How could he have known the cop was “bad and murderous” when at the time he had yet to murder anyone?
Your basis for saying he was right to run away is shoddy and makes no sense. I’ll say it again; unless you can outrun a bullet, running away from someone you think is going to shoot you is not going to make things any better.
Okay, so you aren’t going so far as to say that it definitely was stupid to run. I’m just a lot more cautious than you on this – I think it’s entirely possible that running was a rational course of action based on what he knew and was experiencing at the time.
I don’t know, and we’ll probably never know. I think it’s entirely within the realm of possibility, and consistent with the video, that he saw/heard/experienced something that would serve as a very real and reasonable motivator to try to flee urgently.
Probably, in general.
I don’t know if the victim was right to run – I’m just saying he might have been, and I don’t think it’s right to say that it was stupid/unwise/irrational to run, since there are circumstances in which it might be smart/wise/rational to run consistent with the video.
Since we know that this cop was a bad, dangerous, and murderous individual, I think there are far more circumstances in which it’s smart/wise/rational to run from a bad/dangerous/murderous person with a gun than if this were not the case. Not that I’m stating that this was the case – we probably can’t ever know for sure.
It’s usually a bad idea to run from police, but not always. In this case, because this was a bad/murderous/dangerous cop, it is more likely than it otherwise would be that it might not have been a bad idea.
[quote]
If you do not [list=A][li]attack the cop, or []run away from the cop, or []make any sudden movements, or[*]refuse to let the cop handcuff you if he feels the need[/list]then the cop will not shoot you.[/li][/quote]
Most of the time, but not all the time. I’ll put it in a way that I’ve used before, but is usually ignored:
In 1850, this was almost certainly categorically not true broadly: there would be numerous circumstances in which a black person would be shot by police other than attacking, running from, or making any sudden movements. In 1900, it probably still wasn’t a general rule – there were no consistent and reasonable “rules” that a black person could follow to be safe from police. In 1950, it was probably closer, but far from perfect – in general, a black person could probably hope not to be shot by not running/attacking/suddenly-moving to a cop, but there were still lots of circumstances in which this wasn’t the case.
And then we’re at the present. I think this is in general true – usually, a black person can expect to not be shot by police if he doesn’t run/attack/move-suddenly. But I don’t believe we’re at 100% yet, especially in certain parts of the country.
The difference seems to be that you think we’ve gotten to 100% (or very close) for that rule of not-being-shot-by-police-unless-you-run/attack/move-suddenly, and I think we’re not there yet as a country.
This seems like a trivially obvious statement – yes, obviously if the cop hadn’t decided to shoot a fleeing man who offered no immediate danger to anyone, the shooting wouldn’t have occurred.
I think this is pretty different – for the rape discussions, I believe this ignores the majority of the actual incidents – most rapes have nothing to do with poor decisions on the part of the woman (unless “being alone with a man” or “having a drink with a man” or “going out in public” is a poor decision, and I don’t buy that). That’s quite different for police shootings. But I’m certainly not ready to include this incident in the “stupid” camp – there have been and still are circumstances in which running from the police is not irrational, and for this specific incident based on what we know, it seems just as likely to me that this was the case as the likelihood that it wasn’t.
Because human beings have things like intuition and feelings, which can be derived from things like facial expressions, body language, and “looking into someone’s eyes”, and those things can lead one to legitimately and rationally believe that they must escape urgently.
Where did I say he ran because he thought the cop would shoot him? That’s not part of the possibility I’ve offered – I’ve suggested that he might have felt some indication based on his up-close and personal interaction with the cop that this cop was an immediate physical danger to him, and the best course of action when in the presence of an immediately physically dangerous person can be rationally to run.
To put it very broadly, some people’s experiences have provided them rational, reasonable, and legitimate reasons to believe that police officers are a dangerous group who mean them harm, and for whom no rules can ensure safety when around them. If all a kid sees of cops is unfair treatment and beatings of his father, and then as a teen and young adult he’s unfairly treated and beaten by cops, then it shouldn’t be a surprise that he is going to see cops as a dangerous enemy and take actions that others might consider irrational because in-the-moment they seem like the best chance to stay alive. That’s a danger to police, to individuals, and our society in general.
I don’t think this is broadly true – most people in the US don’t have such experiences. But in 1850, 1900, and 1950, most black people probably did. In the present, I believe there’s still a significant number of folks who have had those experiences, and have rational, reasonable, and legitimate reasons to see cops as dangerous and unpredictable foes.
He didn’t run from the cop because he feared or intuited that the cop was going to harm him because he was a black man. He ran to avoid being jailed for back child support (as he had been numerous times in the past). If he hadn’t run, he wouldn’t have been shot. Slager was polite and professional to Scott prior to his running off, and he attempted through voice commands, tasering and physical effort to subdue him prior to the shooting. There is no evidence at all that Slager was eager or determined to shoot Scott simply because he was black.
Maybe not, but there is evidence indicating that he was determined to kill Scott, and not in self-defense or the defense of others. (As one law enforcement officer pointed out the other night, even if it was Hannibal Lecter jogging/running away, that isn’t a free pass to use deadly force. And I’m not sure I saw much “physical effort” either; it ain’t like Scott was even running at all fast.)
While I agree that obeying the cops is usually the safest path, there are situations where even compliance can get you killed.
I’ve heard from cops, and people who know cops, that they generally see three kinds of people: Criminal scum, idiots (‘civilians’, as if the cops themselves weren’t civilians), and other cops. So let’s say a cop sees someone who ‘matches the description’ of a perpetrator. This can be as broad as ‘a male Black’, even if the car he’s driving is a completely different make and colour. Some cops are predisposed to believe that they have The Right Suspect, even on the flimsiest of evidence. Or maybe the cop’s just having a bad day, and a homeless person just annoys him. A cop who already thinks the suspect is guilty, or one that’s just looking for an excuse to get physical, may very well perform an aggressive takedown. Let me use myself as an example.
I’ve managed to destroy both of my knees. Say a cop has me get out of my car, and he has a gun pointed at me. He tells me to put my hands in the air. I do. He tells me to get down on the ground, face down. Well, there’s a problem. I can’t do that without at least one of my hands. But he told me to put my hands up. If I try to reach down so that I can comply with his second command, he might shoot me. If I don’t try to get on the ground, he might shoot me. If I try to tell him I have injuries, and I have to put down my hands in order to comply with his order to get on the ground, he’ll tell me to shut up. If I try to tell him again, then I’m ‘resisting’. He might just shoot me. Or he may tackle me. And there’s something that is an issue for people who don’t necessarily have injuries.
Videos I’ve seen of aggressive takedowns are very violent. They seem to put the suspect in very painful positions. A cop would tell you, ‘Pain helps them comply.’ I think pain causes an instinctive reaction on the part of the person being hurt to make the pain stop. Suppose a person has an asthma attack, and needs to reposition himself in order to breathe and not die? These actions will appear to the cop to be ‘struggling’ and ‘resisting arrest’, when it’s the cop’s own actions that are causing the so-called ‘resistance’. Someone might end up cuffed and face-down on the pavement and die due to a medical issue the cop didn’t want to hear about. Or the cop might decide the person is still struggling too much and use his taser – only he inadvertently draws his pistol instead.
Cops not only need to not shoot people with little provocation, they must understand the situation. Not think they understand, but actually understand.
The long version of the Feidin Santana video shows Walter Scott resisting arrest.
What’s the deadly force rule in South Carolina concerning a suspect physically assaulting a police officer and then fleeing the scene (of the assault, not fleeing the traffic stop)?
We don’t know that though. At that point Slager hadn’t had an opportunity to pat Scott down and determine whether he was armed, and given that neither verbal commands, tasering, nor physical struggle were sufficient to subdue him, Slager may have had concerns as to whether Scott’s will to escape might lead to such things as carjackings or home intrusion, possibly with hostage taking, as I suggested in my first post to the thread.
Most of the struggle took place away from the dashboard camera and before the eyewitness began his video. The eyewitness however did describe them on the ground and struggling, with Slager appearing to gain the upper hand before Scott broke away and began running.
“May have had concerns” does not justify deadly force.
I trust you are not a member of law enforcement, and that’s a good thing (if you are or have acquired these notions from someone who is, hopefully that person isn’t on the job very long). The police officer is not entitled to presume that the person may be armed or have bad intentions. An officer is not entitled to use deadly force just because he “had concerns” about “what if” scenarios.
Yikes.
I’d like to know why this fine, upstanding citizen was buying a [used] Mercedes when he owed $18,104 in back child support? Seems he had a real problem getting his priorities straight.
You see, it doesn’t matter if he was a fine upstanding citizen, police don’t get to shoot people (even black people) in the back just because the victim has lead a less that perfect life. Well, to be honest, police have been pretty much allowed to straight up murder a person of color, or two, but the times are changing and the cops and Fox viewers better get with the times. Everyone has a camera phone now.
I’m sure that we can all agree that all deadbeat parents deserve to be murdered. :dubious:
Concerns were adequate in this case. The guy was running and the cop was in no apparent immediate danger. But the cop was concerned about what the guy would do with the gun he stopped to pick up during the chase were he to get away. The main difference in the two situations is that in the Muskogee case the cop knew the suspect had a gun, and in the South Carolina case the cop hadn’t had an opportunity yet to make that determination. But when you have a suspect who’s that determined to get away for whatever unknown reason, it isn’t unreasonable to think that he may well put others at risk in order to do so.
Seriously?
He wasn’t shot because he lead less that a perfect life. He was shot because he ran from the traffic stop, fought with the officer, tried to grab the taser and was unfazed after having had it used on him, and then was fleeing arrest.
He wasn’t shot over a brake light and he wasn’t shot for being black and he wasn’t shot for leading an imperfect life. He was shot for behaving like a dangerous and desperate criminal determined to get away at all costs.
Again, the SC officer was not entitled to use deadly force on a “what if”.
Neither here nor there, but I’m still waiting for the first scenario where a citizen lawfully carrying a gun shoots a cop and (as cops often do) gets away with “well, I was in fear for my life and (s)he *might *have shot me or [X person], so …”
I’m not sure I would have been shot, as a white guy about the same age, if I had done the same thing. I do know it would have not been justified, as this shooting was not.
Maybe it only applies to suspects who assault police officers?
In your scenario, why would you chose to assault the police officer?