And you think an injured person couldn’t wield a knife?
That wasn’t irony, that was assuming a belief I don’t hold. I’m perfectly fine with the Rigby killers surviving and going to trial, I would also be perfectly fine if they had been shot and killed. The difference between said knife-wielding man and the police who shot them is that one has the direct intent to kill while the police have the intent to remove the threat that has been presented to them.
No blood lust on this end, maybe you should look in the mirror?
You never did address my comments upthread to explain why you can believe what you believe about the dangers of someone with a knife and still think the cop did the right thing by standing flat-footed and allowing the suspect to get that close to him. There’s *absolutely *something else he should have done to ensure his safety, because we’ve already established (haven’t we?) that bullets aren’t magic and are no guarantee of stopping a threat. The officer had hundreds of feet of empty space behind him which he failed to utilize for his own goddamned safety.
Probably the most frustrating thing about threads like this is people who think that firearms are always the best option in dangerous situations.
No, I don’t think a person put down by several bullet hits presents a real knife threat. It seems banal to say that we might anticipate a lack of mobility in such a person. Not saying it would be a good idea to lean right over him, but how about taking a couple of steps back?
My irony was not solely aimed at you, if you haven’t seen the “he got what he deserved” mentality littered throughout this thread then you haven’t read it.
I don’t think Keystone Kops running away from bad guys is a particularly good idea…
No, they shouldn’t have retreated. If the guy didn’t want to die, he should have dropped his weapon and stood still. If he did want to die, he got his wish.
Seriously, think about this for a minute. Either you have the cop retreating backwards, which will be slower than someone coming at him could move (and has the added risk of falling over and entirely losing control of the situation), or of turning away from the knife wielding person threatening him, which even you can’t seriously be suggesting.
The idea is ridiculous. But then so is any duty to retreat law. If you have the means and opportunity to stop someone, don’t put yourself at greater risk by retreating or running :smack:
Being hit by several bullets doesn’t necessarily ‘put a person down’, as long as they don’t hit anything immediately vital they can still be up and active, and even a fatal wound may not incapacitate them quickly enough to prevent them sticking a knife in the side of your neck.
You have a rather exaggerated view of the efficacy of bullets and an apparent lack of understanding of the dangers of knives.
By the crack about the British cops ‘finishing off’ the suspects after being shot? Eh?
Amazing how you’ve completely mischaracterized my suggestion that the officer put tactical space in between himself and the suspect as “retreating,” “running,” or “turning away,” none of which I suggested, in order to suit your own argument.
It really is just strawmen all the way down with you, isn’t it. :rolleyes:
Here’s a video I just found on youtube of a cop being a bit more sensible against a knife-wielding attacker. If only someone would have told him that his tactical decision to back away was ridiculous.
This is completely fucking retarded. That is literally a byproduct of their job. Even if we take situations like this out of the question, violence is literally a necessary condition of their job in most major cities. To take the job, you are explicitly accepting a level of violence that a civilian walking down the street does not. Your comment is so mindbogglingly dumb that I have to assume you don’t really mean it.
Should firefighters not have to accept a higher risk of being injured in a fire? Should nurses not have to accept a higher risk of getting sick than you walking down the street? Accepting a higher risk of being injured is EXACTLY why we pay cops. It’s part of why we allow most beat cops to retire after 20 years with full pensions. We know most 63-year olds can’t reasonable accept the risk of injury with any confidence they can recover fully. We pay these guys to insert themselves into violent situations knowing that some non zero percentage will get hurt regardless of how trigger happy they are. The idea that their tolerance for injury and violence should be that of a civilian walking down the street is just ridiculous on it’s face.
Well, since my question and comments seem to.be going untouched, I’ll speculate: it seemed to me that the handcuffing of the limp, *obviously * lifeless body (and even if he wasnt actually dead, he absolutely was in no position to pose ANY sort of threat to anyone) was a final expression by these police as to the victim/perp’s lack of humanity.
In the case in question the probability that several bullets put the suspect down is 100%. We know this because that is what happened.
[QUOTE=The Great Unwashed]
I would never get why a minimum of nine shots were fired, at least two of which came after the bad guy was clearly down and disabled. Scream at me how naive I am if you want, but short of citing a number of incidents where more than one cop have come to harm from a single perp already shot to bits and prostrate I’m going to believe my naivety is well-founded.
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[QUOTE=Disposable Hero]
You have a rather exaggerated view of the efficacy of bullets and an apparent lack of understanding of the dangers of knives.
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Surely, it is you who has a rather exaggerated view of the risk of an already downed suspect armed with a knife facing two officers with their loaded guns already trained on him.
Seven shots put him down, take a step back for christsakes.
[QUOTE=Disposable Hero]
By the crack about the British cops ‘finishing off’ the suspects after being shot? Eh?
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Read in context it should have been impossible to infer that I have some blood-lust. But then, you obviously skim-read as evidenced above.
No, I don’t think such an absolutist position would be correct.
And no, I didn’t say that.
But seeing as you want me to commit to some position that you can attack:
I do not believe that in the case being discussed that the risk of harm to the police (or civilians) was so great that their only reasonable choice was to fill that poor dead idiot full of lead (including continuing to shoot after he was clearly down).
If you can explain how he can put “tactical space” between him and the attacker without moving away from him, go for it. Then explain how he can move away whilst keeping himself safe from someone coming at him with a knife.
Yes, if someone is just standing there making threats, moving away might be effective. Not when they’re coming at you. The point is to not increase the risk.
So, cops should just take a beating because we pay them to, and not defend themselves? Yes, obviously violence is an inherent part of their job. That doesn’t mean they should just stand their and take being punched or stabbed.
Those are inherent risks of the job, yes. But for your analogy to make sense, we’d have to accept someone deliberately setting a fireman on fire, or infecting a nurse. People aren’t violent to cops by accident, it’s not some unavoidable force of nature…
That doesn’t follow. Yes, we accept and deal with the fact that cops will get injured, and pay them accordingly. No, no individual cop should accept someone attacking him, and should have the same self defence rights as anyone else. Having the right to defend yourself doesn’t mean that defence will be successful, it means that if it is successful, you won’t face any sanction for doing so. It’s not some magic shield that protects cops from injury.
This is absurd. You ever been in a fight? Ever seen a fight? Backing up or moving out of the way to buy time and a more advantagious position is often a good and valid strategy.
Not necessarily. Everyone has a right to defend themselves. The issue is whether that right includes an expectation that said defense is commensurate with the risk posed. Additionally, it’s whether, as a means of public policy, LE should attempt to minimize civilian death and injury by requiring procedures that make use of a gun the last step taken when all other reasonable measures fail.
Regardless, that is not what you said that I objected to. You said:
Which is just too stupid for words. We couldn’t ask police to rush in to execute warrants on dangerous criminals if they shouldn’t accept more violence than a civilian. We couldn’t have them do traffic stops, or 100 other things they do. Choosing to be a cop means you accept more violence than the average citizen. There is no way around that. If they don’t accept that, then they can choose not to be a cop. Violence is a known and expected risk for most of them.
No one has argued it does. What some, including me, have said is that the right to injury avoidance doesn’t extend so far as to preclude a cop from having to attempt non-violent conflict resolution first if the situation allows. Additionally, cops should have a higher tolerance for accepting risk and injury than a citizen because such an expectation is almost always better public policy. Does that mean a cop should allow themselves to be stabbed or shot without retaliation? Of course not. But it usually means not confronting people with your guns drawn, ready to kill them if the disobey your orders. Clearly this particular situation is debatable, but I think most smart people should hope that a 15 second interaction with the police doesn’t result in a public execution that puts bystanders at risk.
The analogy is fine. Your comment was about acceptance of risk; something both nurses and firemen accept as part of their job. You are NOW trying to draw a distinction regarding intent when that had nothing to do with your statement. Moreover, it has nothing to do with public policy, nor is it rooted in fact. The majority of injuries police sustain are not intentional. A healthy chunk are police officers being injured in car chases or being hit by passing cars on traffic stops. Another healthy percentage are cops who are injured incidentally when chasing people or by people trying to actively avoid the cops or fighting arrest. There are relatively few times where people intentionally try to hurt cops, and even if that were the majority, it has nothing to do with what you said, or the analogy I made.
It does follow. A right has nothing to do with public policy dictating how you exercise those rights as a civil servant. Cops have the right to essentially arrest almost anyone at anytime, but we ask them to moderate that right, only exercising it when it is reasonable. Cops have the right to trespass and to seize property, but again, we only allow them to do those things in certain circumstances. Cops have a right to free speech, but again that right is moderated in many respects based on the circumstances. The RIGHT to self defense, for a cop on duty is (like all other rights), subject to certain parameters dictated by public policy and the law. Once again, this doesn’t mean cops should allow themselves to be stabbed, but it does mean that they are paid to accept a higher tolerance for risk, and to weigh their rights in balance with the demands of the public.
Bullshit. Cops are generally trained as first responders, meaning they know CPR, first-aid, and how to assess signs of life. The first step in any event like this is to disarm the suspect, meaning this guy would not have access to a knife. Second, in an ideal world, the next step should be to have paramedics, or a cop try to medically intervene to keep this guy alive. I can accept that a cop who just shot a guy may not want to give him CPR, but a paramedic should immediately called to do so if there are signs of life. If there are no signs of life, then obviously a paramedic is not needed, but then neither are handcuffs. The idea that a guy who was just shot multiple times is playing possum, or that you need to be a doctor to recognize when someone is dead/incapacitated is just nonsense. Putting on hand cuffs and rolling over an obviously injured suspect is not only inhumane, but it can actively impede any life saving measures that could be taken. To do so on the off chance you shot some superhuman zombie doesn’t pass the smell test.
It’s a good strategy if you don’t have a better one, one that would stop the fight more or less straight away. Let’s see if anyone can think of such a strategy…
So what happens when the cops retreat to a tactical position across the street and this guy knifes a civilian, and the ensuing shitstorm follows?
We can debate the merits of “stand your ground” or duty to retreat laws for regular people in self defense situations, but the police have a job to be on the spot and stopping a knife-wielding guy who just robbed a store.