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Breonna Taylor case: Louisville police nearly blank incident report

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Re: Breonna Taylor case: Louisville police nearly blank incident report

#291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is the bad guy a couple of cops who we hold to the impossible standard of not returning fire? That's very hard to answer because the cops have censored or lied about most of the report, as well as making claims about knocking and introducing themselves -- holding a no-knock warrant -- which is apparently disputed by witnesses. But then again I don't think it's very helpful to try to identify the one and only Bad Gu…

I think it's very helpful to focus on easily fixable, impactful measures over hard to fix measures with uncertain efficacy.

Agreed. And to add to that, I think it's also helpful to keep in mind that we possess the ability to focus on more than one thing at a time.

Re: Breonna Taylor case: Louisville police nearly blank incident report

#292
post #11

Feels like this incident is even more egregious than the George Floyd incident. In this case the police actually tried to frame the boyfriend, and probably would have gotten away with murder and convicting an innocent person if not for national attention

I agree, but video and a simple narrative goes a long way to getting support.

Breonna's case has the following disadvantages: many Americans are willing to give LEOs benefit of the doubt when there is no video, it's "the word of the police versus a suspected criminal", the police union's hitpiece[1] in the media, and the slow wheels of the legal ("justice") system to investigate the facts which are never fully known in the media within days of an incident.

[1] https://www.wdrb.com/in-depth/louisville-police-fop-presiden...

Re: Breonna Taylor case: Louisville police nearly blank incident report

#293
post #102

What happened to "THIS IS THE POLICE, OPEN UP" along with banging the door? The only situation where I understand a no-knock warrant is like when the police is actually targeting someone's computer and don't want to go through all the hustle of cracking the password.

> The only situation where I understand a no-knock warrant

Quit overthinking this.

Police "understand" no-knock warrants because judges approve them and there are no accountability problems.

You and I find it distasteful, but as long as judges keep approving the no-knock warrants at current rates, DAs keep using the evidence gathered from them, and defense attorneys can't get evidence gathered from them dropped from the case, all of the incentives align. Short of a massive cultural change, only a legislative restriction will change this behavior.

Re: Breonna Taylor case: Louisville police nearly blank incident report

#294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does identifying work though? What's stopping an intruder from doing that? I just don't see how no-knock warrants like this are supposed to work.

I just don't see how no-knock warrants like this are supposed to work. This IS how they work. The police kick down your door, sometimes lob in a few stun grenades, then charge in like they're Rambo. Violence is a feature, not a bug, of this system. The reason no-knocks are used in drug cases is, ostensibly, to prevent destruction of evidence. But, police have come to rely on them (along with armored SWAT teams) for d…

Clinton's ATF actually sought a no-knock warrant for the original Waco raid, but the judge denied it because the evidence sought (illegal machine guns) can't be quickly destroyed.

They used no knock tactics anyway, including climbing into upstairs windows with assault weapons.

Re: Breonna Taylor case: Louisville police nearly blank incident report

#295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Obviously nobody expects the police not to shoot back when fired upon Well, I do. We had a case in Germany a few years back where the police served some kind of no-knock warrant, the guy (a Hells Angel) thought they were from a rival gang, shouted at them and then shot at them. A Policeman died, the guy dropped his gun immediately after police identified themselves. The Case made the news later because the guy got…

> A Policeman died, the guy dropped his gun immediately after police identified themselves. Can you actually believe them though? What if the intruder does what the shooter in Canada did and impersonates the police?

It was the equivalent of a SWAT Team. If you have >10 people shouting police it's very unlikely that's fake.

Re: Breonna Taylor case: Louisville police nearly blank incident report

#296
post #7

USA Today has the best coverage of this I’ve seen. The NYT coverage of this is awful: https://www.nytimes.com/article/breonna-taylor-police.html A key fact is that the police shot Taylor after her boyfriend shot at the police, thinking they were intruders. While he was fully entitled to do that, the NYT doesn’t believe in gun rights so that’s a messy fact. To make the victim seem more sympathetic, the narrative under…

Not only was this a no-knock warrant in a country full of guns, but it was also executed by plainclothes police. Figure out how that’s supposed to work.

But why? Why not wait for a fully equipped team with shields? Sorrounding the house until then prevents anyone from getting out. Unless there's an active shooting, there's no reason not to wait. And with proper protection, police can afford to first identify themselves as shots are extremely unlikely to be lethal.

I always thought it was Hollywood's imagination showing plain clothes police officers performing raids. It's shocking to see that this appears to be common police practice.

Re: Breonna Taylor case: Louisville police nearly blank incident report

#297
post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> nobody expects the police not to shoot back when fired upon This is often part of the "rules of engagement" that military personnel are expected to follow; not only because they're expected not to shoot civilians, but also peacekeeping situations where firing on the wrong forces could cause WW3, as well as the very basic check that the target isn't wearing the same uniform as you and shooting in your direction by m…

Blindly, it seems. The neighboring apartment had several bullets enter, as well. So, zero regard for the safety of anyone.

And zero training. Mandatory weapon training for some US police forces is shockingly short. Other countries train any police officer over months to be able to not only hit targets under stress but also to avoid shooting whenever possible.

Re: Breonna Taylor case: Louisville police nearly blank incident report

#298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Blindly, it seems. The neighboring apartment had several bullets enter, as well. So, zero regard for the safety of anyone.

Zero accountability -> zero regard.

I don't think that a police officer thinks of accountability in this situation. It's a high stress situation and with no training all you can do is randomly shoot. Extensive training would be the answer.

Re: Breonna Taylor case: Louisville police nearly blank incident report

#299
post #7

USA Today has the best coverage of this I’ve seen. The NYT coverage of this is awful: https://www.nytimes.com/article/breonna-taylor-police.html A key fact is that the police shot Taylor after her boyfriend shot at the police, thinking they were intruders. While he was fully entitled to do that, the NYT doesn’t believe in gun rights so that’s a messy fact. To make the victim seem more sympathetic, the narrative under…

> Obviously nobody expects the police not to shoot back when fired upon Well, I do. We had a case in Germany a few years back where the police served some kind of no-knock warrant, the guy (a Hells Angel) thought they were from a rival gang, shouted at them and then shot at them. A Policeman died, the guy dropped his gun immediately after police identified themselves. The Case made the news later because the guy got…

I once saw German police officers at a police shooting range (it's not public but I knew a participant). Shooting without identifying themselves as police and demanding to drop the weapon led to them failing the test immediately, independent of the behavior of the other party.

Re: Breonna Taylor case: Louisville police nearly blank incident report

#300
post #7

USA Today has the best coverage of this I’ve seen. The NYT coverage of this is awful: https://www.nytimes.com/article/breonna-taylor-police.html A key fact is that the police shot Taylor after her boyfriend shot at the police, thinking they were intruders. While he was fully entitled to do that, the NYT doesn’t believe in gun rights so that’s a messy fact. To make the victim seem more sympathetic, the narrative under…

> Obviously nobody expects the police not to shoot back when fired upon.

They do it in other countries though. Equipped with vests, helmets and shields police forces have much more protection against gunshots compared to the shooter. Even if they're shot at, they have still multiple options to resolve the threat without killing the shooter. But that needs extensive training.

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