591–600 of 864 posts
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When number of shootings is 1, you are not actually doing useful statistics. It can easily be an aberration.
Mass shootings are almost by definition outliers
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What's more, are those SWAT teams trained policemen or scared little children? Because if they are the latter, why do they go with guns and ammo and equipment enough to equip a small army just to arrest some kid who's selling weed or some guy who threatened their neighbors and such? SWAT teams should be for breaking into Escobar's hideout or stopping angry mobs, not for responding to random phone calls and simple cas…
The overuse of SWAT is ridiculous, but sending them into a shots fired / hostage / bodies on the ground situation is entirely appropriate. And no different from most other developed countries. If you go into a house in Germany, shoot someone, and then threaten to shoot everyone else, do you really think you’re going to get an officer or two casually knocking on the door without weapons at the ready?
It's not the same. It's reasonable to respond with lethal force after shots have been fired by the opponent, it's totally not reasonable to do so when you suspect that it might be the case that they might get fired with no good evidence that it actually is so.
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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 of…
This is a training issue, absolutely. But Police should be trained to deal with the population, never the other way around. No one should be shot because a police officer is spooked by a hand that isn’t where they can see it. Suspects should have the benefit of the doubt and police officers should carry all the risk.
Sort of like, car drivers do have the ultimate responsibility to not hit people, but it sure is a lot safer if we also tell people to generally stay on the sidewalks.
Policemen are generally going to try to do the right thing, but it's a whole lot easier for them to get it right if, in addition to being innocent, you also act safe.
Considering AI is better at image processing than humans, finding whether the subject in the view point is carrying a weapon should be able to give the officers a second opinion when needed under these circumstances.
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The video of the shooting was released, and you can tell from the video that, with the amount of interaction the police had with the victim, they can't really tell if he's the supposed hostage or the hostage taker. So even in the interest of rescue, the police fucked up big time.
This is a good point. In the interest of a constructive way to go forward, I think a "how can we make this better" process will save more lives than outrage. It's the outrage that the unions are so skilled at skirting.
Here's the problem: you want to draft even more procedures and guidelines and checks and balances (even though we're already neck-deep in bureaucracy), while SWAT teams are guided by a philosophy of 'move fast and break things.'
Here's some actionable suggestions we can use right off the bat:
* ban police unions * automatic trials for all homicides * police shooters are isolate din protective custody * SWAT team leaders are automatically retired from active duty whenever an innocent person is injured or killed
Really I think it's a bit insulting to innocent victims to be 'let's all calm down and have a review process' as if we haven't been through these questions hundreds o times already.
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I call bullshit on this. These cops have to be willing to consider their lives less important that everyone else's. Bullshit. Yes plenty of people go into the military. For myself it was because I could not get a better job. Was I willing to die for my country, yes, but I sure as hell wasn't of the opinion I wouldn't be doing everything in my power to make sure I wasn't. I was just reading the other thread on here ab…
It's called being a "Public Servant" for a reason. Meanwhile, the rest of us don't get any cushy pensions or any of forms of guaranteed stable government benefits like police do. Not trying to say they should consider themselves "less-than", more that they should be fucking servants. Police aren't the point! They are a necessary fixture to enable the real point- SAFE, LIVE CITIZENS.
The police are is a game of heads they lose tails they don't win; what ever they do.
No one wants to hear about the lives they save everyday, no one cares about when a cop is injured or killed doing their job; they deserved it right.
It's one of the toughest jobs you can do; and you're damned if you do and damned if you don't.
Fact, society wouldn't function without the police. Fact if I was a police in America there is no way I wouldnt be armed.
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>if the police show up anywhere, be it an Occupy protest or a carjacking, there is likely to be mayhem and bloodshed. If you grew up in the US (I can't speak for other countries), I think most people, despite the media coverage, would say otherwise. There's way too many cops for this to even make sense. If even 1% of police interaction ended in a death, there would be literally millions of people dead by cop every ye…
I think we are waiting to hear: "and this culture of impunity and valuing their own lives above the lives of the people they swore an oath to protect needs to end and we need to re-train our forces and hold those who use deadly force accountable" That would go further than making excuses for the rash thinking on the part of trigger-happy leo's. The "swatter" should be charged with 2nd degree murder, minimum, but this…
Culture change is fundamentally slow, but I think process is being made. We're talking about a whole new generation of cop, from new supervisors to new codes of conduct and police union leadership.
The comparison to Duterte is unfair and minimizes the atrocities in the name of justice happening in the Philippines. The NYT has/had an excellent article, replete with photos, of the devastation. It is a whole order of magnitude more people in a much smaller nation.
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That's very fair. Unfortunately, being a big black dude is a great way to look threatening, which does suck. As a point of encouragement, though, it is worth noting that in spite of the national news, encounters with police are really rare, and deadly encounters super rare. Many officers go an entire career without ever firing their gun at anyone - it's just very rare. Your staircase is way more likely to kill you. I…
I agree completely, and I have had nothing but pleasant encounters with the police. Even when I was pulled over going 25 miles over the speed limit in Mississippi and I didn't have proof of insurance and had an out of state license. He gave me two tickets - one for speeding and one for no insurance. I paid the speeding ticket by phone when I got home and faxed them my insurance card and they dropped the other one. I…
Do the police have to shoot to kill? Is it possible to aim somewhere else? Or shoot into the air? Also, I think in my country they are obligated to shout out "stop, I will shoot" or something to that effect.
Police don't shoot to kill. They shoot to stop the threat. That means aiming center mass (the chest) as it is the biggest target and the easiest to hit. Sometimes that means the person dies, but that's not the objective. As someone who is very well versed in shooting, it would be insane to expect someone to hit a leg or arm of a suspect; especially with a pistol. That would lead to many stray rounds which stay lethal…
What bothers me about these situations is just the entire idea of "SWAT" as practiced. You are a cop with 5+ other cops. You all pull your guns. Someone comes to the door, groggy in the middle of the night. They may or may not understand you are police. They may or may not believe you are the police. They are definitely confused/frightened/angry by your presence. We now begin the dice rolling process. Since every pol…
How I see it is that the officers of their own freewill took on the role of law enforcement and public service.
Fully aware that they would be put in life threatening situations.
Their first instinct shouldn't be to fire first to save their own skin, but be trained to take time to assess the situation and risk erring on restraint of force.
Most of the talk coming from police departments usually state their actions in terms of the officer's personal safety.
Though that is important, due to their choice and the role in society that they play, their safety should be a secondary concern to the safety and lives of those they are to protect.