# Who would beat somebody in front of a camera? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [January 31, 2023, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-would-beat-somebody-in-front-of-a-camera/979084 "2023-01-31T01:37:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 33
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2023, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-would-beat-somebody-in-front-of-a-camera/979084/33 "2023-02-09T04:45:51Z")
> [@snowthx](#): > > Yeah, that makes we wonder if widespread excessive use of deadly force is an American thing. IIRC some other highly advanced countries’ police forces generally aren’t even armed, and are better trained to defuse situations rather than use force. Is that true? This issue came up in a thread several years ago. A police officer in New York identified a guy as an escaped murder convict and shot him when he started to run. Escaped convict survived, and question was whether NY state use-of-force doctrine allowed the officer to use deadly force. Answer seemed to be that yes, it was allowed under NY law. Escaped convict had killed before, and therefore it was reasonable to use deadly force to stop him. Out of curiousity, I asked a Crown prosecutor here in Canada if Canadian use-of-force doctrine would allow an officer to shoot in the same circumstances. His off-the-cuff answer was no, it wouldn’t, for at least three reasons: there was no evidence that the convict was posing immediate harm to anyone; there was no evidence that the convict was armed; and the officer didn’t have personal knowledge of the accused, and was just relying on a picture for id. See @Loach 's comment at post 11 in that thread, and my comment right at the end. The thread is over here: > [@should the cop really legally shot the fugitive? \[David Sweat\]](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-cop-really-legally-shot-the-fugitive-david-sweat/723780/): > > I was under the impression that cops aren’t supposed to shoot someone who is not immediately threatening them or others. The fugitive, Sweat, was running away, unarmed and not posing a direct threat. Now, I recognize no one is really going to cause a stink about this; but did the cop really legally have the right to shoot a fleeing felon who wasn’t posing a direct threat? Also, How did he know the guy running was Sweat? was it just a calculated risk that it was him, and not some dude skipping… --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-would-beat-somebody-in-front-of-a-camera/979084)._