From what I understand, this is the policy of police in Canada, as well. You just don’t draw weapons on armed police and expect to survive. Of course, wearing a parka in warm weather is not exactly suspicious behaviour - all kinds of new immigrants to Canada would be regularly shot, if that was the case.
“Aim small, miss small.”
So what are the police going to do in the winter?
Shoot people in bathing suits.
While I’m not a cop per se, I do federal law enforcement at the federal level, and our training is pretty much on par with all other fed/state/local policies. When speaking of deadly force, we aren’t trained to “shoot to kill”. As others have pointed out, you shoot until the threat that justified the use of deadly force is over. Whether that’s one round or all of them. And you shoot for center mass. Period. There really isn’t much to the policy beyond that. For situations where deadly force is not appropriate, there are alternatives such as pepper spray, baton etc.
Obviously, certain criteria must be met prior to the use of deadly force (which, btw, we define as force which will most likely cause death or serious bodily injury). A subject must have: a weapon, the opportunity to use said weapon, and take actions to indicate intent to use said weapon to cause death or serious bodily injury to some other person.
So, bottom line is: If a subject meets the above criteria for use of deadly force, then you shoot center mass until that threat is over. There is no “shoot to disable”.
It can obviously be discussed in greater detail, but that’s the core of it.
Heh - a little redundant.
Anyway, I forgot to add: If you are faced with a situation in which you have the luxury to aim for a leg or an arm, then you probably don’t have a true deadly force situation as defined above. Also, the highly specialized members of SWAT teams and the like will play by slightly different rules.
I think the point is sorta getting lost here. It seems that there is serious talk to make it official policy to shoot (to kill, disable, stop— whatever) people in overcoats.
Everyday I say it-- I can’t believe how few people are not seriously frightened by the direction democracy is taking these days. The terrorist have REALLY, SERIOUSLY, NO SHIT, NOT BEING SARCASTIC OR IRONIC HERE --won.
Bingo. It’s that they’re implementing a shoot to kill policy based on a vague profile. Considering how many people are going to fit that profile and how few people actually die each year from terrorism it’s seriously fucked up.
I was playing a game called “Rachet and Clank: Up Your Arsenal” a while ago. It’s a fun game, full of ridiculously large weapons and snarky digs at pop culture. One of the levels is a place called Zeldrin Starport, complete with a woman issuing security announcements on the PA system. At one point she says, “Due to heightened security, please refrain from looking suspicious. Violators will be disintegrated and fined.”
So now you’re telling me that this is not, in fact, a joke? That’s just fucking great.
Calm down, how many people have been shot to death by law enforcement for wearing overcoats.
Now, how many people in your country have died recently from terrorist attacks.
Which one are you more worried about? Why?
Oh, so this is a competition to see who can kill the most innocent people? What’s the body count at Abu Ghraib?
Is it less than in the Tube? Yay! We win!
To answer your question, I am far more worried about what my country does to it’s citizens than what terrorists do. I’d like to think a democracy would be above that. It’s pretty heartbreaking to see this just isn’t so.
I’d like to see the original text of these guidelines before jumping to any conclusions, but it appears to say no more than: “If you know for a fact that you’re dealing with a suicide bomber, shoot for the head to kill instantly, thereby reducing the chance of detonation, instead of shooting for center mass where you may hit the bomb, or allow the bomber to trigger the device.”
The selected quotes seem somewhat out of context. For example:
Do the guidelines say this exactly? Or is this just the way the author of the article chose to write it? As it’s written, it certainly seems to suggest that officers should just shoot someone in the head who fits a certain profile, however I’m highly dubious that any law enforcement organization in the western world would advocate such a policy. My guess is it’s a poorly written article.
And this:
What this tells me is, if you have a suicide bomber strapped with explosives, and you can clearly see this, don’t wait for the bomber to reach up to the detonator - just shoot him immediately. OK, I can live with that. This is addressing a fairly common “use of deadly force” procedure that states a subject must display “actions” or a clear intent to use deadly force before an officer can respond with deadly force. (i.e. - drawing the gun). The guidelines in the article seem to state: don’t wait for him to “draw the gun” - just shoot him if he’s strapped with explosives. For reference, under the use of force policy that I follow, deadly force would not be authorized if I encounter someone who has a gun in his waistband. He has a weapon, and the opportunity, but no actions. If he were to suddenly reach for the gun to point it at someone, the “deadly force triangle” is met, and deadly force would be authorized. These guidelines seem to be suggesting that a suicide bomber has already registered his intent by strapping on the explosives and going into public, so don’t wait for him to “reach for the gun”.
Like I said, I’d like to see the exact wording of the guidelines for proper context before drawing any conclusions.
Another point, shooting someone in the leg, or the hand can easily be lethal, even if you do manage to hit where you’re aiming. If you aren’t justified in using lethal force, you aren’t justified in firing bullets at someone, even if you shoot at their leg. Any time you fire a gun you are using deadly force, there is no such thing as shooting to wound or shooting to maim. And if you were in a situation where you could safely shoot someone in the arm you wouldn’t be justified in shooting them because deadly force wouldn’t be warranted in that situation.
Guns don’t kill people, bullets kill people. Well, actually bullets don’t kill people, having holes blown in you kills people. There ain’t no safe way to do it. The only reason to fire a gun at someone is because you want a deadly hole blown in them. If you don’t want a deadly hole blown in someone, don’t fire your gun at them. Simple rule, really.
Well the statistic I found was that police shootings kill 400 people a year in the U.S.But I’ll grant you there are no overcoat-specific stats, and it’s safe to assume 0.
On the other hand the new rules haven’t been implemented yet. And there’ve been no deaths by suicide bomb in the U.S. ever (that I can think of, anyway). Which is what this is designed to prevent.
If you wear white after labor day, what happens?
Well, most likely you’d be trying to conceal anthrax residue on your clothing. Which would mean you were probably transporting a high-grade weaponized anthrax dissemination device. The threat could only be safely neutralized by detonating a small nuclear device in your vicinity, vaporizing any anthrax and limiting casualties to an acceptable number.
No handy cite, but I velieve the Israelis have a pretty fair record of taking down suicide bombers or limiting deaths from same, based on suspicious profiles. And I don’t remember hearing about a rash of illegitimate deaths of people who simply were wearing bulky clothing out of season.
There seem to be quite a few people in the U.S. and U.K. who feel that way.
Truly bizarre.
The two documents I believe they’re referring to are here. They’re pretty unclear on the issue. The first just describes the profile. The second describes how to react to a suicide bomber. And only has this much to say about how to decide when to use lethal force:
I think that means fitting the profile, but you be the judge.
Perhaps I’m missing something here, but I fail to see what your concern is. These guidelines are for dealing with a suicide bomber. A suicide bomber who’s clearly packed with explosives, not someone who merely fits a profile and who may or may not be a terrorist. It says as much in your bolded sentence:
That sentence is addressing exactly what I said in my last post - it’s addressing the standard use of force doctrine that states officers should wait until a subject displays actions to use a weapon in a deadly manner, i.e. “making a move”. The guideline is stating that officers shouldn’t wait until a bomber “makes a move” for the trigger of a device before the officer employs deadly force.
But if it were clear who is and who isn’t packed with explosives, why would they need a profile to figure out who might be packed with explosives, like in the first document linked by uglybeech?