avoid him. You mean the eyewitness who was in the car? The one who has every reason to lie because he is 1) a criminal and 2) mad his friend is dead. If there’s another eyewitness report I missed it after just skimming through the last few pages looking for it (I genuinely may have missed it, not being a smart ass.) ---
**Author:** ![wring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/838e76/32.png) [@wring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wring)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/194 "2006-03-01T22:48:13Z")
> [@Martin Hyde](#): > > So was John Gotti. what a fucking tool you are. You are _seriously_ putting a petty theif in the same basket as a Mob figure? Let me ask you - do you ever order stuff on line? through catalogs? have you ever done so? do you carefully keep track of all such purchases so that at the end of the year you can pay the appropriate use tax to your state? If not, I submit to you that you, too, are a theif, a tax cheat, and depending on how often you’ve failed to do so, a career criminal, certainly much more $$ involved than this particular crime (incidentally, do you currently have proof that the dead kid was in fact owing the restaurant anything? from the number of kids and the amount of $$ involved, it’s entirely possible that at least one of the persons didn’t order anything) ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/195 "2006-03-01T22:49:59Z")
> [@Martin Hyde](#): > > You mean the eyewitness who was in the car? > > The one who has every reason to lie because he is 1) a criminal and 2) mad his friend is dead. You have to prove he lied, not just grump that he might have. You could say the same thing about the cop’s testimony, he has every reason to lie to cover his ass. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/196 "2006-03-01T22:51:51Z")
> [@Fear Itself](#): > > You have to prove he lied, not just grump that he might have. You could say the same thing about the cop’s testimony, he has every reason to lie to cover his ass. Of course. And in a case where it’s he-said-she said, you can’t really believe either one so that can’t be enough to make a determination sans other evidence. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/197 "2006-03-01T22:52:27Z")
> [@askeptic](#): > > The problem with your hypo bup is that it fails to distinguish between felonies and misdomeanors. These kids did not rob a bank they did not pay for a meal. Big difference, morally and legally. If I agree to go into a bank with you to throw waterballoons at the manager and then when we get in you pull out a gun and shoot him, am I guilty of the murder? NO. But if I go in to rob the bank with you and you pull out a gun and shoot somebody I will be guilty of murder. Same here. In your original post, you said > [@](#): > > He was in the backseat. He had no control of the drivers actions. Cops are supposed to take into account the potential danger to bystanders. I thought you were saying he shouldn’t have been shot because he fits into the class of “bystander.” I will almost assuredly agree he should not have been shot after the dust settles, but not \*because \* he was a bystander. Regardless of the level of the crime, if someone were shot because the vehicle they were in was fleeing the crime, they’re not bystanders. I just thought the bank robbery example made that easier to see. ---
**Author:** ![D\_Odds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/d_odds/32/2882_2.png) [@D\_Odds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Odds)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/198 "2006-03-01T22:56:45Z")
> [@Washington Post](#): > > As part of their investigation, officials said, detectives will rely on ballistics tests, a reconstruction of the crash scene and witness accounts to determine how the incident unfolded. > > The case will then be forwarded to Alexandria Commonwealth’s Attorney S. Randolph Sengel, who will decide whether criminal charges are warranted. He declined to comment until he makes a determination. > > Debbie Weierman, an FBI spokeswoman, said investigators began a “preliminary review of the circumstances surrounding the shooting to determine whether or not to open an FBI investigation.” If this were Rudy Guiliani’s NYPD, my knee would also be jerking, but then, good ol’ Rudy would already have declared the cop totally innocent, would have started a PR campaign against everyone in the car, and would have the cop in pistol training for only hitting passenger. As I don’t know Alexandria’s history, I’m not going to jerk my knee and pass judgment until the PD, State Attorney’s office, and FBI give me a better story. Right now, all I’m hearing from the PD is, “No comment until we know more” and from car mates of the victim, “Of course we did nothing wrong.” Both expected. No lawyer is going to let the kid go, “Steve-O, he gunned his engine at the pig…no way was he getting a DUI.” ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/199 "2006-03-01T22:56:55Z")
> [@wring](#): > > what a fucking tool you are. You are _seriously_ putting a petty theif in the same basket as a Mob figure? > > Let me ask you - do you ever order stuff on line? through catalogs? have you ever done so? do you carefully keep track of all such purchases so that at the end of the year you can pay the appropriate use tax to your state? If not, I submit to you that you, too, are a theif, a tax cheat, and depending on how often you’ve failed to do so, a career criminal, certainly much more $$ involved than this particular crime (incidentally, do you currently have proof that the dead kid was in fact owing the restaurant anything? from the number of kids and the amount of $$ involved, it’s entirely possible that at least one of the persons didn’t order anything) Casual purchases are typically exempted from the use tax. ---
**Author:** ![wring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/838e76/32.png) [@wring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wring)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478/200 "2006-03-01T22:59:27Z")
> [@Martin Hyde](#): > > Casual purchases are typically exempted from the use tax. check again asshole. Not in my state they aren’t, and I’d be willing to bet not in yours either. But you’ve just admitted (essentially) that you have, indeed made purchases out of state for items that were intended for use in your state w/o paying use tax. Theif. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cop-shoot-kills-teen-after-he-skips-out-on-check-at-ihop/346478.md?page=11)