Word associations probably belong in the Circus. But I think the first thought that pops into my mind re America is "Statue of Liberty" or "yellow taxis." (Are taxis yellow everywhere in America? Or is that just New York?)
However, the other way around, the first country that pops into my mind in relation to "gun" is America.
Do you think the positive brain activity implied by the use of the word "decided" applies?
I can't get in to that without signing up to receiving every bit of news they want to send, ever.
If Biden had his wits about him, he'd say to the NRA: "OK. You object to my proposal for reasonable gun control? Write one that's to your liking and that would get guns out of the hands of criminals and crazies while preserving the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens. You have three weeks."
I just came to rant about the shooting of Duante Wright. All of the commentary I've seen is either "he was pulled over for having an air freshener and the cop shot him" or "he tried to run from the cops - he shouldn't have done that!"
And it's a load of crap.
Duante Wright had an open warrant for his arrest, in connection with an earlier crime. So the facts are:
1. Duante Wright was stopped for having expired licence plates. That's a bit of a "driving whilst black" charge - yes, it's a valid reason for cops to stop someone, but plenty of people drive for a long time on expired tags without getting stopped.
2. Once he was stopped, the cops are going to run his ID, the computer's going to say "open warrant - needs arresting" and they're going to attempt an arrest. That's inevitable, and automatic, and happens to anyone who they stop for whom there's an open arrest warrant.
3. Yes, he tried to escape from the cops. Yes, that was a bad idea. He shouldn't have done it.
4. People do stupid things. People make mistakes. People who have open warrants for their arrest for an earlier crime are probably more likely to do stupid things (a. It's a high stress situation, which makes people more likely to make a bad choice. b. If you've been arrested for a prior crime, you probably have a history of making bad choices, so you're more likely to make another one.)
5. This is completely predictable. Some fraction of people who are being arrested try to run. This is not a surprise. Cops know that this happens. They should plan for it. And by "plan for it" I don't mean "plan to let him get back in his car, then shoot him". The people arguing "he shouldn't have run" are missing the point. Yes, he shouldn't have run. So what? It was entirely predictable that some fraction of people in Duante Wright's position would try to run. The cops need to have a plan for this that doesn't involve shooting someone who isn't presenting an active danger to anyone else. The way this cop behaved, she didn't have a plan. She was just expecting compliance, and reacted when she didn't get it. That's a serious training problem.
The fundamental issue here is that cops have to be able to arrest uncooperative people without killing them, and they seem notably unable to do that when the person who isn't cooperating is black.
Or she did have a plan, and executed it perfectly. Cops have been getting away with mowing down black men for centuries in this country. It's hard to adjust to the newly-dawning reality.
What I find hard to believe is that a 26-year veteran of the police force could not remember which side of her belt she stashed her taser in, and which side her pistol, and what the feel of each was in her hand.
That said, I do feel just a slight bit sorry for her. But just a bit. I do not in the least excuse her behavior.
As I heard some wag say, "It's too dangerous having cops that can't tell a handgun from a taser in a high-stress situation. Next time she might shoot a white person."
What I don’t understand, in these situations, is why the police are so desperate to stop them then and there at that moment if they run. If you can identify them - which you have just done if you have found out there’s an open warrant - you can go arrest them later. (Unless the warrant is for murder or extreme violence.)
People who get repeatedly arrested tend to be not very good at hiding, which is why they keep getting arrested - they go back to familiar places and people.
And in Chicago, a video is released showing a police office shooting Adam Toledo, aged 13, whose hands were in the air when he was shot. Toledo was running away from the police, stopped when called on to stop, raised his hands in the air and was then shot dead. The shooting happened on March 29.
Body cams are revealing the truth about trigger happy police officers.
They can always run after them. That's what British coppers usually have to do.
This is the thing. American police are readily given a gun as a tool. And they operate in a culture where guns are far more common (way more per capita than any other country).
And so the whole mindset develops that a gun is a good solution to a problem. It isn't just police, either. The whole range of shootings that happen (sadly seeing a new report of 8 dead in Indianapolis), and even a lot of American films are demonstrating that same mindset. Problems are responded to with guns, because there is an entire industry built around convincing people in various ways that guns can be used to solve a far wider range of problems than people in many other countries would ever believe.
There are also police-specific problems, one of the chief ones being that there are so many thousand separate forces that it's almost impossible to effect change on a large scale. But I question to what extent the problem of trigger-happy police can be solved without addressing the wider problem of a culture that accepts guns.
Part of it has to do with whether data can be used to negate this belief that guns are so useful. One of the most shocking things to me is that laws were passed in the USA many years ago to actually prevent gathering proper, official data on what's happening. Gun supporters were scared that such data would be used to take guns off people. Just think about that for a moment... you prevent the collection of information because you believe the information will show that your position is not based on reality. In this context I find that horrifying.
So yes, maybe one day fewer people will have their own personal gun for "self-defence" if they understand that there's only about a 1 in 23 chance the gun will be used for that purpose rather than an accidental shooting, suicide or deliberate harm/murder. Maybe one day guns will be viewed as tools for hunting/animal control, sports shooting and the like and not something that people ought to be uncritically able to carry around in an urban environment.
And then if gun use in general is not an expected thing, then police - even if they still have guns - might gun use as an exceptional measure rather than the first reponse to a difficulty as trivial as a suspect on the run.
Toledo was running away from the police, stopped when called on to stop, raised his hands in the air and was then shot dead. The shooting happened on March 29.
"Trigger happy" is a good description of this approach. For completeness, the video seems to show Toledo throw a gun (or something) behind a fence, turn whilst raising his hands, and get shot, almost in the same movement. The cop will probably say "I thought he was bringing his gun up to shoot me" and the bodycam video is not inconsistent with that impression.
Which rather underlines my point that the big picture isn't whether you prosecute individual cops or not (my view, having seen the bodycam video, is that there's enough reasonable doubt that there won't be a conviction in this case), but how you change what cops do to stop this happening.
Are there changes to the way that cops deal with armed criminals that would end with fewer people being killed, without placing cops or the general public at an increased risk?
For completeness, the video seems to show Toledo throw a gun (or something) behind a fence, turn whilst raising his hands, and get shot, almost in the same movement. The cop will probably say "I thought he was bringing his gun up to shoot me" and the bodycam video is not inconsistent with that impression.
Totally ignoring the question, of course, of what a 13-year-old was doing with a gun. But perhaps the NRA would like to answer that.
The death of Adam Toledo has been reported across the media here in the UK.
It struck me how very differently this reporting sounds...depending on how Adam is described.
Yesterday I heard that ‘A Man, Adam Toledo, had been shot’
The next report was ‘ A Child, 13year old Adam Toledo had been shot’
There followed ‘ A Young Man...’
And ‘A Youth....’
I know that sometimes the line between teenagers and adults is blurred, but at 13yrs old?
As I heard some wag say, "It's too dangerous having cops that can't tell a handgun from a taser in a high-stress situation. Next time she might shoot a white person."
No she won't - if Mr. Wright had been white, she wouldn't have drawn her weapon in the first place.
As to the excuse that there was a warrant for his arrest, what crime was it for? Quite likely not one that would carry the death penalty.
As I heard some wag say, "It's too dangerous having cops that can't tell a handgun from a taser in a high-stress situation. Next time she might shoot a white person."
No she won't - if Mr. Wright had been white, she wouldn't have drawn her weapon in the first place.
As to the excuse that there was a warrant for his arrest, what crime was it for? Quite likely not one that would carry the death penalty.
Irrelevant if it did, except inasmuch as it might have some bearing on the danger he might pose if apprehended. This is the USA, not Megacity 1.
It's worth restating at every opportunity that Judge Dredd is set in a dystopia.
Presumably police who have guns are trained to use them. I think guns should be heavily regulated but if you must arm the police why do they seem to shoot to kill not maim in these circumstances?
Presumably police who have guns are trained to use them. I think guns should be heavily regulated but if you must arm the police why do they seem to shoot to kill not maim in these circumstances?
Presumably police who have guns are trained to use them. I think guns should be heavily regulated but if you must arm the police why do they seem to shoot to kill not maim in these circumstances?
From what I've heard the ability to hit specific parts of the body when shooting is pretty much confined to snipers and specialist performers. For the average cop (and average soldier for that matter) it's aim for the middle and hope. There isn't really any reliable method for "shoot to maim", particularly not that would prevent an armed criminal shooting back. Training standards for police across the US vary considerably so I wouldn't bank on high quality firearms training, certainly not to the level of UK firearms officers.
Presumably police who have guns are trained to use them. I think guns should be heavily regulated but if you must arm the police why do they seem to shoot to kill not maim in these circumstances?
Everyone who is trained to use a gun is trained to shoot to stop. Shooting people in the hand to make them drop their gun is movie bullshit. Aim for centre of mass.
(Note that the police are generally bad shots. Most rounds fired by police in the field don't hit anyone.)
Here, by contrast, is a pretty clear example of a cop not having much choice except to kill the suspect.
Presumably police who have guns are trained to use them. I think guns should be heavily regulated but if you must arm the police why do they seem to shoot to kill not maim in these circumstances?
Everyone who is trained to use a gun is trained to shoot to stop. Shooting people in the hand to make them drop their gun is movie bullshit. Aim for centre of mass.
(Note that the police are generally bad shots. Most rounds fired by police in the field don't hit anyone.)
Here, by contrast, is a pretty clear example of a cop not having much choice except to kill the suspect.
Or let him go. Is the life of the policeman more important than catching the criminal? The policeman had tried very hard to get the guy, he had certainly done his duty. Is it bad for the officer to let the guy go?
It is bad for an officer to let a scofflaw with a gun go. The officer takes a chance that the bad guy could kill an innocent person if they escape with the gun. My son-in-law used to be a sheriff's deputy (and an SVU detective) so we've had discussions of this nature frequently. Thank goodness he never had to shoot anyone and I am extremely grateful he is not in law enforcement anymore.
I'm just glad I'll never have to make that choice.
Can police shootings of people be separated from the problem that anyone could be carrying a gun in America? Suspect that police there are uniquely on edge about being shot themselves.
It is bad for an officer to let a scofflaw with a gun go. The officer takes a chance that the bad guy could kill an innocent person if they escape with the gun. My son-in-law used to be a sheriff's deputy (and an SVU detective) so we've had discussions of this nature frequently. Thank goodness he never had to shoot anyone and I am extremely grateful he is not in law enforcement anymore.
I'm just glad I'll never have to make that choice.
A suspect is an innocent person, and if you shoot and kill them then an innocent person has died - rather than simply a innocent person *might* die.
A suspect is an innocent person, and if you shoot and kill them then an innocent person has died - rather than simply a innocent person *might* die.
That's legal sophistry. A suspect is a person. They may or may not be innocent. In the example posed by jedijudy, or in the news article I referenced, there's a person who is armed, and has fired that gun at people. The fact that they have not yet been convicted of the offence makes them "innocent" in a legal sense, but they are not innocent in any factual sense. They've got a gun, and have demonstrated a willingness to shoot at people with it.
It would be best if the gunman was apprehended alive, and had his day in court. But I'll agree with jedijudy that the gunman being killed by police is a better outcome than the gunman being allowed to escape, and subsequently killing someone else.
But perhaps he wasn't going to shoot someone else - perhaps he was going to go home, calm down, and then surrender himself. Or perhaps he was going to go home, and can be arrested at home in a controlled manner.
You are taking the certainty of someone dying, as better than someone might die. This is irrational.
Legal sophistry or not, the police acting as if anyone they think might be a dangerous criminal as if they actually are a dangerous criminal, is part of the reason they keep shooting people. People who they are supposed to protect.
You are taking the certainty of someone dying, as better than someone might die. This is irrational.
No, I'm valuing the arsehole with the gun less than I'm valuing some innocent third party.
If, for example, an armed robber was holding a bank customer at gunpoint, and a sniper had the opportunity to kill the robber and save the customer, I'd absolutely take the shot. The armed robber and the customer are not equivalent. I'm not going to sacrifice the customer to save the life of the robber.
What I find hard to believe is that a 26-year veteran of the police force could not remember which side of her belt she stashed her taser in, and which side her pistol, and what the feel of each was in her hand.
That said, I do feel just a slight bit sorry for her. But just a bit. I do not in the least excuse her behavior.
No. No no no no no no. I don't care who he was, the occupying force needs to stop killing us. I live less than ten miles from his lynching. We. Are. done.
As I said, "It would be best if the gunman was apprehended alive, and had his day in court." If he can be talked down, that's the best possible result. But I stand by my statement that a dead criminal is a better result than a dead innocent person.
Also, you guys get the context of Wright's murder? He was a 20year old young Black man with a warrant for a minor offense, pulled over by white cops because he had something hanging in his rearview- something they never pull us white people over for. His back was to the cop when she shot and killed him. She says she thought she was using a taser, which was overkill, too.
(and can we acknowledge she pulled the stupid white lady defense? I didn't see it until a Black woman wrote about it, but I can't unsee it now.)
The only cop who went to jail for shooting a civilian was Noor, Black Somali man, who shot and killed Justine Damond, a pretty white lady. He got Manslaughter 2. The pretty white woman cop who killed a Black boy got a lesser charge, Man 3.
And yes people protested this latest lynching. So now cops are throwing tear gas at and assaulting the protestors. They are arresting journalists and medics, FFS! The Gov brought out the national guard- who are protecting the cops and attacking protestors.
The backdrop for this whole mess is that Chauvin, who killed George Floyd less than a year ago in the same metro, is on trial right now. We already had protests at the courthouse. Schools are closing this week because the verdict is due Weds.
So now another Black man is dead. Black Black Black Black Black. This is about Black people getting killed by police officers, and it being twisted into the victims' fault. Being Black is not a crime.
But I stand by my statement that a dead criminal is a better result than a dead innocent person.
Where does the line between criminal and innocent fall? In possession of minor drugs? In possession of an unpaid parking ticket?
In any case, while if the guy is a hitman pointing his gun at his target then, yes, it's better to shoot to kill them than let them kill the target. But that's not the situation we're talking about here. The "better a dead criminal than a dead innocent" argument only applies if the criminal is a certain and direct threat to the public. It doesn't apply when the best you can say is that the criminal might in future for all you know kill someone.
In most (non-consequentialist) moral systems it's better to err on the side of allowing someone else to commit an injustice than to err on the side of committing one oneself.
Also, you guys get the context of Wright's murder? He was a 20year old young Black man with a warrant for a minor offense, pulled over by white cops because he had something hanging in his rearview- something they never pull us white people over for.
The claim seems to be that he was pulled over for expired tags, before the cop noticed the air freshener, and pointed that out too. And yes, as I pointed out earlier,
That's a bit of a "driving whilst black" charge - yes, it's a valid reason for cops to stop someone, but plenty of people drive for a long time on expired tags without getting stopped.
His back was to the cop when she shot and killed him. She says she thought she was using a taser, which was overkill, too.
Yes, indeed. There was a warrant for his arrest, for not appearing in a Minneapolis court on a misdemeanor charge. That's hardly the sort of clear and present danger that warrants drawing a weapon (and a taser is a weapon, not just a convenient cattle prod for arresting people.) It's true that he also had pending charges for armed robbery against him, from more than a year earlier, but that's no indication that he posed any kind of active threat.
Snopes has a decent summary of Duante Wright's criminal record here
He was scared: cops around here shoot people, especially Black men.
Yup. He was scared. He was under a lot of stress. People in those conditions often react in stupid and irrational ways. That's completely predictable.
It actually looks to me as though the trainee cops botched his arrest, and were the trigger that set him running. And then the trainer cop shot him.
There's all sorts of questions we could ask about how cops are trained, and what they could do better (and we do have to view this in an American context, where there are more guns than people, and when cops do sometimes get shot at and killed when they make traffic stops), but I think the most fundamental question is this:
"Did the cops view people like Duante Wright and Philando Castile as part of the "public" that they were supposed to serve and protect?" 'cause it's hard to escape the idea that the answer is 'no'.
So how likely is Biden to get gun control of any kind through? If so how likely is the underground market for guns going to grow? What is a reasonable level of gun control in the US?
Depends what you mean by "of any kind"? He'll probably get something passed. It is vanishingly unlikely to have any significant effect on the availability of guns in the US.
Also here in the Twin Cities, not a week after Daunte Wright was murdered — a 61 year old man trapped a cop's arm in a car window, dragged him down the street, and hit him in the head with a hammer. Arrested without a scratch on him. No prizes for guessing what color his skin happens to be.
Or let him go. Is the life of the policeman more important than catching the criminal? The policeman had tried very hard to get the guy, he had certainly done his duty. Is it bad for the officer to let the guy go?
The biggest problem with this suggested approach is the message it sends to every other criminal out there. Namely: "if you open fire at the police when they try to arrest you, they'll let you get away".
That is not a message that's conducive to a reduction in gun use. Or crime in general, for that matter.
If someone opens fire, the cops can't just let them get away. But the cops shoot unarmed people all the time. They pursue people all the time that they could just go pick up later.
Comments
However, the other way around, the first country that pops into my mind in relation to "gun" is America.
https://www.startribune.com/brooklyn-center-police-fatally-shoot-man-20-inflaming-tensions-during-the-derek-chauvin-trial/600044821/
I can't get in to that without signing up to receiving every bit of news they want to send, ever.
https://apnews.com/article/daunte-wright-minnesota-police-shooting-1ad1b12b77f35f9fa01e680b73add7d5
You're right, I'm not sure our cops do any thinking until it's time to cover up their messes.
And it's a load of crap.
Duante Wright had an open warrant for his arrest, in connection with an earlier crime. So the facts are:
1. Duante Wright was stopped for having expired licence plates. That's a bit of a "driving whilst black" charge - yes, it's a valid reason for cops to stop someone, but plenty of people drive for a long time on expired tags without getting stopped.
2. Once he was stopped, the cops are going to run his ID, the computer's going to say "open warrant - needs arresting" and they're going to attempt an arrest. That's inevitable, and automatic, and happens to anyone who they stop for whom there's an open arrest warrant.
3. Yes, he tried to escape from the cops. Yes, that was a bad idea. He shouldn't have done it.
4. People do stupid things. People make mistakes. People who have open warrants for their arrest for an earlier crime are probably more likely to do stupid things (a. It's a high stress situation, which makes people more likely to make a bad choice. b. If you've been arrested for a prior crime, you probably have a history of making bad choices, so you're more likely to make another one.)
5. This is completely predictable. Some fraction of people who are being arrested try to run. This is not a surprise. Cops know that this happens. They should plan for it. And by "plan for it" I don't mean "plan to let him get back in his car, then shoot him". The people arguing "he shouldn't have run" are missing the point. Yes, he shouldn't have run. So what? It was entirely predictable that some fraction of people in Duante Wright's position would try to run. The cops need to have a plan for this that doesn't involve shooting someone who isn't presenting an active danger to anyone else. The way this cop behaved, she didn't have a plan. She was just expecting compliance, and reacted when she didn't get it. That's a serious training problem.
The fundamental issue here is that cops have to be able to arrest uncooperative people without killing them, and they seem notably unable to do that when the person who isn't cooperating is black.
What I find hard to believe is that a 26-year veteran of the police force could not remember which side of her belt she stashed her taser in, and which side her pistol, and what the feel of each was in her hand.
That said, I do feel just a slight bit sorry for her. But just a bit. I do not in the least excuse her behavior.
People who get repeatedly arrested tend to be not very good at hiding, which is why they keep getting arrested - they go back to familiar places and people.
Ego. "You think you can run from me? Well, you have another think coming!"
Body cams are revealing the truth about trigger happy police officers.
This is the thing. American police are readily given a gun as a tool. And they operate in a culture where guns are far more common (way more per capita than any other country).
And so the whole mindset develops that a gun is a good solution to a problem. It isn't just police, either. The whole range of shootings that happen (sadly seeing a new report of 8 dead in Indianapolis), and even a lot of American films are demonstrating that same mindset. Problems are responded to with guns, because there is an entire industry built around convincing people in various ways that guns can be used to solve a far wider range of problems than people in many other countries would ever believe.
There are also police-specific problems, one of the chief ones being that there are so many thousand separate forces that it's almost impossible to effect change on a large scale. But I question to what extent the problem of trigger-happy police can be solved without addressing the wider problem of a culture that accepts guns.
Part of it has to do with whether data can be used to negate this belief that guns are so useful. One of the most shocking things to me is that laws were passed in the USA many years ago to actually prevent gathering proper, official data on what's happening. Gun supporters were scared that such data would be used to take guns off people. Just think about that for a moment... you prevent the collection of information because you believe the information will show that your position is not based on reality. In this context I find that horrifying.
So yes, maybe one day fewer people will have their own personal gun for "self-defence" if they understand that there's only about a 1 in 23 chance the gun will be used for that purpose rather than an accidental shooting, suicide or deliberate harm/murder. Maybe one day guns will be viewed as tools for hunting/animal control, sports shooting and the like and not something that people ought to be uncritically able to carry around in an urban environment.
And then if gun use in general is not an expected thing, then police - even if they still have guns - might gun use as an exceptional measure rather than the first reponse to a difficulty as trivial as a suspect on the run.
"Trigger happy" is a good description of this approach. For completeness, the video seems to show Toledo throw a gun (or something) behind a fence, turn whilst raising his hands, and get shot, almost in the same movement. The cop will probably say "I thought he was bringing his gun up to shoot me" and the bodycam video is not inconsistent with that impression.
Which rather underlines my point that the big picture isn't whether you prosecute individual cops or not (my view, having seen the bodycam video, is that there's enough reasonable doubt that there won't be a conviction in this case), but how you change what cops do to stop this happening.
Are there changes to the way that cops deal with armed criminals that would end with fewer people being killed, without placing cops or the general public at an increased risk?
Totally ignoring the question, of course, of what a 13-year-old was doing with a gun. But perhaps the NRA would like to answer that.
The death of Adam Toledo has been reported across the media here in the UK.
It struck me how very differently this reporting sounds...depending on how Adam is described.
Yesterday I heard that ‘A Man, Adam Toledo, had been shot’
The next report was ‘ A Child, 13year old Adam Toledo had been shot’
There followed ‘ A Young Man...’
And ‘A Youth....’
I know that sometimes the line between teenagers and adults is blurred, but at 13yrs old?
No she won't - if Mr. Wright had been white, she wouldn't have drawn her weapon in the first place.
As to the excuse that there was a warrant for his arrest, what crime was it for? Quite likely not one that would carry the death penalty.
Irrelevant if it did, except inasmuch as it might have some bearing on the danger he might pose if apprehended. This is the USA, not Megacity 1.
It's worth restating at every opportunity that Judge Dredd is set in a dystopia.
Because that's impossible in real life.
From what I've heard the ability to hit specific parts of the body when shooting is pretty much confined to snipers and specialist performers. For the average cop (and average soldier for that matter) it's aim for the middle and hope. There isn't really any reliable method for "shoot to maim", particularly not that would prevent an armed criminal shooting back. Training standards for police across the US vary considerably so I wouldn't bank on high quality firearms training, certainly not to the level of UK firearms officers.
Everyone who is trained to use a gun is trained to shoot to stop. Shooting people in the hand to make them drop their gun is movie bullshit. Aim for centre of mass.
(Note that the police are generally bad shots. Most rounds fired by police in the field don't hit anyone.)
Here, by contrast, is a pretty clear example of a cop not having much choice except to kill the suspect.
Or let him go. Is the life of the policeman more important than catching the criminal? The policeman had tried very hard to get the guy, he had certainly done his duty. Is it bad for the officer to let the guy go?
I'm just glad I'll never have to make that choice.
A suspect is an innocent person, and if you shoot and kill them then an innocent person has died - rather than simply a innocent person *might* die.
That's legal sophistry. A suspect is a person. They may or may not be innocent. In the example posed by jedijudy, or in the news article I referenced, there's a person who is armed, and has fired that gun at people. The fact that they have not yet been convicted of the offence makes them "innocent" in a legal sense, but they are not innocent in any factual sense. They've got a gun, and have demonstrated a willingness to shoot at people with it.
It would be best if the gunman was apprehended alive, and had his day in court. But I'll agree with jedijudy that the gunman being killed by police is a better outcome than the gunman being allowed to escape, and subsequently killing someone else.
But perhaps he wasn't going to shoot someone else - perhaps he was going to go home, calm down, and then surrender himself. Or perhaps he was going to go home, and can be arrested at home in a controlled manner.
Legal sophistry or not, the police acting as if anyone they think might be a dangerous criminal as if they actually are a dangerous criminal, is part of the reason they keep shooting people. People who they are supposed to protect.
Are you talking about the one in or out of uniform ?
No, I'm valuing the arsehole with the gun less than I'm valuing some innocent third party.
If, for example, an armed robber was holding a bank customer at gunpoint, and a sniper had the opportunity to kill the robber and save the customer, I'd absolutely take the shot. The armed robber and the customer are not equivalent. I'm not going to sacrifice the customer to save the life of the robber.
No. No no no no no no. I don't care who he was, the occupying force needs to stop killing us. I live less than ten miles from his lynching. We. Are. done.
He was scared: cops around here shoot people, especially Black men. Jamar Clark. Philando Castile. Here's a link if you're in the US: https://www.startribune.com/minn-families-linked-by-police-violence-say-it-s-time-for-a-change/572795852/
(and can we acknowledge she pulled the stupid white lady defense? I didn't see it until a Black woman wrote about it, but I can't unsee it now.)
The only cop who went to jail for shooting a civilian was Noor, Black Somali man, who shot and killed Justine Damond, a pretty white lady. He got Manslaughter 2. The pretty white woman cop who killed a Black boy got a lesser charge, Man 3.
And yes people protested this latest lynching. So now cops are throwing tear gas at and assaulting the protestors. They are arresting journalists and medics, FFS! The Gov brought out the national guard- who are protecting the cops and attacking protestors.
The backdrop for this whole mess is that Chauvin, who killed George Floyd less than a year ago in the same metro, is on trial right now. We already had protests at the courthouse. Schools are closing this week because the verdict is due Weds.
So now another Black man is dead. Black Black Black Black Black. This is about Black people getting killed by police officers, and it being twisted into the victims' fault. Being Black is not a crime.
In any case, while if the guy is a hitman pointing his gun at his target then, yes, it's better to shoot to kill them than let them kill the target. But that's not the situation we're talking about here. The "better a dead criminal than a dead innocent" argument only applies if the criminal is a certain and direct threat to the public. It doesn't apply when the best you can say is that the criminal might in future for all you know kill someone.
In most (non-consequentialist) moral systems it's better to err on the side of allowing someone else to commit an injustice than to err on the side of committing one oneself.
The claim seems to be that he was pulled over for expired tags, before the cop noticed the air freshener, and pointed that out too. And yes, as I pointed out earlier,
Yes, indeed. There was a warrant for his arrest, for not appearing in a Minneapolis court on a misdemeanor charge. That's hardly the sort of clear and present danger that warrants drawing a weapon (and a taser is a weapon, not just a convenient cattle prod for arresting people.) It's true that he also had pending charges for armed robbery against him, from more than a year earlier, but that's no indication that he posed any kind of active threat.
Snopes has a decent summary of Duante Wright's criminal record here
Yup. He was scared. He was under a lot of stress. People in those conditions often react in stupid and irrational ways. That's completely predictable.
It actually looks to me as though the trainee cops botched his arrest, and were the trigger that set him running. And then the trainer cop shot him.
There's all sorts of questions we could ask about how cops are trained, and what they could do better (and we do have to view this in an American context, where there are more guns than people, and when cops do sometimes get shot at and killed when they make traffic stops), but I think the most fundamental question is this:
"Did the cops view people like Duante Wright and Philando Castile as part of the "public" that they were supposed to serve and protect?" 'cause it's hard to escape the idea that the answer is 'no'.
Now for the sentencing.
The think they might want is to get away with armed robbery.
The biggest problem with this suggested approach is the message it sends to every other criminal out there. Namely: "if you open fire at the police when they try to arrest you, they'll let you get away".
That is not a message that's conducive to a reduction in gun use. Or crime in general, for that matter.