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LAPD arrests man on suspicion of making deadly swatting call to Wichita police

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Re: LAPD arrests man on suspicion of making deadly swatting call to Wichita police

#61

Post by nazgob »

MikkoFinell wrote: post #44
downandout wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was my immediate reaction. My guess is that the blame and punishment will all be laser focused on the caller, in an attempt to avoid a public outcry for the actual shooter’s head. That cop shouldn’t be on administrative leave, he should be in jail for murder.

Should cops have to wait until they are actually being gunned down before they can use force to protect themselves? What happened was an absolute tragedy, and every measure should be taken to avoid anything like that ever happening again. The shooting was not justified, and cops need better training, non-lethal options must be expanded, penalties for this kind of "prank" must be made harsher. Everyone agrees on that.…

Isn't it like that in many countries? Do not fire unless fired upon? It's also a common rule of engagement for many militaries deployed in Afganistan, Iraq or other 'dangerous places'.

Re: LAPD arrests man on suspicion of making deadly swatting call to Wichita police

#62

Post by ryanwaggoner »

downandout wrote: post #26
ryanwaggoner wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m as upset about police shootings as anyone, but there’s no way you can make this claim with the information available.

An unarmed man was shot and killed in his own doorway. The officer that shot him could not have seen a weapon, because there was no weapon. That is all the information that is necessary to make a determination not only that he should be charged with murder, but convicted of it.

I know, why even bother with a trial? We've all read the news accounts, let's string him up! /s

So due process is one concern here, but also, my concern here is more about the fucked up system we have. Is it reasonable to create a broken system, heavily arm cops, train them poorly, get them hyped up, and send them off with bad intel into (what they believe is) an incredibly high-stakes / high-stress environment, and then when one of them makes a human mistake that anyone could make in that situation, toss them in jail and throw away the key?

EDIT: this is an excellent article on the mentality that I'm talking about: https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/12/police-...

Re: LAPD arrests man on suspicion of making deadly swatting call to Wichita police

#63

Post by qaq »

glenstein wrote: post #48
lb1lf wrote: post #18

Coming from a country where the police spends more time developing people skills than doing gun practice, it never ceases to puzzle me how the solution to any situation appears to be to shoot anything that moves on the flimsiest of assumptions, then figure out what happened afterwards. Now, I appreciate that the police in the US does face a population with more guns on hand than the Norwegian police does; this surely…

To your point about non-lethal weapons: it seems to me that we haven't yet claimed the low-hanging fruit in the US when it comes to this problem. Why not indulge the most base impulses of both silicon valley and police militarization with high tech, non lethal weapons? It will probably introduce new problems, such as even more unnecessary use of force. It addresses absolutely none of the cultural or institutional pro…

I'd rather be unnecessarily tasered vs being unnecessarily shot at

Re: LAPD arrests man on suspicion of making deadly swatting call to Wichita police

#64

Post by lb1lf »

tuna-piano wrote: post #37
lb1lf wrote: post #18

Coming from a country where the police spends more time developing people skills than doing gun practice, it never ceases to puzzle me how the solution to any situation appears to be to shoot anything that moves on the flimsiest of assumptions, then figure out what happened afterwards. Now, I appreciate that the police in the US does face a population with more guns on hand than the Norwegian police does; this surely…

Just a side note, because you’re from Norway, that may be surprising to some. The US is #1 with 1.01 guns per capita, and Norway is #9 with .31 guns per capita. In any case, i don’t think the number of guns per capita explains the difference in gun crime rates between the two. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_guns_per...

The difference is very pronounced in the kind of weapons we have, though - the average Norwegian gun is a 12 gauge shotgun or a 6.5x55 rifle. Handguns are strictly regulated - in order to obtain one, you need to have a clean record, be an active member in good standing of a gun club - and you can only carry your weapon - dismantled - between your home and the shooting range; keeping it in, say, the glove compartment is likely to result in a fine and having your gun licence revoked.

For deer during hunting season, though, Norway is a place best avoided.

Re: LAPD arrests man on suspicion of making deadly swatting call to Wichita police

#65

Post by drtillberg »

lb1lf wrote: post #18

Coming from a country where the police spends more time developing people skills than doing gun practice, it never ceases to puzzle me how the solution to any situation appears to be to shoot anything that moves on the flimsiest of assumptions, then figure out what happened afterwards. Now, I appreciate that the police in the US does face a population with more guns on hand than the Norwegian police does; this surely…

At one time, police in the U.S. were trained that to shoot to kill-- only. If the officer discharged the weapon at all, she emptied the magazine and aimed to kill. No warning shots, no shots to disable, that would be against training.

Thus confusion, inattention, or misunderstanding in the face of commands from a self-identified officer easily can be a lethal situation.

Re: LAPD arrests man on suspicion of making deadly swatting call to Wichita police

#66

Post by downandout »

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #62
downandout wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An unarmed man was shot and killed in his own doorway. The officer that shot him could not have seen a weapon, because there was no weapon. That is all the information that is necessary to make a determination not only that he should be charged with murder, but convicted of it.

I know, why even bother with a trial? We've all read the news accounts, let's string him up! /s So due process is one concern here, but also, my concern here is more about the fucked up system we have. Is it reasonable to create a broken system, heavily arm cops, train them poorly, get them hyped up, and send them off with bad intel into (what they believe is) an incredibly high-stakes / high-stress environment, and…

>I know, why even bother with a trial? We've all read the news accounts, let's string him up!

They have the weapon he fired, police body cam footage, the bullet, and the fact that there was no weapon on the victim, which means the cop did not see a weapon. So he just fired because the guy put his hands down and then obeyed commands to put them back up, which last I heard was not on the list of causes for justifiable homicide. This wasn’t a “mistake that anyone could make”. You don’t shoot guns at people unless they have a gun and are about to shoot at you, even if you happen to wear a badge.

So yes, tossing him in jail and for a long time seems like the appropriate outcome in light of the evidence.

Re: LAPD arrests man on suspicion of making deadly swatting call to Wichita police

#67

Post by jmaygarden »

_wmd wrote: post #8
paganel wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And what would that make the US police forces look like? To me, as an European, it makes them look like a weapon, which you can conjure by a simple phone-call. It doesn't have to be like this.

(As another European) it's hard to see any alternative for regular people whose profession just happens to put their life at almost permanent risk, thanks to the attitude toward guns over there. I'm not sure if in Europe we'd react any different -- if you called the police to report an in-progress shooting, I wouldn't be surprised if a similar trigger-happy result emerged

The risk of gun violence against police is completely blown out of proportion. Of the reported police gun deaths each year, the overwhelming majority are suicides. The biggest real risk to police in the US is vehicle accidents from driving recklessly. Being a police officer isn’t even in the top 10 most dangerous professions. On the other hand, over a thousand people are killed by police in the US each year without due process.

Re: LAPD arrests man on suspicion of making deadly swatting call to Wichita police

#68

Post by lb1lf »

CydeWeys wrote: post #28
qaq wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All good points except for the last one even if you could even theoretically develop practical armor that could stop cal. 50 round it would still be able to kill a person through the impact force damaging internal organs.

Not true at all. If the person firing the round can survive the momentum imparted into their shoulder from the rifle, then the person on the receiving end can survive it if they're wearing armor that spreads out the imparted momentum similarly. Basic Newton's Third Law. Also, there are .50 BMG handguns (and no, I'm not mistakenly referring to .50 AE, I mean .50 BMG). They are stupidly impractical, but they exist. You…

Oh, I just figured 50cal would leave sufficient overkill factor to cover all situations - after all, I think it would be unfair to require police officers to show lots more restraint using their firearms if they didn't have armour capable of saving them should the situation escalate; after all - if I was given PPE at work which would be sufficient to get me out of 70% of incidents alive, my first (and last!) question would be "Fine, what about the 30% which'll kill me?"

Re: LAPD arrests man on suspicion of making deadly swatting call to Wichita police

#69

Post by jmaygarden »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #40
v64 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So - the demonstrations following some police shootings aside, is there any significant push in the US to drive the police towards less lethal encounters with the public it is to serve and protect? I'm from the southern US, which is historically more conservative than the rest of the country. I'm not in any way claiming that the following viewpoints are universal and accepted in this region, but a large enough port…

Its a very different world if you're not white and live in the American South. Easy to believe the best, when you are relatively safe.

Police violence is a universal problem. A Harvard study has shown that white people in the US are statistically more likely encounter lethal force from police than people of color [1].

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/07/13/why-a...

Re: LAPD arrests man on suspicion of making deadly swatting call to Wichita police

#70

Post by Dove »

lb1lf wrote: post #18

Coming from a country where the police spends more time developing people skills than doing gun practice, it never ceases to puzzle me how the solution to any situation appears to be to shoot anything that moves on the flimsiest of assumptions, then figure out what happened afterwards. Now, I appreciate that the police in the US does face a population with more guns on hand than the Norwegian police does; this surely…

I don't think it's reasonable or effective to entirely expect police to solve this problem. Here is the account from the article:

    Livingston said when the door opened, officers gave Finch commands to put his hands up and walk toward them. He complied for a "very short time" and put his hands back down. He raised them again, and then lowered them for a second time, Livingston said.

    "The male then turned towards the officers on the east side of the residence, lowered his hands to the waistband again, then suddenly pulled them back up towards those officers at the east," he said. "The officers on the north side of the street feared the male pulled a weapon from his waistband, retrieved a gun and was in the process of pointing it at the officers to the east. Fearing for those officers’ safety, the officer on the north side fired one round."
From my perspective, they are describing a very threatening movement. Stuff that looks like that is how officers die. Asking them to not react when someone does that puts them in pretty serious danger. A sudden movement like that is how gunfights start.

It's tragic that it's also something a panicked innocent citizen might do! But that doesn't change the fact that it's a genuinely threatening thing to do.

I think probably the most effective way to solve the problem would be to make people better aware of what makes you appear threatening and non-threatening in a confrontation.

Some of us have been insulated from violence for so long that we don't know what it looks like. We have no reason to know that innocent sudden movements can just like dangerous sudden movements.

I'm not saying the guy's death is his fault. The whole thing is a tragic misunderstanding between good people. But I am saying he could have been educated to prevent it. I don't think it's realistic to ask police to solve the problem at great risk to themselves when regular people can solve it by learning that the best way to avoid misunderstandings and snap reactions is to move slowly and deliberately in any confrontation.

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