First thing I thought when watching the video was. Why not a taser gun against a 12 year old? Even if the gun was real, just shooting a kid shouldn’t be the only alternative.
Side question for someone knowledgeable of police practices, from the Yahoo story linked earlier:
Is there a reason that once shot, with the gun removed from proximity to the boy, the two police officers already on scene wouldn’t provide medical aid and instead that waited for a random federal agent to come by?
Open carry is legal in Ohio. Just an observation.
For 12-year-olds?
Wait. Either the cops knew he was 12 and maybe should have been more circumspect, or they believed he was an adult and not violating the law.
I would, but I don’t want to look too show-offy.
Either they knew he was 12 and already breaking the law by carrying a gun or they knew he was over 18 and should realize that reaching for a gun when a cop has his gun pointed at you is fucking stupid.
Moderating
It’s probably time to move this over to Great Debates.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
Okay with the move, but I was asking a factual question and not looking for a debate. I was hoping someone with some familiarity with police procedures could enlighten us.
Not long ago a guy tried to hold up a Wendy’s here with a pellet gun. The police responded in minutes, before the guy with the pellet gun left the building. Three officers entered the building. The perpetrator drew down on the officers with the pellet gun and the officers fired back. They hit the perpetrator and also the sound guy from the show “Cops.” They also put two bullets through the window of a tanning salon a block away.
The perpetrator and the sound guy from “Cops” later died at the hospital, which was two blocks from the Wendy’s location.
Yeah, the parents play a big role here. When I was a kid, probably around 9ish I got some Dick Tracy kit for Christmas from my aunt. One of the things in it was a fake gun. But it looked absolutely real. My parents told me that they would hold it for me. That was the last I ever saw of it.
Taser(s) I believe are a one shot deal. A cop isn’t going to risk his life with the hopes he can make that shot - when he has another weapon that can do multiple tries per seconds. A taser only goes so far and a person with a weapon might be able to get off a shot in the mean time.
Once a cop decides you might have a gun (or knife if with x distance) - you are done. The training takes over and they do not really think.
I wasn’t there - I didn’t see it, but people seem to be under the impression that cops are/should be doing all this thinking to avoid shooting people that MIGHT not have a gun. Maybe they should, but they don’t if you make an aggressive move - and they don’t want to die.
It is pretty well known (granted maybe not to a 12 year old) that you put up your hands when the police ask you to. Should you die for not doing that? Probably not just for that, but the fact is this is what happens.
Pulling a gun on a cop - fake or not - is 99% of the time going to get you shot at.
Oh - and I seriously doubt the police are going to be looking at the orange ring indicating it is fake (not if you are pointing it at them).
If police don’t shoot if you have an orange plastic tip - well your going to start finding criminals painting their barrels that way.
Watch the video. Forewarning - it does show the boy being shot to death.
None of what the cops said about the incident was true.
Tactically, I cannot imagine how it was a good idea to pull up right next to the kid.
Nothing depresses me more than hearing “he deserved to die” as some sort of justification for the police officer’s actions.
Jesus - I suck at watching those surveillance videos - I can’t even tell he was shot.
I thought you were exaggerating when you said “right next to the kid” - wholly crap were you not.
If the police really were worried about someone with a gun - I tend to agree it isn’t a good idea to pull up so close he can hit you with the gun if your window is down.
I couldn’t tell what happened, but this isn’t what I thought it was going to be. As with all police shootings - this should obviously be investigated.
I’ve never messed with Airsoft, but have seen them for sale in flea markets. They did not have orange tips. Heading over to Wikipedia, I find that they are generally sold with orange, but there is no requirement to do so. Local laws within the US may vary.
It also says the orange tip had been removed in this incident. Again, airsoft is not a “toy,” at least not in the sense that you would hand it to a child and forget about it. A BB gun, airsoft or even a regular gun is fine in the hands of a child, but must be accompanied by adult supervision and accountability.
I’ll be interested to see where this airsoft gun came from. Did his parent give it to him, and tell him to scoot off to the park to shoot small animals? Did a retailer sell it to him? Did a gang member give it to him as a training piece?
To back up DataX, the president of the Cleveland Police Patrolman’s Association said an officer taking a Taser out when they believe there could be a person with a gun
puts the officer at risk.
To my mind - and speaking as one who is generally willing to give cops the benefit of the doubt, having to make split-second decisions - if the shooting shown in that video is “justifiable” according to police training, then police training is putting the public at an unacceptable level of risk.
To my mind, it would not be acceptable had the gun been real.
The police account was that they pulled up, one officer shouted three times at the kid to put his hands up as the kid advanced towards the car, then the other shot him when the kid put his hand to his waistband (holding the gun replica).
Looking at the video, this cannot be true. The car pulls up, the officer gets out and shoots the kid within, at most, two seconds, from very short range. The officers do not have time to shout at the Kid three times. The kid turns towards the car but does not advance towards it. I cannot see the kid reaching, but that may have happened - the video quality isn’t good enough for me to tell.
Aside from their account, which is as I note not believable, the actual events demonstrated on the video show the police too willing to place their own safety over that of the public. There was no attempt whatsoever made to ascertain the situation, to defuse the situation, or even to communicate with the kid in any meaningful way.