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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

#391

Post by anonfunction »

TillE wrote: post #189
dboreham wrote: post #123

I don't see anyone here asking this: how many people are police killing who are not 100% innocent bystanders like in this case, but still didn't need to be killed? I mean, we're all outraged because they shot "some dude in his PJs" but doesn't that imply they must be shooting 10, 100x as many folks where we'd be thinking "well, he shouldn't have had a knife in his hand" or "he shouldn't have been high"? Where I live,…

> "well, he shouldn't have had a knife in his hand" Right. German cops, for example, are trained to shoot people in the leg in that scenario. It happens quite frequently and successfully. American cops seem like they're all on a hair trigger to kill at the slightest hint of danger, rather than as a last resort when they're truly threatened.

I've always heard American cops are trained specifically to always shoot to kill.

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

#393

Post by ivanhoe »

freedomben wrote: post #185
ivanhoe wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have to approach the situation prepared for the worst case scenario. Problem is that they typically lack the proper training and the discipline required, and act too hastily. There's also a huge problem with the whole that macho, gun loving, power-tripping culture, it just makes things worse, wrong profile of people gets that kind of job.

> Problem is that they typically lack the proper training and the discipline required, and act too hastily. What you are asking them to be is super human, indeed even better than a computer could in the same situation. No amount of "proper training" or "discipline" can prepare you to make perfect decisions based on imperfect data (your sensory perception, plus all the data that isn't present such as must be read from…

It's not a binary thing, it's a matter of probability, one can be more or less likely to overreact and training helps with that. You most likely can't fix the problem entirely, mistakes happen, but you can at least reduce the number of incidents.

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

#394

Post by bitwize »

dba7dba wrote: post #363
dclowd9901 wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worst case scenario? I’m pretty sure that is the scenario that played out. Police should be prepared to die wearing the badge, with civilian casualty being an absolute last resort. It works this way for the military. I can’t fathom why it doesn’t work this way with police.

Police should be prepared to die wearing the badge, with civilian casualty being an absolute last resort. I disagree. No one should be prepared to die while working a job, a job that one will have all his life.

As much as people slag off the "thin blue line" mentality it does mean something. You put that uniform on and you are the meat-shield between order and chaos, between civilization and lawlessness. You're performing a grim but necessary service, and there's no shame in retiring to civilian life if you can't or won't accept this duty. This is why soldiers are taught that they are outranked by any civilian.

Every officer used to know this. Maybe less so today, when police work is an attractive option for violent people to let loose on civilians with legal sanction. But that's a separate problem from the mentality of duty and sacrifice.

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

#395

Post by CalChris »

ThrowawayR2 wrote: post #349
DanBC wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

132 police died while on duty in 2016. There are 750,000 police officers in the US.

So? In 2015, there were 51,548 assaults against law enforcement officers, resulting in 14,453 injuries.

Yes, and postal workers had 32,213 injuries in 2012 with only 630,000 workers.

https://www.gao.gov/assets/660/658174.pdf

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

#396

Post by DanBC »

cheschire wrote: post #384
TillE wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "well, he shouldn't have had a knife in his hand" Right. German cops, for example, are trained to shoot people in the leg in that scenario. It happens quite frequently and successfully. American cops seem like they're all on a hair trigger to kill at the slightest hint of danger, rather than as a last resort when they're truly threatened.

American police and military are trained to shoot for the largest target area, center of mass, as this is the least likely area to have unintentional results. Some examples of unintentional results are: 1) Missing. 2) Hitting another person. 3) Maming, or otherwise causing grievous injury such as shooting in the leg and hitting an artery on accident when you didn't intend to kill the target.

> Some examples of unintentional results are: 1) Missing. 2) Hitting another person. 3) Maming, or otherwise causing grievous injury such as shooting in the leg and hitting an artery on accident when you didn't intend to kill the target.

And these are common in the US, because the number of uses of weapons by police is so high.

https://www.popehat.com/2013/12/05/nypd-baby-you-know-we-lov...

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

#398

Post by ThrowawayR2 »

burntwater wrote: post #56
maxerickson wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

US military people are often quite critical of the rules of engagement employed by US police. Even in potentially more dangerous situations the military typically is much more disciplined and slower to use lethal force.

Perhaps one answer here is to require military service before becoming a police officer. That potentially could solve two issues; better trained police, and employment for veterans.

> Perhaps one answer here is to require military service before becoming a police officer.

People will protest even more loudly over "police militarization" and not without some justification. Beyond that, it reduces the supply of police officers to people willing to serve in the military and then become police officers afterward instead of some other career.

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

#399

Post by anigbrowl »

cwbrandsma wrote: post #227
username223 wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This process is designed to have a weapon be discharged. Unfortunately, as a US civilian you need to be smart about de-escalating encounters with underpaid rage-monster cops with something close to legal immunity. Your goal should be to avoid injury or death until you can get to a lawyer.

If you are a cop in this situation, not the lead officer, a grunt among other grunts. You are told the basic situation is that shots have been fired and women and children are in danger...as are you and your team. There is an ARMED individual in the house. Your police training also tells you there is a split second between you and one of your team getting killed as well. Your team members are also husbands and father…

But there isn't an armed individual in the house. You've just been told that there might be. Don't you see how you've fallen into the epistemological error here of not only assuming the truth of a claim without further evidence, but also shifting all your attention tot he possibility of someone being armed.

That sounds very hand-wavey and you might say well it's a lot different in the real world, but I've been in a bunch of high-danger real-world situations. Survival is about more than having great reflexes, it's also about having a cool head and knowing when not to act.

And look, while it's legitimate to have some fears/stress, rage monsters are absolutely a problem in policing. Cops are just as likely, or more, to take steroids or be assholes as people in the general population. Let's not forget that nobody is forced to be a cop. If you want to help people and like excitement you could always be an EMT or a firefighter.

Your version of deescalating the situation is to remove the suspect as quickly as possible

See, that's not de-escalation, it's catharsis through crisis - literally the exact opposite of de-escalation. By abdicating your own decision-making power you've ended up arguing for counterfactuals. I realize that you're attempting to model the thought process of police in high pressure situations, but counterfactuals + weapons = deadly errors. The thought process is, however, something we could change.

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

#400

Post by hateduser2 »

millzlane wrote: post #372
dingbat wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and being woken in the middle of the night, wearing boxers or pajamas with hands in the air, better pray that they don't happen to slip down causing you to instinctively "reach for your waistband" in order to hitch them up

Funny, this happens often in my neighborhood where people wear pants too big for their waists with no belts.

Are you suggesting my fashion should be influenced by the chance that the police my murder me over it?
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