Well that’s just silly. If he had time to step in front of it, pull his weapon out, and fire, then he had time to step back to where he was.
Did these kids even know the guy was a cop; he was off duty, and likely not in uniform. They might have been thinking “Loony with a gun ! Get away !” I mean, even if I were to skip out on a check for pancakes, I wouldn’t expect someone to pull a gun on me.
Why the hell does an IHOP even need an armed guard? And how many disgusting chocolate chip flapjacks do they hafta sell to pay for that guy?
Yeah, I’d fear for my safety, too, if I had a habit of jumping in front of moving vehicles - not to mention my sanity. If this parking lot is such a “tight space,” how fast could this Jeep have been moving anyway? And from the last WaPo link, we find that the dead kid was seated behind the driver. And that the off-duty cop apparently fired the final and fatal shot thru the side window of the Jeep as it was passing by him.
God forbid you read the OP rather than making stupid, incorrect assumptions.
When shooting at a car to stop it, aren’t you meant to shoot at the *tires *! 
Whatever the case, I don’t see any reason a gun should ever be drawn over a dine-'n-dash. He should have just called in the license plate.
Curiously though, what can a restaurant do if someone skips out on the bill without paying, once they get away (unless there are security cameras) isn’t it one word against the other? Anyone know how restaurants handle this?
No. That’s in movies.
They had a Virgina cop on the radio today say that they don’t fire at tires or the engine block or anything. They’re allowed to fire into the vehicle.
However, this piggybacks on what Mhendo posted. Someone on that same show this morning was saying the kid was shot in the back of the head.
That said, that’s the only place I’ve heard that, and even if it is true. . .clearly the kid could have been turning away from a man with a gun. Still. . .rumor mongering is FUN!
To me, regardless of the original crime is, all that matters is what happened in that parking lot.
Did the officer HAVE to use his firearm?
If so, did he make a bad decision that put himself into such a position?
Was he actually calmly trying to stop the vehicle and they tried to ram him, or did he run out in front of it.
Without answers to those questions, it’s hard to really form an opinion.
Waiting for more details is important with respect to filing charges, not so important when chit chatting over the limited details you already have.
From these descriptions it sounds like the officer put himself in harms way (in front of the car) in an effort to get them to stop, then shot it up when they didn’t stop as fast as he wanted. I’m not really thrilled with that concept, essentially he risked his life (and their lives, obviously) over some fucking flapjacks.
Actually, it doesn’t take very long at all. Most law enforcement officers do “speed drills” on their firing ranges. Like I said in my earlier post, I’m a slow hand on my pistol, and from the shout of “GO” I can draw, let loose with all 13 rounds and reload in just under five seconds. My squadron’s best is still held by an old (now retired) Chief Master Sergeant named Eric Williams, who could draw, empty his Baretta, reload, and empty it again in 5.something seconds. In a firefight, five seconds is an extremely long time.
Sorry for the aside. Carry on! 
Ditto. It’s plain stupid.
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Shooting out a tire on a vehicle coming towards you from a short distance away is not going to stop it or significantly alter its path.
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Shooting at the engine flat-out wouldn’t do anything, unless the officer was packing a Barrett .50-caliber under his jacket. He might get lucky with his sidearm and make a hole in the radiator, forcing the vehicle to stop sometime in the next 1/2-hour…
Then shooting the occupants of said car is also flat out, as that also will have no predictable effect of stopping or altering its path. Right?
Wow, what a horrible, horrible story. I feel sad for everyone involved, especially the kid’s parents. It would destroy me if someone I loved died over such a trivial thing.
It’s safe to say the cop totally over-reacted. Still, that doesn’t mean he’s an evil person.
I can definitely see how, if he was angry at the kids and not really thinking straight, a person might act impulsively by throwing himself in front of the car…then panic and draw his gun when the car kept coming. Cops are just people like all of us, and a lot of people make stupid mistakes during emotional moments. I’m sure a few people on this board have also tried to stop someone from leaving by standing in their car’s way, and a few of us have probably also been in situations where we would have shot someone over something stupid if we had happened to have a gun at the time.
Obviously I’m not saying it’s justifiable; just that I understand how such a thing could happen. 
I’ll bet the cop probably feels awful about shooting the kid now that he has had time to actually think about what he did. What a terrible way for so many lives to be ruined.
Yep. I pointed that out upthread.
In my city (Jackson, MS) there are two IHOPs that I know of. Both are in neighborhoods that would make an armed guard a not-so-bad idea.
-Joe
Ick. I’ve been to that IHOP; I used to live about a half-mile from there.
It is a really small parking lot, so I can kind of see why it’d be tough to move out of the way. OTOH, if my memory serves (and spatial orientation hasn’t been my strong suit), there’s no way at all that a cop or anyone could have jumped in front of a moving car there and had enough time to make a reasonable decision as to whether the car would stop. If the cop shot, he jumped in front of the car with the plan of shooting – no way he could have given them enough time to stop before he started throwing shots. This maniac should lose his job.
I know I’m painting with too broad a brush, but there’s not a week that goes by that something doesn’t make me glad I moved the fuck out of Virginia.
–Cliffy
No, it’s not safe to say that.
It is very easy to imagine a scenario where the cop acted perfectly appropriately and to claim WITHOUT THE FACTS that “it’s safe to say he overreacted” slanders a cop who might have behaved properly.
Ever with the paucity of facts we do have, he overreacted. Dining and dashing does not justify walking in front of a moving car. Perhaps if they had abducted someone, or threatened someone with a gun; but over pancakes? The prudent response would be to get the license plate and call them in.
So you have no reason to believe the teens purposely charged the cop, but you’re willing to postulate the cop was on a “big power trip” with absolutely no more reason?
Asshole.
The cop stepped out in the path of a moving SUV over an unpaid pancake bill. I’d like to hear the scenario where this is a more reasonable action than getting down the license plate number.
Beat me to it.
Maybe it was a lot of pancakes…