I assume it’s a piece of SOP police radio jargon^ that’s bled over to journos who’re using it so they feel kewl and to show they’re hip with the bluebros.
^ and really does serve an actual useful function when used in context; to unambiguously differentiate between shootings that the police are merely responding to (i.e., between one or more non-police people) and a situation where the police are in the midst of shooting.
Agreed. This is why we separate civil and criminal cases! A crime is not just an offense against the victim. It is an offense against the community.
I think the phrase does the opposite, and it is used with the intention to obfuscate rather than clarify. The phrase “officer involved shooting” could mean a) an officer shot someone b) an officer was shot by someone c) an officer was involved in a situation where someone was shot.
The vague language only seems to be used when the officer has shot someone. In other cases, when the actor is known they are spoken of.
I would at the very least like him to undergo sufficient training to be able to distinguish a camera from a gun.
At the time the incident is occurring those distinctions don’t really matter. I agree that when the phrase is used outside the context for which it was intended it obfuscates rather than clarifies.
I’m tired of this shit. seeing cops acting like utter assholes to the point comparing them to jackbooted thugs is an insult to the jackbooted thug. This country has a problem that is dee, severe, and needs a deft hand to find a way to fix.
Sadly those ‘deft hands’ seem to not exist and the ones that do are busy openly grabbing loose change from our pockets to stuff into their own.
The amazing thing is that nobody ever black-bags these people and works them over, at the very least. I am not a very “revenge” oriented person, but many are, and it is a strong emotion/motivation. I mean, if I killed a beloved member of somebody’s family, I would expect somebody to act out against me.
Thin blue line. If you’re a cop, that means you’re essentially part of a legally sanctioned gang and can “work over” anyone who makes your buddies feel uncomfortable. And in the circumstances anyone in your gang steps out of line, it’s a trivial matter to say “s/he’s been very stressed lately chief. They’ve been erratic. I think they might have PTSD.” and then the cop with integrity or aspirations of good police work finds themselves involuntarily committed to a psych ward.
Sure, I know that the thin blue line is how police fail to police each other. But in my remarks above I was wondering about everybody else, the public at large. I am surprised that there are so many forgiving people out there, where if their kid or sibling are killed by police, apparently just resign to let it go if the court does not address the matter. Not even a few mock executions on their way home from the bar?
I am not saying that genuine forgiveness is not a brave and commendable virtue, it’s just that I am very skeptical/surprised. For example, the attitudes of people in that “gun drawn in WalMart” topic where so many say that it’s obvious that many would use force to defend their family, even some immutable primal instinct. Except if it was cops, then “Forget it, Jake. It’s Chinatown.”
Is it possible that the cop is a member of the LGBTQI community wanting to make his feelings about the Grimm’s anti-LGBTQI stance known?
(Before anyone jumps on me for victim-blaming or anything, I’m a journalist. Who had strong outrage and disgust at the cop for being so idiotic and apparently poorly-trained that he mistook a camera/tripod for a gun. Until I read about the Grimm’s abhorrent stance…)
Cops have an enormous advantage in incumbent organizing institutions to coordinate their behavior, and clear lines of demarcation in who is in vs. out. Organizing and coordinating in any effective way at any meaningful scale is hard.
About 22:00 apparently so yes.
Also apparently dark enough that the cop couldn’t tell the man with the “gun” was his good buddy the local news photographer and owner of the local newspaper.
From the article:
Andy said the deputy gave him no warning. “I was just doing my job,” he said.
“I know Jake. I like Jake. I don’t want him to lose his job over this.”
Maybe, just maybe Jake doesn’t like you back, Andy…
If you can’t see what you’re pointing your gun at, then you have no business handling firearms. Seriously, the way cops shoot people you’d think they were given their guns on day one and told by the chief “handle them like toys. No big deal.”
Chief Wiggum takes the utmost of care to provide firearm training!
Events that cause PTSD doesn’t always have to be based on an officer confronting a criminal, or the frequency they confront them. I heard of an officer who left the force because he was sent to check on a home owner, and what he found was a corpse that was half eaten by that deceased honeowner’s dogs. That imagery really got to him and he made the right decision by moving into a different line if work.
Being a police officer puts a person in a position to more frequently see and experience situations that the average citizen rarely will. Not only that, but what a person’s true psychological tolerance level is for seeing and experiencing messed up situations is kind of a blind spot for that individual; as each person is different. That’s why I think police officers should go through a better screening process for PTSD, and should receive quality care if they are found to be diagnosed with it.
To be honest, better mental health care all round would be good.
Very true.
You might be right, but there’s also a different way of looking at it. I was a journalist in a town of about the same size for a couple of years. In a town like that, the journalists and the cops are often actually friends. Just about everyone knows everyone else. There were times when I spent as much time in the city police/county sheriff’s dispatch center (which was also the center of action for the local state patrol officer) that I got to know the copy pretty well. It doesn’t excuse the cop’s ridiculous trigger-happiness (or the apparent homophobia of the newspaper staff), but it could explain why they’re not more upset over the incident.
Um, I don’t care how good a friend I thought someone was - if they shoot me I’ll be just a little pissed off.
Strangely enough the better I know them, the more pissed off I’d be.
There’s two kinds of people:
Personally, I think careless shooting should include jail time or a hefty fine, regardless of charges pressed, and at least a ban until the shooter is re-certified. You may injure yourself as much as you want, but injuring anyone else isn’t acceptable.
