From: osan@cbnewsb.cb.att.com (Mr. X)
Subject: Re: No charges filed in SWAT killing
Organization: Twilight Zone
Distribution: usa
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 00:12:49 GMT

In article <viking.714190353@vincent1.iastate.edu> viking@iastate.edu (Dan Sorenson) writes:
>
>In <3154@isgtec.isgtec.com> robert@isgtec.com (Robert Osborne) writes:
>
>>viking@iastate.edu (Dan Sorenson) writes:
>
>>You are missing a critical difference Dan:
>
>>Soldiers deal with the enemy.
>>Police officers deal with SUSPECTS.
>
>	As may cops, when one starts talking about house-to-house
>fighting or any place where civilians may be, along with soldiers.

	NO NO NO!  The police do NOT have tha same prerogative as a soldier,
	except in certain very NARROWLY defined cases.

>There were an awful lot of civilian deaths in the wars since World
>War I, and I suspect this is due to civilians and soldiers being in
>the same place.  

	Well, yes, but the reason this was so was due to a quantum change
	in the way war was to be waged.  In olden times (hack... cough)
	the armies met in desolate areas and fought.  Now they fight anywhere
	the damned please and don't give a shit who dies as a result. Shameful
	if you ask me.

>One is obviously a non-combatant, but can we
>reasonably expect the cop, or the soldier, to make an accurrate
>evaluation 100% of the time?  


	No, but there is an extremely narrow range of circumstances under
	which such screw ups are acceptable and most that I have seen in the
	news seem to be well outside of that range.  A cop certainly has the
	right to defend his life, just as anyone else does, but they also 
	have AT LEAST the same obligation to act responsibly, if not even more
	so given their repsonsibility to the public trust.  Poosible injury is 
	an occupational hazard that must be accpted by a cop or they have no 
	business doing this for a living.  I also think that the current state
	of our nation WRT the high anixiety of police is clearly indicative 
	that many of the laws they are charged with enforcing are not good 
	laws.  People therefore regard them with contempt.


>Just like the toy gun you refer to
>below, if people are shooting at you everybody looks like a target.

	If this is so you have no business being a cop.  If you don't have
	the discipline to do the right thing then you become as big a menace
	to our society as the criminal, and in some ways even bigger.

>Police deal with suspects, I agree.  I figure there is no reason to
>draw a weapon at a routine traffic stop, but when attempting to
>arrest a person charged with a crime that shows the suspect is armed

	First of all,  when you go to arrest someone, they have not yet
	(usually) been charged.  They are, under law, to be considered
	as INNOCENT.  Remember innocent until proven guilty?  This does
	not mean that a cop cannot exercise caution, but to approach any
	given situation with life and death paranoia is absolutely 
	unnacceptable behavior that is probably going to get somebody real
	dead, and such a person may be innocent and will certainly not have
	been proven guilty by any means.  Unless the suspect makes an overtly
	dangerous gesture toward the PO or perhaps another person, there is
	NO justification whatsoever for the use of deadly force against them.

>and dangerous, is it not reasonable to act as if the suspect were
>armed and dangerous, rather than just a harmless person who will
>willingly come along?  

	One may consider them armed and dangerous and may take APPROPRIATE
	precautions, but the source of the claim of armed and dangerous
	must be considered as well as the possibility that the person you are
	approaching may not be the right target.  Mistaken identity occurs
	quite often.  *I* certainly would not want to be shot and perhaps
	be killed by some stupid asshole cop that thinks I'm John Dillinger,
	has no bladder control and blows my fucking head off due to nerves.
	If you cannot be cool under pressure, then get the hell out, or go
	to jail when you fuck up big time.

>I'm trying to balance the job the police do
>with how I would like to handle the situation, and be handled, and I
>find that prudence is the best thing for all concerned.  

	Agreed, but you seem to contradict yourself from the paragraphs
	immediately above.  Many cops do NOT exercise good prudent behavior.
	They seem to have this Miami Vice "get in there and shoot the place
	all to hell" attitude.  This is shit and if it were tried with me I
	assure you that while I may not survive, I'd take as many of the lousy
	bastards with me as I could manage.  Fuck them and their rotten and
	unsound tactics.  They stink and it should be cleaned up in a very big
	way.


>	A cop who
>has a gun drawn and perhaps aimed at me, but without a finger on
>the trigger (I assume a competent cop here) frightens me less than
>the idiot who waves a gun around at the range, and I can hardly
>fault the officer if the charge he is arresting me on is murder
>or armed robbery.  Can you?

	Yes I most certainly can.  If I have made no menacing gestures toward
	the rotten bastard, then what the fuck is he doing pointing his weapon 
	AT me?  I might take his gun away from him and rip his trachea out of 
	his neck just because he pissed me off so much.  If you oint a gun AT
	me I will assume that you are gonna use it.  At that point all bets are
	off and I will do what ever I have to to neutralize the threat, which 
	probably means KILLING the fool in order to keep myself alive.  What a 
	waste.  Intelligent behavior can make all this quite unnecessary.
>
>>Police arrest suspects for trial and defend themselves if the suspects
>>prove dangerous.  Police officers don't get to assume anybody is
>>dangerous,  that must be proved by the suspect.  Police officers can't
>>assume everybody in a residence is a suspect.  Since an unarmed women
>>gathering up children presents no immediate danger the officer should
>>go to jail for a long time.
>
>	The details of the situation are not known to us, and I am
>highly torqued that no trial or review will be held to make the
>facts known.  Still, I presented no danger when the screw in my
>ankle set of the airport metal detector.  I was unarmed.  The police
>did draw guns, but also relaxed and secured them when it became clear
>I was not a threat.  Why do I think this proper?  The place was
>Washington D.C. and the time was three days after the start of the
>ground war in Iraq.  In the same situation, I would have acted in a
>similar manner.  

	They reacted improperly.  A hand on the handle and unsnapping the
	holster would be fine, but actually drawing the weapon...  bogus.
	I suupose they pointed the weapons at you?


>	Likewise, anybody breaking into my house is met with
>a shotgun, and I don't put it down until I am certain they are either
>unarmed and leaving, or somebody I know and trust enough to do so.  

	These two situations cannot be compared in this way.  YOU are a	
	"regular" citizen, not a cop on duty.  YOU are in your home and
	pretty well know who should and should not be there at any goven
	hour of the day.  A completely different scenario from the typical
	arrest scene where the cops usually don't have a clue as to who in 
	hell they are dealing with and are not entitled to make the same
	assumptions and have the same reactions as someone defending their
	homes.

>I
>cannot fault police if they believe what they are told and act in a
>manner that protects themselves.  Going in guns drawn hurts nobody,
				   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

	Wanna BET?

>but might save an officer if the suspect draws a weapon.  At this point,

	In the case of cops bustin MY door down when I have done nothing
	to merit such an act, I say FUCK the lousy cop, let him die for
	being such a careless fool.  You wanna make dangerous assumptions,
	FINE, but you'd better be damned well prepared to pay for them when
	the shit hits the fan and your neat little plan of playing Miami
	Vice goes down the shitter.

>is the suspect still to be considered harmless?  Note that I do not
>think guns drawn means finger on the trigger and ready to blast away,
>but I do figure the cops can protect themselves just as I can.
>
>>Any police officer who is told 'building A contains people who wish
>>to kill him' and acts accordingly is breaking the law.  The police
>>are not soldiers and are NOT executioners.  Police officers arrest
>>suspects for trial and only get to defend themselves if in clear
>>and present danger.
>
>	Could you elaborate on this?  I assume a clear and present
>danger is already given if the occupants are known to be killers, or
>to have exchanged fire with police forces.  In such an instance, I
>cannot fault an officer who enters with weapon ready.  I can fault the
>officer if he just starts shooting people without regard to the threat
>they might pose (unarmed, asleep, whatever), but who can fault a person
>for being ready for a situation that might not ever happen?
>
	There's a BIG difference between being PROPERLY prepared and going
	nuts.  And where do you get this "are known to be" shit?  Usually
	NOTHING is known for certain.   Many assumptions are made, and some
	are reasonable but many are most certainly NOT.  And it is usually
	these unacceptable assumptions and the actions that the cops take
	based on them that get people killed "by accident".

>>> The police have to
>>> try to protect their own lives and the lives of the citizen, and it is
>>> a certainty that there will be screw-ups.
>
>>Yes there will be screw-ups.
>>Acceptable screw-ups include:
>>    shooting somebody who has a toy gun
>>    
>>Unacceptable screw-ups include:
>>    shooting somebody by 'accidentally' pulling the trigger
>>    shooting somebody when the officer 'trips' and his gun goes off
>
>	I agree.  Prudence means not only being prepared to use your
>weapon, it means being prepared to not use it if the situation doesn't
>require such force.
>
>>> If I were in Vietnam and saw a
>>> person in black pajamas running towards me, am I justified in shooting?
>
>>Maybe.  But is this moot.
>>Is a police officer on the beat in Hometown, USA justified in shooting
>>somebody running towards him without even identifing himself first.
>>(Good thing police don't hang out near jogging trails!!!)
>
>	Of course not, but is the officer justified in clearing his
>sidearm from the holster "just in case?"  

	If the person is not in visible possession of a device that can be
	readily used as a weapon, then they most certainly are NOT.  Cops
	are supposed to use only enough force, and not too much.  If I 
	haul off and belt a cop in the teeth with my fist, he has NO legal
	justification for drawing his gun, yet.  Uless he is being beaten
	to within an inch of his life or otherwise attacked such that
	deadly force is either being used or is apparently imminent, the gun
	must stay put.  This is what PR-24's and fists are for.  Run away
	if you can.  You only shoot when THERE IS **NO** OTHER CHOICE.


>I am assumming that the
>officer has some feeling that this jogger is really dangerous and
>can justify drawing the weapon.  Most of the time the jogger doesn't
>merit a second look, but if he does, why is it wrong to draw a weapon
>and be prepared?  It doesn't mean he has to use it if he is wrong.

	Are you NUTS?  What if the jogger looks like a homeless person?
	We all know how dangerous those razor toting loonies are, right?
	Just happens to be a Columbia computer science professor.  And
	what if by some wild chance the drawn gun scares the shit out of
	the jogger so badly that he makes some sort of wild gesture?
	Cops shoots his miserable ass and there you are; innocent man is
	dead because the cop is a lousy coward that cannot control his
	fear or his bladder.  WONDERFUL.  How would you feel if this were
	one of your parents? a sister of brother of a child?  You must be
	out of your fucking mind, please pardon me.  With an attitude like
	that, an attitude of unbounded paranoia and fear, how could you
	ever expect anyone to trust a cop?  You might see people shooting them
	on sight as a precautionary preemptive measure.  You've got to be
	kidding.
>
>	Sorry, I wasn't clear here.  We had an incident where an armed
>robber was met by a squad of police upon exiting the store.  He pointed
>the gun at the police, and the police opened fire.  The robber did not
>get the first shot, so might not have been actually wishing to shoot the
>police, but the police never gave him that chance.  I have no problems
>with this.  Thus, no cop needed to be shot or killed before the police

	This is VERY different from what you have said up to this point.

>
>>> Just the sight
>>> of the weapon, or even the bulge, is enough to justify drawing and
>>> aiming weapons in my opinion.  Note I didn't say "fire," but I trust
>>> you see why I can equate the two occupations in this day and age.
	
	Wrong-O Dan.  VERY wrong-O.
>
>
>	Crime is on the increase, and violent crime is much higher
>than it was just ten years ago.  

	That's is no justification for cops to ignore common sense or the
	rights of the people, noe whatsoever, and I don't give a shit HOW
	bad the crime is.

>Had I a bulge in my pants that was
>likely a gun, would it not have been entirely appropriate for the
>police to draw guns, aim them, and remove me from the area?  I would

	Jeez... I hope you are not serious, otherwise I'd have to suggest
	therapy.  Serious therapy.

>If I am carrying one in a crowd that happens
>to be in Chicago in 1967 during the Democratic National Convention,
>isn't it reasonable for the officer to think me a threat?
	
	To consider you carefully and perhaps even to order you to out the 
	bat down, yes.  To draw and/or fire, NO; not if you aren't making
	threatening gestures toward the officer.

>
>	Again, I apologize for not making myself more clear in my
>thoughts on this issue.  

	I'm afraid you still have not done so.  First you say incredibly
	nosensical things and then you say quite reasonable things
	indicating intellingence in abundance and swap back and forth a few
	times like that.  I'm still not sure you have it down quite right.
	No flame, really... I just can;t quite figger you POV.

	-Andy V.