Friday, September 3, 2010

Seattle Cop Kills Man Who is Holding a Knife

It seems to be going around lately, San Jose, on the East Coast, and now Seattle.

Did this officer not consider any other way to deal with this situation other than shooting and killing a man? Did he call for backup? Were there any witnesses or perhaps a nearby camera that caught this on film? Do Seattle police officers complete any training in nonviolent conflict resolution? Do they get any sensitivity training? Was this particular officer on any type of prescribed medication? Did this officer ever serve in the military? Has this officer ever been reprimanded or written up, how often, and for what?

Good questions. What do you think? If the police fall short in some of these areas, the non-violent conflict resolution, the sensitivity training, etc., don't you think it would be even worse for civilian gun owners? Wouldn't the problems exhibited by the police be that much worse among regular gun owners?

Please leave a comment.

5 comments:

  1. The author is trying to manufacture outrage. None of those questions can be answered by the audience.

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  2. "If the police fall short in some of these areas, the non-violent conflict resolution...."

    Where is the non-violent part of the story. The cop responded to a deadly weapon with deadly force.

    Would you be happy if the cop had put away his gun and drawn a knife to fight the bad guy like some cheesy 1940's movie?

    Seems to me that the issue with you on these is not that the cop killed the guy but rather he did it with an evil gun.

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  3. Let's review.
    First a link to the actual article, not the letters to the editor page:

    http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2012764459_copshooting31m.html

    We have a homeless man whittling a piece of wood, approached by an officer of the law, who demanded the man drop the knife, which the man did not do, according to the officer.

    Is it possible the officer lied about his "several loud commands" to drop the knife? Sure.

    Is it possible the cop was a dick and was getting upset that the homeless man was ignoring him and his authority (contempt of cop)? Sure.

    Do we know for sure that any of the above is true? Nope.

    Do we know (or have any reason to believe) the official version is false? Nope.

    As presented, it is a good shoot by the officer, although like any shooting, I believe there ought to be a thorough review. That means that the questions asked in the first letter to the editor ought to be reviewed and asked--by the police, and by an independent review board, hopefully made up of citizens that take seriously their job of reviewing such incidents.

    But, for the rest of us keyboard jockeys, it doesn't do any good at all to sit here and say that it was right, wrong or otherwise. We don't have any security camera footage, or cell phone video, or eye-witness testimony, or anything to lead us to believe it was improper. The only thing we have is a dead man, and his death should be investigated.

    One thing we shouldn't be doing, though, is leaping to the assumption that the officer was wrong, just because he shot somebody. If that's truly the way you feel, MikeB, then perhaps you ought to push for the police to follow GB's example and disarm our officers. That'll make you real popular.

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  4. I agree completely, we should not jump to the conclusion that the cop is wrong. It's enough to raise the possibility.

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  5. And do you know that the possibility wasn't raised by the police review board? Most shootings in most departments end with the officer doing the shooting on paid leave while the shooting is investigated. Just because the public isn't given 100% access to the information deosn't mean it's being covered up or ignored.

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