quote:

Originally posted by BBMW:
I bet the attorney set it up, then coached her on what to say. A well orchestrated interview can be very useful to the defense in a criminal case. Ask George Zimmerman.

Exactly this. Get your story out there, OTHER than the one that the prosecution presents.

Also get your story out there in a way that can be presented to a jury without having to subject yourself to cross examination.

quote:

Originally posted by bubbatime:

quote:

Originally posted by BBMW:
I bet the attorney set it up, then coached her on what to say. A well orchestrated interview can be very useful to the defense in a criminal case. Ask George Zimmerman.

Exactly this. Get your story out there, OTHER than the one that the prosecution presents.

Betty Shelby was just found not guilty. The idiots are already forming downtown.

quote:

Originally posted by bigdeal:....Apparently those 'of color' don't think they have to comply with the law ....

Seems to me the general trend is any who self identify as minorities and claim to be victims of prejudice, feel they are exempt from the law in gaining their "social justice".

quote:

Originally posted by BBMW:
^
So are you saying that LEOs cannot be justified in shooting a subject unless they actually see a weapon in a case like this?

That's a conversation worth having.

If we put that kind of burden of proof (tight ROE) on soldiers serving in Afghanistan - why not on Main Street?


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quote:

Originally posted by Sig209:

quote:

Originally posted by BBMW:
^
So are you saying that LEOs cannot be justified in shooting a subject unless they actually see a weapon in a case like this?

That's a conversation worth having.

If we put that kind of burden of proof (tight ROE) on soldiers serving in Afghanistan - why not on Main Street?
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Wrong question. The question should be why do we impose absurd RoE on soldiers fighting for our country?

Excellent news. As to the drift about "needing to see a weapon". I'd say failure to follow commands is a good indicator that something is about to go sideways.

I'm not a LEO, but a friend of mine was. He was on a domestic call. Husband sitting on the couch. His hand behind a sofa cushion. My buddy shouted several time for the husband to show his hands.

He kept digging deeper behind the cushion and my friend shot him in the chest, killing him. Turned out he was reaching for a pistol.

Was my friend "lucky" there was actually a weapon there? Sure. Could it have gone another way? Very easily.

But at the end of the day, I think the lesson is, we'd all be better off if we simply complied with Officer's instructions in the field.

quote:

Originally posted by Spokane228:
Excellent news. As to the drift about "needing to see a weapon". I'd say failure to follow commands is a good indicator that something is about to go sideways.

I'm not a LEO, but a friend of mine was. He was on a domestic call. Husband sitting on the couch. His hand behind a sofa cushion. My buddy shouted several time for the husband to show his hands.

He kept digging deeper behind the cushion and my friend shot him in the chest, killing him. Turned out he was reaching for a pistol.

Was my friend "lucky" there was actually a weapon there? Sure. Could it have gone another way? Very easily.

But at the end of the day, I think the lesson is, we'd all be better off if we simply complied with Officer's instructions in the field.

And yet, there are people who would argue that since your friend could not have known that there was a weapon that he can't use the subsequent discovery of a gun as a defence. You know, the only what was known at the time canard.

quote:

Originally posted by Fenris:

quote:

Originally posted by Spokane228:
Excellent news. As to the drift about "needing to see a weapon". I'd say failure to follow commands is a good indicator that something is about to go sideways.

I'm not a LEO, but a friend of mine was. He was on a domestic call. Husband sitting on the couch. His hand behind a sofa cushion. My buddy shouted several time for the husband to show his hands.

He kept digging deeper behind the cushion and my friend shot him in the chest, killing him. Turned out he was reaching for a pistol.

Was my friend "lucky" there was actually a weapon there? Sure. Could it have gone another way? Very easily.

But at the end of the day, I think the lesson is, we'd all be better off if we simply complied with Officer's instructions in the field.

And yet, there are people who would argue that since your friend could not have known that there was a weapon that he can't use the subsequent discovery of a gun as a defence. You know, the only what was known at the time canard.

Only what one knows or reasonably believes at the time is indeed usually the standard for deciding whether deadly force is justified, not what is discovered after the fact. “Reasonably believes,” however, doesn’t always require actually seeing a gun to believe that’s what the subject is about to present.

Under the circumstances described, how much time would it have taken to pull a gun from behind a cushion, point it at the officer, and pull the trigger? For anyone who is reasonably fit and proficient with a pistol, significantly less than a second. And because “action beats reaction,” there’s little chance that the officer would have been able to fire in time to prevent the subject’s getting off a shot. Even if the officer did fire first and scored a good hit, there’s no guarantee that it would have stopped the subject’s actions. Those are the sort of facts that must be understood when looking at incidents like this, but unfortunately far too many people, including LEOs, don’t.

Just to follow up. My friend retired after that incident. There was no investigation. He moved on. He said he was tired of strangers trying to kill him.

In light of all the perceived racial undertones in police shootings, I should mention he is African American. He never brought up the race of the perp when recounting his story.

quote:

Under the circumstances described, how much time would it have taken to pull a gun from behind a cushion, point it at the officer, and pull the trigger?

Probably about the same amount of time it would take to mash the gas pedal and run over an officer approaching a car at a traffic stop.

A person sitting in a car (deadly weapon) is a potential threat but not a known threat. Just like a person with their hand in their pocket is a potential threat and not a known threat. An officer is justified in shooting a person trying to run them over just the same as they are justified in shooting a person trying to draw a weapon on them.

I'm sure most agree that officers shouldn't be shooting people in cars "just in case", and I personally extend that same logic to hands in pockets, behind couch cushions, etc. You see something? Light them up.

I have been shot at several times, even ambushed once. In every one of those cases a gun was out, and it was obvious. I have also been threatened several times with hands in pockets as if there was a gun. Never was. Had there been, they would have had it out like the others.

quote:

Originally posted by a1abdj:
Probably about the same amount of time it would take to mash the gas pedal and run over an officer approaching a car at a traffic stop.

Actually, no, and I would expect that anyone who was familiar with motor vehicles and with handling and shooting handguns would know that.

In addition, in the incident described above there was much more to justify the officer’s decision to shoot than not being able to see the subject’s hand—and that’s something else that should be obvious even based on the little information we were provided.

But perhaps I expect too much.

To be clear, I in no way intended to to disparage or criticise the officer in any way. I intended to criticize the idea that being proved right is no defense. Though I do NOT think that being wrong should count against an officer, if he acted under a reasonable belief given what he knew at the time. Perhaps not consistent, but it is what I believe.

I may not be explaining myself well.

Could some smart person help me out here?

quote:

Originally posted by Fenris:
To be clear, I in no way intended to to disparage or criticise the officer in any way.

And I wasn’t criticizing you if that’s how my comments came across. I was just trying to point out how the courts have ruled in other cases and which were based on what an officer perceived and reasonably believed at the time. It may be true that the outcome sometimes sways opinions about justified versus unjustified, but that’s not how it’s supposed to work. I actually don’t have an opinion about the Tulsa case because I can’t even find a video that I can view, and that wouldn’t necessarily be definitive in any event.