So you’re literally saying you can not request that a police officer wait to see what sort of weapon a member of the public might be holding before the officer resorts to deadly force. Got it.
Many of us find those words easy to come by AND reasonable to speak.
wow your bbs post history, taken out of the context of the threads, reads like pure poetry. I love it.
He was a 12 year boy with a toy gun in a playpark. You would presume that the cops are human beings too - with reasoning functioning brains. Right?
But this is the US. 12 year old kids do get their hands on real guns and murder other children. If anything the fact that it was in a park increases the urgency.
That’s “literally” not what he’s saying at all. The point being made was that the airsoft guns are indistinguishable from a real gun from even 1 foot away. This isn’t even the slightest exaggeration. Look up a photo of an airsoft gun. With the orange tip removed, they are indistinguishable from a real gun at 1 foot distance. Literally. The only discernible difference at that distance is the orange tip, which, for some reason yet to be explained, was not present on the airsoft gun in Tamir Rice’s possession. I say in his “possession” as an attempt to be fair to him. The 911 call, the Wikipedia article, as well as multiple news sources, claim that he was repeatedly pointing the airsoft gun at people.
Was he a kid doing something stupid? Yes. Did he “deserve” to die. No. But every time a police officer sees a gun that looks exactly like a real gun, he or she must react as if it were a real gun, and fall back on whatever training he or she has had in regard to handling a situation involving a real gun.
The point is that it doesn’t fire real bullets, and it wasn’t EVEN firing fake ones. No shots were reported. The officer didn’t even catch his breath. What the heck do you imagine you are defending him against?
I must be misunderstanding the above then… The point I was making was that given the video and description of Tamir’s behaviors with the “gun” as described by the caller, there was no way this was a case of someone legally exercising their 2nd amendment rights “as condoned by the state”. There is a giant legal gulf between “carry” and “brandishing”. Whether one does or does not have a legal right to carry, concealed or open, one does not have a right to “brandish” ones weapon, thus my statement that the carry laws in Ohio are irrelevant, as there is no way that Tamir’s behavior could possibly have been a protected behavior/right. (in fact, relevant Ohio law apparently makes brandishing even a “replica gun” an illegal act).
That pedantic point being made, it is entirely reasonable to expect the police to handle a situation in a manner that allows them to collect the data needed to make an educated and correct analysis of the situation, not to roll in like fucking rambo and go batshit on a 12 year old with a realistic looking airsoft gun.
Hmm…
http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/ohio-parental-responsibility-laws.html
Had to look it up, but this reads much like the laws in my state (CA). In fact, all of the states that I’m familiar with (which admittedly isn’t a lot, and tends to be mostly in the western/southwest part of the country) have similar laws. I don’t doubt that there are states where the action must be directed by an adult, but I’m unfamiliar with them.
Does anyone know what the breakdown is with states where parents are generally responsible vs states where parents must direct the action to be responsible?
The officer is defending against someone who was pointing what looked exactly like a real gun at people, and who, when approached, reached for what looked exactly like a real gun.
Oh, well, since you were there…
Sure.
There’s also a giant legal gulf between what the caller reported and what the responding unit observed.
Which is why we come to the same conclusion…
I’m relying on the undisputed public information we have for this specific situation (keep in mind that there was a video of this shooting). My opinions on other police officer shootings vary.
I should also note that one of the ways that the media generates viewership is by encouraging polarization in a black vs. white narrative (which is sometimes justified, but, IMO in this case is not). Somewhere, some journalists are high-fiving each other each time a white police officer shoots a black kid, because they know it’s their gravy train. My point is that you and I could be people who generally agree with each other on a wide range of topics, but are being pitted against each other such that a third-party media entity can extract profit from this tragedy.
Have you read this post in this thread?
There is a lot more undisputed public information at this link:
Thank you for posting that. Although I had previously read excerpts from that report, this time, I read it thoroughly, per your request. I think that episode is being bandied about by the press as being much more relevant that it actually is.
I’m not certain what your point about the fact that the ‘police learned the gun was fake after the shooting’. We already know this fact. I also understand that the gun was never drawn. However, we do know that Tamir Rice was brandishing the gun at multiple people prior to the police’s arrival (I believe this may even be a crime, but I’m not exactly certain how relevant that is, or where it fits into the analysis). Anyway, that’s why the police had every practical reason to believe that when he reached for the gun, that it was the same gun that people were describing him as brandishing.
Can I phone a friend?
I’d ask @Kevin_Harrelson or @Mister44 or @Aaron_Harmon for their opinion of Ptl. Loehmann’s firearm competence, based on that documented police report.
Dude was not fit to be around firearms, let alone to be a police officer. period.
I think that was the worst dirt they could dig on him. I’m looking at his actions in this situation, and I don’t see that his actions, in combination with the perspective in that report, indicate a distinct pattern. For example, the report described an incident in which he failed to properly secure a firearm. If, in a second event, he had left his vehicle unlocked and someone stole a firearm from it, there’s a discernible pattern. You can reasonably claim that there is a broader pattern of irresponsibility around firearms, but I don’t think that’s as strong an argument in this specific situation.
More broadly, I see it like this: was the police officer following standard procedure? If he was not, then he may reasonably be held accountable. If, on the other hand, he was indeed following standard procedure, and we still feel that his actions were not justified, then we have to analyze those procedures, and push to alter them. I feel like the officer is being witch-hunted (not necessarily by you, but by society at large), and I believe that witch-hunt is in part because of his race, and because of the contrast between his race and Tamir Rice’s race.
I could wave a full-sized reproduction of Warhol’s Lichtenstein’s Hotdog at you and you still wouldn’t entirely be sure it wasn’t a gun. That cop shouldn’t ever have been made a cop.
So, maybe by his former Deputy Chief of Police?
[quote]“He could not follow simple directions, could not communicate clear thoughts nor recollections, and his handgun performance was dismal,” Independence Deputy Chief Jim Polak said in letter that recommends firing Loehmann. “I do not believe time, nor training, will be able to change or correct the deficiencies.”
Loehmann was emotionally immature and circumvented direction, Polak said.
“He often feels that when told to do something, that those instructions are optional and that he can manipulate them if he so feels it can better serve him.”
Loehmann resigned from Independence in December 2012. Cleveland police didn’t read his personnel file, which included the damning letter, when they hired him in March.
Cleveland police last week added a policy that will require the review of candidates’ personnel records on file with other police departments, spokesman Sgt. Ali Pillow said.
{emphasis added}[/quote]
Loehmann wasn’t the only one that screwed up, as can be found here.
But he is the only one who pulled the trigger.
No, I don’t think Jim Polak’s comments constitute a witch hunt. Do you?
Let’s examine some of Polak’s points in light of the shooting. Regarding the Tamir Rice shooting, do you believe that Loehmann demonstrated any of the following?
-inability to follow directions
-inability to communicate clear thoughts
-dismal handgun performance
-belief that instructions are optional, and can be manipulated
I’m not disputing Polak’s claims; I’m happy to accept them at face value while we discuss this. I’m just trying to see if the points that Polak made are evident in Loehmann’s behavior in the Tamir Rice shooting, and whether or not we can detect a pattern here.
Do you believe that Loehmann followed the standard police procedure for handling such an incident? My position is that if he didn’t follow the correct procedures, then we need to hold him responsible. But if he did, and we feel that the situation was unjust to Tamir Rice, then we need to push for the police procedures to change.
One question for you - if an airsoft gun is indistinguishable from a real gun, why would you speed your police cruiser up to a couple of metres away from the person with said gun?
Why would you not stop at a safe distance and communicate with the person?
The officers in question fucked up six ways to Sunday - the realism of the gun doesn’t come into it.
