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Black Lives Matter: to the tune of $4 each

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SMOGZINN said:
I didn't intend to say that the law say that they should never fire first. I know that legally they can under a large number of circumstances. I think the laws should be changed to say that they should under no circumstances ever be allowed to fire first.
Personally, I would prefer to see more dead cops and fewer dead civilians. But that is just my strange belief that it is the cops job is to protect civilians not kill them.
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OK. Sig updated.
 
OutHouse said:
damn dude. you got some fucked up thinking.
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No, I just understand that a cop does a dangerous job, and that requiring a higher bar to using deadly force will result in more dead cops. I would prefer for no one to ever die of violence, but I know that simply will not happen. So, if given the choice between cops killing innocent people and cops being killed because they are required to be more cautious, I will chose the dead cop over the dead civilian.
 
13Gigatons said:
America is basically a police state now. You can be killed at any moment by a twitchy cop and he will ALWAYS be found justified in shooting you.
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This needs to be a litmus test for everyone we elect.
If a person doesn't think we have a crisis with police violence in this country, they can !@#$ off.
 
Yeah, there quite a few issues with this one.

First, one of the cardinal rules of safety is “Know your target and what is beyond.” In seeing the photo of the garage door, I’m not sure how he could have done that. Among the articles, it stated the officer tracked up with his shots, which means we can deduce that the door was most likely closed or mostly closed when the shots were fired (as opposed to him shooting at say head level just as the bottom of the door closing passes that height and the other shots would be higher up on the door as the door closes).

While I do think it is very possible the subject had the gun in his hand, it doesn’t make sense that the officer would wait till the door is almost closed before firing. At that point, the subject is not an immediate threat, even if he is still holding the gun. The officer can move or make distance and since the door is closed, the subject would not know where the officer is.

For those that think officers should not fire until the bad guy fires first... So when the bad guy fires at the officer and hits a civilian behind the officer, you can tell that family that it happened because the officer wasn’t allowed to pull the trigger until the bad guy did. Deadly force is authorized when there is the immediate threat to the safety of the officer or others. It’s not that the bad guy has to fire first.

- Merg
 
Serious question: how many of you live in neighborhoods where there is a guy drinking and playing loud music in the garage next to you? Leave everything aside for a moment. I am just trying to gauge where you guys are coming from, how much exposure you have had to certain elements of the society. This does NOT mean I am justifying the cops or anything here. I see this kind of pattern a lot here on this forum, and I suspect it comes from a place of...of...what should I call it...a certain distance and detachment from the "reality on the ground" of this country
 
The Merg said:
For those that think officers should not fire until the bad guy fires first... So when the bad guy fires at the officer and hits a civilian behind the officer, you can tell that family that it happened because the officer wasn’t allowed to pull the trigger until the bad guy did. Deadly force is authorized when there is the immediate threat to the safety of the officer or others. It’s not that the bad guy has to fire first.
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Yes I can, and I can do it with good conscience. I don't support the bad guy firing first either. But I certainly can't face some parent and tell them that their kid is dead because some cop was having a bad day and decided to fire before he was sure that their kid was a danger. I simply will not support anyone using deadly force except in the last resort, and I no longer trust that a police office will use good judgment on when to use deadly force.
 
dank69 said:
Oh I'm being shot I guess I should put my gun back into my pants.
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Please don't forget to unload it at the time. In all fairness cops have no way of knowing if a gun is loaded. But it being found in his back pocket unloaded after the guy was head shot really makes this whole thing stink.

Cop straight up executed a guy though a closed garage door and the department and DA essentially covered it up. Jury really messed up on this one.
 
sdifox said:
Read the article and apparently the jury reduced the four dollar to nothing...

WTF is wrong with Florida?
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Yep.

I have family members who live there who have always defended the place (mostly over taxes) but now even they are 'Screw this place, we're leaving.' And that was a year ago. Houses are on the market, so I guess they were serious!
 
SMOGZINN said:
Yes I can, and I can do it with good conscience. I don't support the bad guy firing first either. But I certainly can't face some parent and tell them that their kid is dead because some cop was having a bad day and decided to fire before he was sure that their kid was a danger. I simply will not support anyone using deadly force except in the last resort, and I no longer trust that a police office will use good judgment on when to use deadly force.
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I’m sorry, but if someone has a gun and starts to point it at a cop, I have no issue with that cop firing first.

Now don’t get me wrong in that I am saying that happened here.

Even if the guy did raise the gun at the officers here, I can see it being justified IF they had fired while the dour was still open. Once that door was closed, the imminent threat was gone.

So, what if he was pointing a gun at a civilian? Does the officer have to wait for the subject to fire at the civilian before he can fire? “Hey, I wanted to save your life, but had to wait till you were killed by the bad guy.”

- Merg
 
Noah Abrams said:
how many of you live in neighborhoods where there is a guy drinking and playing loud music in the garage next to you?
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Every single night. Actually, most of my neighbors don't have garages (I live in the south, we have mild weather) and just play their music and drink in the front yard.

I'm pretty comfortably middle class, but I rent a decent sized house in a old neighbor hood with houses build mostly in the late 50's early 60's. The house is nice, but the neighborhood is a bit rough.
 
SMOGZINN said:
Every single night. Actually, most of my neighbors don't have garages (I live in the south, we have mild weather) and just play their music and drink in the front yard.

I'm pretty comfortably middle class, but I rent a decent sized house in a old neighbor hood with houses build mostly in the late 50's early 60's. The house is nice, but the neighborhood is a bit rough.
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Probably is a white neighborhood though, and thus would have less crime than a black one. That alone makes the police jittery. Not that I am defending cops. I think the police in this country are thugs. But so are a lot of people. There are very few angels in all this mess
 
This is outrageous. If what the cop say is 100% true (I smell BS) and he felt a threat for his life was imminent then the shooting (murder to me) was justified. But several nearby witnesses said otherwise. I wonder what evidence was presented to the jury during the trial. 😱
 
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The Merg said:
I’m sorry, but if someone has a gun and starts to point it at a cop, I have no issue with that cop firing first.
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If someone is pointing a gun at you and has not already fired it is because they really don't want to. The cop should be looking for a way out of this that does not include deadly force.

I know that these things are on a sliding scale. I know there are situations where a cop could be justified at firing first. The problem is that this leeway we give cops to make those judgment calls has been abused too much and now I don't trust them. There is a overwhelming feeling out there that a cop killing an innocent person is better then the cop taking the chance that they might be in danger. I simply do not agree with that. Cops put themselves in the way of danger to protect society and civilians. Any officer that does not believe in that should find a different line of work.
 
Noah Abrams said:
Serious question: how many of you live in neighborhoods where there is a guy drinking and playing loud music in the garage next to you? Leave everything aside for a moment. I am just trying to gauge where you guys are coming from, how much exposure you have had to certain elements of the society. This does NOT mean I am justifying the cops or anything here. I see this kind of pattern a lot here on this forum, and I suspect it comes from a place of...of...what should I call it...a certain distance and detachment from the "reality on the ground" of this country
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Lol loud music complaints happens in almost every type of neighbourhood. About the only place it doesn't happen is in rural areas where houses are far apart.
 
Noah Abrams said:
Probably is a white neighborhood though, and thus would have less crime than a black one. That alone makes the police jittery. Not that I am defending cops. I think the police in this country are thugs. But so are a lot of people. There are very few angels in all this mess
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I'm in Texas. My neighborhood is mostly Hispanic.
 
SMOGZINN said:
If someone is pointing a gun at you and has not already fired it is because they really don't want to. The cop should be looking for a way out of this that does not include deadly force.
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Sorry, but that’s a ridiculous statement. So, the cop has to wait for the person to finish raising the gun at him and see if he pulls the trigger before he can fire his own gun? And how long is it before pointing the gun goes from I want to shoot to I don’t really want to shoot?

- Merg
 
The Merg said:
Sorry, but that’s a ridiculous statement. So, the cop has to wait for the person to finish raising the gun at him and see if he pulls the trigger before he can fire his own gun? And how long is it before pointing the gun goes from I want to shoot to I don’t really want to shoot?

- Merg
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The problem is we have already followed this line of logic to 'why even wait to see if he has a gun. Shoot first, shoot quick, and then lie if you got it wrong'. I can't accept that anymore. Now we have to pull back, and when the pendulum swings too far one way, it always swings the same distance the other.
 
SMOGZINN said:
If someone is pointing a gun at you and has not already fired it is because they really don't want to. The cop should be looking for a way out of this that does not include deadly force.

I know that these things are on a sliding scale. I know there are situations where a cop could be justified at firing first. The problem is that this leeway we give cops to make those judgment calls has been abused too much and now I don't trust them. There is a overwhelming feeling out there that a cop killing an innocent person is better then the cop taking the chance that they might be in danger. I simply do not agree with that. Cops put themselves in the way of danger to protect society and civilians. Any officer that does not believe in that should find a different line of work.
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The other option is to fix the justice system that continually lets officers off the hook for abuse of their power while still allowing the good officers to reasonably protect themselves.
 
Jhhnn said:
C'mon, guys. The cop obviously wasn't in imminent danger when the deceased closed the garage door. That makes no sense at all.
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Just like a guy who dances to the his cars trunk and pulls out an M1 while to cop watches. Sounds crazy.
I wasn’t there, I need more info on this
 
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