Really? I have, in fact, that's the first thing I did as the story started to unfold. I asked myself...what would I have done if I were in his cop's shoes? My answer at this moment is there is fucking no way I would have shot that kid based upon the most current news reports.
I would predict that most people participating in this thread have put themselves in the cop's shoes. Isn't that the most basic thought process in forging an opinion to events like this?
Perhaps I should elaborate as to what I meant. I don't think people are
logically looking at the situation through the officer's eyes. No, let me further distill that thought... I don't think people have enough real world experience (or baring that, a solid grasp of the physics and physiology involved here).
I'll try to highlight a few examples below.
its called a billy club. if he was charging him he should have used that instead.
"Dr. Michael Baden, a renowned New York forensic pathologist who performed a preliminary autopsy commissioned by Brown's family, said his examination... suggested that Brown was shot from a distance of at least one to two feet"
http://www.latimes.com/nation/natio...hael-brown-autopsy-20140818-story.html#page=1
So let's take the officer's (as well as "non cop" witness accounts) at face value and say 6'4", 300lb Michael Brown was charging the officer. As someone who has played football, I can tell you that a person of that stature can close "one to two feet" in a literal fraction of a second. In fact, if that's how it went down, Id say the officer waited to last possible moment before opening fire. Of course, that's assuming everything went down like they say.
2clicker said:
...and yes tazing does work. not everyone can take it even if you are big. and they also have mace of which nobody can handle. and if anyone can then they are freaks of nature or on meth or something.
It would be more accurate to say that "tazing
can work". As I
just demonstrated in the previous reply, tazers and OC spray can be UNDERWHELMINGLY ineffective. I would further argue that someone the size of a linebacker rushing at police could quite possibly be amped up on adrenaline and/or drugs (Im being silly, I'm sure cops are never attacked by people hopped up on drugs), further increasing the chances that less than lethal techniques would be ineffective.
2clicker said:
this guy had other options. i KNOW this to be fact.
We all have an infinite number of options regarding every event that occurs in our lives. The questions remains, how much time did the individuals involved have to consider and weight those options? As I said, its easy to arm-chair quaterback after the fact and without the threat of physical injury or death hanging over your head.
2clicker said:
this big guy is running at me... my only option to protect myself is to kill him... nah i dont think so. the gun should be his last option against an unarmed man. regardless of his size.
so if these other methods of defense are so useless why are the cops equipped with them? yes he should have tazed or sprayed him or just beat him until he could subdue MB. its not u reasonable to expect a cop to do this. cops are trained to do this.[/QUOTE]
- I already have given reasoning, with video proof, as to why these options are "less than optimal". Even if those weapons are ineffective a small portion of the time, you aren't going to want to reach for them if your life is in danger. Furthermore, that's not how LE is trained (which I suppose could be a legitimate argument, but that seems to be low on people's list).
- Police are equipped with those less than lethal measures for instances where they are appropriate. Now the questions remains, when is it appropriate? Is it still appropriate to use less than lethal force on a suspect who has already ignored your commands and that is rushing you? How about when that suspect is extremely large, and you have no idea on his state of mind, what drugs he may or may not be on, or if he is even armed?
- Being "trained" to hit someone in the head with a club is a far cry from being confidant that you can knock a 300lb assailant out cold in the first blow. What happens if the cop misses, or simply hurts and pisses the suspect off more? Well, if the officer gets taken to the ground, something like this might happen:
BTW that officer was EXTREMELY lucky. I also avoided posting videos where the officer actually get shot with his own firearm. Figured that would be in poor taste.
Thank you! I said the same thing. If he was running at the cop, why not shoot at MB's legs? I doubt he was running in a zig zag pattern. Maybe the cop was just a terrible shot?
Again, this shows a disconnect from reality. Reality of how things work in a real life situation as well as the reality of police training. When you fire your weapon you NEVER "shoot to wound". You shoot center of mass and you keep shooting until the target is no longer a threat. Go through any firearms training, be it private, LE or military, and that's one of the first things that is taught to you.
Also, its extremely hard to hit a moving target while under duress. Again, this is another reality that people with no experience seem to take into consideration... but its one of the reasons why police, military, etc are trained to fire multiple rounds.
invertedisdead said:
And I think if you looked up statistics of tasers, pepper spray, and batons working it would be in favor of them being effective the vast majority of the time
I'm glad you're willing to take that gamble on someone else's life. I'm sure the officer who has a large charging man coming at him, has a different opinion about playing those odds though.
Let me ask you... when your life is in danger and you only have few seconds to react, whats more likely to pop in your head as you decide on which tool to use?
"Well, this one
usually works..."
or
"I remember that time when I hit a pissed off crackhead with this thing and he didn't flinch..."
I would also like to remind people that (again, according to the emerging story) before the shooting occurred, the officer already had his firearm drawn and MB failed to get on the ground when initially asked. AFAIK those 2 facts aren't in much question.
Now, assuming MB was running at the cop like they say, how fast do you think that officer would need to be in order to assess the situation, HOLSTER HIS ALREADY DRAWN WEAPON, unholster his OC spray/tazer, take the safety off, AIM, and finally fire at the 6'4", 300lb male coming at him?
Talk about The Matrix style skills!
