30 LAPD Officers Gun Down Man In Middle Of Freeway...

[John Picard]

Seriously? OK, let me ask you something, if you have a gun and a guy threatening to kill you is coming at you with a knife are going to seriously going to say "oh, gee, I have a gun and he only has a knife so I guess I can't shoot him." You have got to be fucking kidding me.

Maybe it's my compassion clouding my judgment. But when someone, incoherent, and babbling comes toward me, and 29 of my trigger happy buddies, carrying a knife, and we have a guns. I think it would be a red flag, that he has a bigger problem, and i would pull my taser out, and drop his ass. I'm sure his family would appreciate my restraint.

worse case I would have shot him in the leg, or legs, i think that would have pretty much stopped his forward momentum, ya think?


just saying, 30-1 is not a fair fight anyway, especially against trained gangsters monkeys in uniforms.
k'riq


k'riq

Are you a police officer? Have you ever worked as a police officer? I like your generalization of calling them "trained gangster monkeys in uniforms". I bet my whole paycheck that you're one of the first to scream for the police to do something rather than demanding the citizenry defend itself.

 

[Lindley]

Of course it's possible to envision a scenario in which the force was excessive. It's also possible to do the opposite----if the guy was reaching "for a weapon" which was not immediately identifiable as a knife, then yeah, they're going to open fire. We don't have all the information and we weren't there. We don't even have the cops' statements, which the official investigation will have.

Frankly the fact that there were 30 cops present to begin with implies something significant was going on there.

 

[sidious618]

And let them shoot me down in the street like a common citizen (politicians call them sheeple)? not on you life. Times have changed


now that i'm older, i just send good vibes instead of intervening....


k'riq

Nice backpeddle. It's a far cry from being in the incident at hand rather than playing armchair cop, isn't it?

We all play armchair cops/generals/whatever so that's a silly complaint.

 

[FrontLine]

Seriously? OK, let me ask you something, if you have a gun and a guy threatening to kill you is coming at you with a knife are going to seriously going to say "oh, gee, I have a gun and he only has a knife so I guess I can't shoot him." You have got to be fucking kidding me.

QFT. In every LEO agency in the US you are trained to not meet threat with life force. Someone comes after you with their fists, you take out your baton. Someone comes after you with a knife, you are authorized to use deadly force to protect your life. So you don't want to get shot, dont try to kill the officer. Pretty simple.

LEOs in the US should carry firearms.

 

[John Picard]

And let them shoot me down in the street like a common citizen (politicians call them sheeple)? not on you life. Times have changed


now that i'm older, i just send good vibes instead of intervening....


k'riq

Nice backpeddle. It's a far cry from being in the incident at hand rather than playing armchair cop, isn't it?

We all play armchair cops/generals/whatever so that's a silly complaint.

I'm not the one passing judgment on the police officers and then claiming how I could have done the job in a better (in my world view) manner.

So no, it's not a silly complaint. It's like people who bitch about soldiers who don't want to fight in a war -- unless you've been there, STFU. To me, the same is true for those who complain about police officers and how they handle a situation.

 

[scotpens]

I think this article is relevant here, although the circumstances of the case discussed are a bit different:

"The Bullet Counters"

Perhaps the cops did use unreasonable force. But shouldn't we reserve judgment until all the facts have been made clear?

 

[B.J.]

I'm still wondering where the "30 cops" and "hail of gunfire" came from. The article the OP linked to says "A Los Angeles police officer fatally shot a motorist in Sherman Oaks today at the end of a car chase that started east of downtown."

 

[doubleohfive]

As I was not there at the time, nor do I have all the facts, I hesitate to pass judgment on the police officers responding to the scene of the crime.

However I think it is a vast error in judgment to insist or demand or even state that law enforcement should not be armed. I don't particularly care for guns myself and given how easy it is for some nutjob to procure one, I am quite glad to know law enforcement is armed to the teeth when need be.

My sympathies to the man who was killed and his loved ones. Bipolar disorder can be a really difficult thing to live with and clearly the through line of this story has been a tragic one.

As someone stated above, there clearly was more going on than we are currently aware of if there were 30 police officers there. Last February a gentleman pulled over in his Bentley on Lankershim and Cahuenga in Studio City around 10pm one night. Helicopters, SWAT, the mobile police weapons tanks, and just about every last freakin' LAPD cruiser and officer were on the scene within about an hour. LAPD gets a bad rep and perhaps deservingly so ... but they take their jobs seriously.

 

[cultcross]

I'm still wondering where the "30 cops" and "hail of gunfire" came from. The article the OP linked to says "A Los Angeles police officer fatally shot a motorist in Sherman Oaks today at the end of a car chase that started east of downtown."

Makes it sound more like a thoughtless firing squad execution and less like a tactical decision that way.


Regarding the question at hand; I have never carried a gun, nor do I wish to. In fact, if we were issued mandatory firearms, I would probably resign. I think armed police escalate criminal conflict - when the police carry guns, the criminals carry guns to defend themselves.
But once you've begun that cycle, one side can't just pull out. Firearms are entrenched in LA - I wouldn't want to be the one who took them away from the police. You're going to see a lot more bodies if you do that.
So to answer the question, I'd ideally choose an unarmed police force, but once you've gone down that road, you can't undo it.

 

[clint g]

This is why cops should be armed

Two NYPD auxiliary police officers were shot and killed by a heavily-armed gunman in a volley of gunfire on the streets of Greenwich Village around nine o'clock Wednesday night, after the suspect had fatally shot a restaurant employee.


Investigators say the volunteer officers — Nicholas Pekearo and Yevgeniy 'Eugene' Marshalik — as well as responding officers from the sixth precinct began chasing the suspect after he fired 15 shots at an employee at DeMarco's pizzeria on West Houston Street near Macdougal, killing 35-year-old Alfredo Romero.

http://www.ny1.com/?SecID=1000&ArID=67691

It should be noted that NYPD Auxiliary Police do not carry weapons. If these two officers had firearms on them, they would probably still be alive

 

[Pingfah]

There's a lot of articles about this on Google, and I cannot find a single one that mentions anything about 30 police officers being involved.

 

[clint g]

worse case I would have shot him in the leg, or legs, i think that would have pretty much stopped his forward momentum, ya think?

Shooting someone in the leg is much much easier said than done. There is a reason why people are trained to shoot center mass. It's very easy to miss a limb, at which point in time you need to worry about a ricochet and other issues

just saying, 30-1 is not a fair fight anyway, especially against trained gangsters monkeys in uniforms.

and fyi, i too have cops in my family...

Its not supposed to be

 

[propita]

Maybe it's my compassion clouding my judgment.

This implies that anyone not agreeing with you has no compassion. You may not intend the implication, but the implication is in the words.

But when someone, incoherent, and babbling comes toward me, and 29 of my trigger happy buddies, carrying a knife, and we have a guns.

This does a disservice to all of the responsible LA cops (and cops everywhere) who are not the trigger-happy exceptions. Again, you generalize and imply, but this time it is a clear insult.

I think it would be a red flag, that he has a bigger problem, . . .

Him having a bigger problem is irrelevant to the problem he is presenting, that of an armed person who is apparently intending harm and of questionable self-control.

. . . and i would pull my taser out, and drop his ass. I'm sure his family would appreciate my restraint.

Feel free to get in taser range of someone with a knife and apparently willing to use it.

worse case I would have shot him in the leg, or legs, i think that would have pretty much stopped his forward momentum, ya think?

That's a idea I will not argue with. "Stopping" an assailant armed with a knife need not include "killing." Though it is possible he could throw the knife, a second shot--to the arm--would do this. Now, do you think that a cop would have such wonderful aim in the heat of the moment to ensure the shot would be to the leg and/or arm, and miss vital organs or anyone on the other side of the assailant?

just saying, 30-1 is not a fair fight anyway, especially against trained gangsters monkeys in uniforms.

Cut and paste: This does a disservice to all of the responsible LA cops (and cops everywhere) who are not the trigger-happy exceptions. Again, you generalize and imply, but this time it is a clear insult.

 

[J.T.B.]

Once again, the Los Angeles Police department has murdered another citizen. 30 police shot a bi-polar man down in a hail of bullets. They claim he was wielding a knife. A fucking knife, Shit if 30 police were that scared of one man with a knife, this can only be classified as a Gangland style murder.

"Murder" is a specific crime, and it is up to the justice system in California to decide if that's what happened. Using the term in the post above is just inflammatory.

The story linked doesn't say anything about bi-polar or how many police fired, BTW.

Next time they should call me, I'm pretty sure I could have taken him down by myself.

Or you could be wrong and be fatally stabbed. If you're in that position and that's the risk you are prepared to run, more power to you. But I have no problem with someone who values their own life enough to not risk it.

Well at least he wasn't as dangerous as the fucking homeless woman wielding a screwdriver. A danger they were able to contain by blowing her brains out, also in a hail of bullets from 17 police hiding in safety, behind the doors of their Policecruisers, thank god, to think, she might have scratch someones paint job with that thing.

So what was the finding in the case you refer to above? I am all for civilian police review boards, prosecuting LEOs that violate the law and disciplining those that violate their agencies' policies. But if the officer on-scene assesses the situation and decides that deadly force is need to prevent the loss of someone else's life, I give them the benefit of the doubt until proven otherwise.

We need to take the guns from the police, like the Bobbies in London, because clearly they are not capable of making that life or death decision on their own. Only a SWAT style unit should actually be allowed to carry wepons of leathal force.

The comparison to London is not valid because firearms, and especially handguns, are not nearly as common in he UK, nor are the numbers of law enforcement personnel killed in the line of duty. Sending LEO's out unarmed to perform their duties in many parts of the United States would be a death sentence. Having to wait to assemble and deploy SWAT-type teams would give violent criminals a huge immediate tactical advantage and much more opportunity to escape.

Take a look at the Fort Hood shootings. The officers that returned fire and stopped the shooter were not part of a SWAT team, but regular patrol officers. That is usually how things happen.

worse case I would have shot him in the leg, or legs, i think that would have pretty much stopped his forward momentum, ya think?

There are very good reasons why LEOs are trained to fire at the center of body mass when deadly force is justified. One, it's a bigger target and handguns are easy to miss with, especially in the adrenaline-pumped confusion of a gun fight. Two, someone shot in the leg could still kill someone else.

just saying, 30-1 is not a fair fight anyway,

Why should it be fair? We are not talking about a high school wrestling match, we are talking about people going home alive after a day's work or not.

especially against trained gangsters monkeys in uniforms.

And there it is. At least you haven't tried to hide your bias.

--Justin

 

[Lonemagpie]

Sounds like it's more their training regimen and rules of engagement that need to be looked at rather than whether or not to have guns

 

[Candlelight]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OuX-nFmL0II&feature=related

I love this sketch.

 

[SPOCKED]

Once again, the Los Angeles Police department has murdered another citizen.

Murder? Let's see the jury verdict for the defendant(s), please.

And is there a link to see how this event really went down?

30 police shot a bi-polar man down in a hail of bullets. They claim he was wielding a knife. A fucking knife, Shit if 30 police were that scared of one man with a knife, this can only be classified as a Gangland style murder.

No, it's procedure. Would you feel better if the alleged bi-polar, knife wielding citizen was shot and killed by a hail of only one bullet from 30 cops? What ratio of cop's bullets to stabby is acceptable for you? How about 2 cops firing 5,000 bullets? What in the world difference does it make? For whatever reason, the police took him down through procedure; procedure that protects them and the public. And if they broke procedure there will be a price to pay. So the lesson here... DON'T EVER ATTACK THE POLICE -- they might just have to take your life.

Next time they should call me, I'm pretty sure I could have taken him down by myself. This is getting too common, who's next?

Bring deadly force with you - it could save your life.

 

[Star Wolf]

Seriously? OK, let me ask you something, if you have a gun and a guy threatening to kill you is coming at you with a knife are going to seriously going to say "oh, gee, I have a gun and he only has a knife so I guess I can't shoot him." You have got to be fucking kidding me.

QFT. In every LEO agency in the US you are trained to not meet threat with life force. Someone comes after you with their fists, you take out your baton. Someone comes after you with a knife, you are authorized to use deadly force to protect your life. So you don't want to get shot, dont try to kill the officer. Pretty simple.

LEOs in the US should carry firearms.

Remember Officers Koon, Powell, Briseno, and Wind. Since the entire nation, if not the world decided to ignore double jeopardy out of fear of a third Los Angeles riot you will never see a LAPD officer with a baton. It used to be they slid it into their belt anytime they left their cars like a soldier wearing his headgear outside. You never saw them without it. From Adam-12 to real life it was LAPD.

When Colin Farrell was twirling his baton in the SWAT movie it was about as unrealistic as the jet which landed on the bridge.

 

[bigdaddy]

It's why we the people need to carry bigger weapons.

 

[FrontLine]

Regarding the question at hand; I have never carried a gun, nor do I wish to. In fact, if we were issued mandatory firearms, I would probably resign. I think armed police escalate criminal conflict - when the police carry guns, the criminals carry guns to defend themselves.
But once you've begun that cycle, one side can't just pull out. Firearms are entrenched in LA - I wouldn't want to be the one who took them away from the police. You're going to see a lot more bodies if you do that.
So to answer the question, I'd ideally choose an unarmed police force, but once you've gone down that road, you can't undo it.

Actually the cycle went the other way. Officers started to carry when criminals did. When criminals switched to semi automatic weapons it took years for agencies to authorize their deputies and officers carrying of similar hardware. This is how it has been in the US for ages. Again, the LEOs do not escalate the cycle, the criminals do

This is why cops should be armed

Two NYPD auxiliary police officers were shot and killed by a heavily-armed gunman in a volley of gunfire on the streets of Greenwich Village around nine o'clock Wednesday night, after the suspect had fatally shot a restaurant employee.


Investigators say the volunteer officers — Nicholas Pekearo and Yevgeniy 'Eugene' Marshalik — as well as responding officers from the sixth precinct began chasing the suspect after he fired 15 shots at an employee at DeMarco's pizzeria on West Houston Street near Macdougal, killing 35-year-old Alfredo Romero.

http://www.ny1.com/?SecID=1000&ArID=67691

It should be noted that NYPD Auxiliary Police do not carry weapons. If these two officers had firearms on them, they would probably still be alive

Wait, how did that possibly happen? I thought that the comstock act, and more recently Mayor Bloomberg had eradicated all personally owned firearms in the City? I mean that is what he proclaims time and time again and states that NYC is safer for it.

worse case I would have shot him in the leg, or legs, i think that would have pretty much stopped his forward momentum, ya think?

and that goes against all training in the US from the FBI on down. You pull the trigger, you are to aim for the center mass of the target and eliminate him as a threat. A wounded bad guy is still a threat. Shooting an extremity is something for the movies, not reality.

Shooting someone in the leg is much much easier said than done. There is a reason why people are trained to shoot center mass. It's very easy to miss a limb, at which point in time you need to worry about a ricochet and other issues

just saying, 30-1 is not a fair fight...

Boo fucking hoo for the bad guys. When you are fighting, especially for your life, the only fair fight is the one you win. My life is worth a million times more to me than some one who's trying to kill me.