When did I actually mention the holocaust, or draw comparisons between killing a dog and killing six million people? I didn’t, that was your idea. I pointed out that ‘just following orders’ is not and should not be an excuse for doing something that’s wrong, and that the concept that people are responsible their own actions even when ‘under orders’ dates back to the Nuremburg era.
Also, although you and your ilk refuse to acknowledge it, this case is not just about a dead dog but about a group of innocent people forced out of a car at gunpoint on the basis of a phone call and nothing else. How far from a police state are you when ‘officer safety’ requires that you kneel by the side of the road at gunpoint for investigation of a wallet left on the roof?
You realize that some people object to police pointing guns as innocent people without a damn good reason, don’t you?
It is the cop’s job not to violate the basic human rights of citizens, which is done on a regular basis. If you threatening someone’s life because you feel like it (say, by pointing a gun at them) that is a violation of their basic human rights unless you’ve got a damn good reason. Also, pointing guns at people unneccesarily is unsafe, as demonstrated by the numerous accidental shootings by police, so even by your job description above, pointing guns at people without a good reason is not part of the cop’s job.
Watch the video, this time with the sound turned up. The cop next to the car clearly says “we’ve got a dog in here”. Also, try to pay more attention as to what side of the car the dog hops out of.
One thing that struck me was that it’s probably a damn good thing the dog didn’t go directly toward the cop with the shotgun and flashlight. That cop started backing up as soon as the dog hopped out and decided to fire within the 2 or 3 seconds the dog was out of the car. If the dog hadn’t gone out and come back, the cop would have been aiming the shotgun not only at the dog, but at the family and other police officers. With the way he reacted, I would bet money that he would’ve fired the shotgun without any thought to what was beyond his target.
Was your first reaction to kill that dog? Would you have shot it dead if you’d had a gun in your hand? Why or why not? Do you think that being a police officer gives you a special right to kill dogs (or anything) that may or may not be a threat to you?
**When did I actually mention the holocaust, or draw comparisons between killing a dog and killing six million people? I didn’t, that was your idea. **
hmm…My apologies…Would you mind explaining what you meant when you said this:
**I have no sympathy for the ‘just following orders’ defense, and I think it went out of style back in the 40s. **
Also, although you and your ilk refuse to acknowledge it, this case is not just about a dead dog but about a group of innocent people forced out of a car at gunpoint on the basis of a phone call and nothing else.
My ilk?
Please…I have been far from pretending that this was an acceptable incident. You and I just differ in opinon on who deserves the blame.
You want to blame some $30,000 a year cop while I don’t like scapegoating the small guy in order to safeguard a system that isn’t working.
My first reaction was akin to a deer caught in the headlights. I didn’t do anything but breath a sigh of relief when I realized it was a friendly dog who just wanted to drool all over my dog. If I wasn’t caught by surprise and had a firearm in my hands it is entirely possible that I would have shot the dog.
I don’t believe that police officers have any more right to kill something or someone then any other citizen. I think any reasonable person has just cause to fear for their safety when faced with a strange dog charging towards them.
I already did, you must have missed it in your zeal to selectively quote. “I pointed out that ‘just following orders’ is not and should not be an excuse for doing something that’s wrong, and that the concept that people are responsible their own actions even when ‘under orders’ dates back to the Nuremburg era.”
I don’t think that blaming the person who committed the crime is scapegoating anyone, that wanting to punish the criminal is equivalent to scapegoating his accomplices, and that the person sticking a gun into someone’s face is not some ‘small guy’ who just innocently got mixed up in things but a violent criminal who finally got caught abusing his power.
And the police on the scene didn’t know what the 911 call was. Not that it matters anyway; Cars -can- slow down, you know. Even if it had been speeding so fast before, that doesn’t mean it would be by the time they found them. The speeding bit added extra suspicion, which probably helped those early in the chain of command to decide there might be criminal activity involved.
Hello Godwin :rolleyes:
So when -can- the police do a felony stop? When someone’s already shot at them? Should it be illegal for them to ever conduct a felony stop if they’re not 100% sure the people they’re arresting are guilty? Because you’re damning them now for conducting a felony stop when all they knew was that dispatch said to conduct a felony stop on a car suspected of being involved in a robbery.
And the comparison of “just following orders” to conduct a felony stop to “just following orders” in the murder of hundreds or thousands is a bad one at best, and a disgusting and insulting one at worst.
You like to keep bringing this up, so I’ll point it out again; The police on the scene did not know the contents of the phone call, or even how it came to be that these people were suspects. They could not compare the two, because they did not have both pieces. Are you now blaming them for not being omniscient, too?
Misleading? I already told you, a felony stop doesn’t mean jack shit as to wether the people being pulled over commited a felony or not. If you want to infer that from it, fine. You can do that. You can also be completely wrong, too.
Oh yeah… As to whoever trained you in your nice psycic abilities to tell what someone else is trying to imply by using a straight-foreward term, I think you should go and ask for your money back. It doesn’t seem to be working too well.
I’m not implying one fucking thing, but that doesn’t seem to stop you from seeing what you want to. And I know there wasn’t any damn felony involved. I’m sure you’ve got the reading comprehension skills to know I know that, too. But it sure isn’t stopping you from putting words into other people’s mouths, now is it? Always easier to fight a strawman, after all. And not just that, but a red herring as well. The name of the stop they performed has zero relevance beyond identifying the action they took.
So if the police on the scene are told to arrest some people in a felony stop, they are the ones who should be in trouble if it ends up the person giving them the info/orders was wrong? For all the officers at the scene knew, there could have been hundreds of witnesses seeing these people comitting some crime.
I thought that might be what he was saying (The audio was kinda crappy on the copy I saw). But still, he was on the left side of the car, from the camera’s viewpoint, and the dog came out on the right, unless there’s something I’m missing there…?
Something that also bothers me, and someone please correct me if I’m wrong, but the police wouldn’t tell the family why they were being held face down in the dirt and in handcuffs.
Now, don’t you have a right to informed of the charges against you? And ok, yes technically they weren’t actually charged with anything, the police were seeing if there was anything to charge them with, but the fact that they wouldn’t even tell them what they were suspected of doing bothers me.
It seems to indicate to me a very arrogant attitude on the part of the cops. They stop the family based on NOTHING but a phone call. They didn’t tell the family why they were pulled over and handcuffed, and they didn’t shut the car door after being asked in order to keep the dog in, and then wound up shooting it.
The whole thing is disturbing.
Wow, I just saw the video. THAT was the big scary dog? That could have been a squirrel. That was utterly pointless. That didn’t look like anyone responding to a threat: it looked like a jumpy officer discharging his weapon at a rather tiny dog who was just happy to be outside and free to run around.
According to the family, the officers didn’t even bother to apologize after they found out the family was innocent and they simply let them go. Their hand-wringing came only after this became a media-event.
Are you sure? I thought I remembered one of the articles saying that the police told them they were being detained because they were indicated as possible robbery suspects or something to that effect (Can’t remember the exact wording). Can’t find it now, though…
Found out some news, too. THP stated that one of its dispatchers was the one that changed the whole thing from an inquiry to alerting units of “possible robbery suspects,” and that some of the dispatchers are now under review by investigators…
You’re the one making that comparison, not me; I simply pointed out that ‘just following orders’ is not a defense. I’m not going to bother responding to the rest of your post until you cut out your Nazi comparisons, which will probably be never so goodbye.
You’re the one making that comparison, not me; I simply pointed out that ‘just following orders’ is not a defense. I’m not going to bother responding to the rest of your post until you cut out your Nazi comparisons, which will probably be never so goodbye.
Face it, you made an obvious reference to the Holocaust. You may not want to admit or deal with it, but you’re the one who brought it up.
—Face it, you made an obvious reference to the Holocaust.—
You’re weaseling. You’re the one obsessed with the Holocaust, you’re the one who keeps pushing it. Get over it, and get back on point instead of trying to derail discussion with an utterly pointless “gotcha.”
Fine, forget the whole nazi bit, then. However, that bit you’re using about “just following orders” in the 40s were people who were doing something they know was “evil,” so even barring the whole nazi comparison, they’re still not comparible scenarios. Pulling people over is something the police do, and when it’s possibly a high-risk stop (As the dispatcher said it would be, it was not their conclusion), they do a felony stop to be safe. That isn’t illegal.
Well, like I said, somebody correct me if I’m wrong, and I guess I was.
Wow, so not it’s turning out that it was a dispatcher that started it all. Sheeze, I wonder what developments will happen next. What other new information will come out about who else screwed up.
