OMG. Somebody made a YouTube video about the case
Here’s another case from 1927, in which the slip was fatal
Here’s another case from 1927, and it also involved the Boston Elevated Railway Company
More of a children’s-media trope: crochety senior citizens who just happen to have “crochety senior citizen” last names, like “Critchfield” or “Grunchley.” (You never hear a character say “Oh no, you just hit our only baseball into Mr. Delacroix’s yard!”)
And that reminds me – old “cops and robbers” type shows from the 1950s/60s era would often show the police arriving at a crime in progress and immediately drawing their guns and shooting at the bad guy. I first noticed it in an episode of The Twilight Zone. It was incredibly jarring to watch that in our current era when police shootings are heavily scrutinized. And a certainly hope that was just pure Hollywood drama and not the way police actually behaved back in the 1950s.
Damn! Another one from the Boston Elevated Railway Co. Maybe the damned banana peels forced them out of business
Stacey Sutton (Tanya Roberts) did it, too, in the James Bond movie A View to a Kill
It happened to me once, on a sidewalk. I didn’t quite fall but yep, it was extremely slippery. The peel was pretty blackened, had been there for at least a day.
Lawyer billboard in Boston - “PERSONAL INJURY? JORDAN P. (Williams & Williams) LAWYER 35 Court rm 12 rms 16 Wellington: No peel too small.”
*actual lawyer listing from Boston from that era (with my embellishments 
)
Yes and no. There were certainly more circumstances where deadly force was allowed than now. It was legal to shoot a fleeing felon to prevent escape. The landmark case Tennessee v Garner established that police may use deadly force to prevent escape only if the officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect poses a significant threat of death or serious physical injury to the officer or others. Before Garner it was legal and allowed to shoot any person attempting to flee a police officer as long as he was wanted for a felony. Garner was in 1985.
To walk that back a little there were previous cases that imposed limits much earlier but they were either state cases or Appeals Court cases that covered part of the country. Many individual states had laws that restricted deadly force long before Garner but Garner was the landmark caselaw that covered the entire country. The precedent was also quoted in many other cases that followed.
Interesting. Obviously, as you mention, the popular view of how often deadly force might be used was changing; but what led the court to suddenly decide that this was a violation of the Fourth Amendment, when for a long time no one had had any problem with it?
I’m going to throw in a personal favorite: The soldier or sailor in every war/military movie staring at one magic console that can tell you everything about something that’s out there - not only location relative to the ship/base, direction and speed, but identifying information about the object being tracked (which IRL would take several people at several consoles sharing information to figure out) and stuff that no console ever will tell you, like intent and the other guys’ possible tactical moves.
In second place on my list: Hollywood torpedoes, shells, and missiles, which apparently can only damage or destroy a target by directly hitting it, and which contain some sort of self-destruct mechanism that will destroy said projectile at the last possible minute for the sake of saving the heroes from imminent destruction.
a very thoughtful post …
You can tell, those were 6 years well spent!
I can’t claim to be a constitutional scholar. I do know that the fleeing felon rule came from common law. I know that many states had adopted similar standards statutorily. I couldn’t tell you the timeline. Graham v Conner came a few years later and established the reasonableness standard for use of force.
In movies when the bad guy kidnappers demand a ransom for safe return it’s actually a ruse, they intend on either killing the person after they get the ransom anyway or the kidnapping is actually just a distraction or misdirect for something else.
Don’t think I’ve ever seen a movie where the ransom got paid and the kidnappers planned on giving the hostages back safe and sound.
To be fair, I’m not sure I’ve seen that much in real life either.
If only because in the modern world while it’s not too hard to abduct someone, it’s nearly impossible to get away with collecting a ransom. For a long time the fictional method was to demand payment into an anonymous Swiss account but iirc the Swiss now cooperate when violent crime or terrorism is in play.
Cops (or other high-risk occupations) who are a day before retirement, or otherwise planning to move on, are basically 90% likely to die in the next 24 hours. If it’s mentioned on-camera, you might as well bring out your black suit now.
I did a search and I couldn’t find a mention…
Outlining a dead body in chalk, did anyone ever do this?
I am reminded because I saw an Adam-12 the other day where there was a hit and run and the cops did two stupid things. They outlined the body before any investigation could begin, and even more silly, they covered up the body and then took pictures! What was the point of that?
You’d think the actor would say, “Mr Director, I don’t think this is right - why am I talking pictures of a covered body?” With the probable answer, “You’re not being paid to think, just do what you’re told! Actors!”
He’s especially a goner if he shows his partner a picture of the boat he’s going to live on when he retires. "Isn’t she a beauty? I named her “Happy-Ever-After”. I can’t wait!