http://a.abcnews.com/images/US/ht_walter_scott_shooting_video_new_01_jc_150409_16x9_992.jpg
Posted on 04/11/2015 10:43:37 AM PDT by EveningStar
Twenty years working in the ER of a major,big city,hospital showed me what damage one under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs can do.If you've got about 12 hours I can tell you about one third of the stories I have.
We’re not discussing how big an a-hole the dead guy was.
We’re discussing the a-holeness of the cop. Let’s assume the dead dude said/did some very rude things while under the influence. Irritating and angering, quite reasonably, the cop.
The problem is that irritation or anger, however reasonable, do not provide legal justification for killing.
That is limited, quite reasonably IMO, to protecting your own or another’s life, at the moment of the shooting, mind you, not some theoretical future or actual past offense.
I suggested a while back somebody come up with a reasonable scenario by which, under the law, this shooting would be justified. Nobody’s done so, or really even tried, IMO.
I’m left with the sad idea that defense of his actions is based on knee-jerk defense of a cop, or even more sadly, of a white cop.
Look, I understand that cops have a hard job. I also understand that for fairly obvious psychological reasons, people who like to dominate over others are attracted to police work, much as pedophiles have a reason to be attracted to jobs where they work with kids.
The problem we have, and it’s a big one, is that good cops have developed an unhealthy sense of brotherhood with bad cops. Also that US cops kill people at a rate of 40x+ those in most advanced countries. Heck, the UK cops recently went two years without killing anybody.
I realize UK is not US, and the population here is 5x. But come on. 1000 or more dead Americans in two years vs. zero dead Brits!
We’re not THAT much more criminal than they are.
And if,by chance they do will you still be *certain* that the cop's an a-hole?
Yes.
Also: here are a few spaces for you to use when you type your next post: No need to thank me.
Protect innocent civilians is the job.
Source?
Why don't we go a step further and assume (without firm evidence either way at this point) that the dead guy did/said something *dangerous*.What next?
Fine, let’s do so.
The problem is that to make the shooting legally justifiable you have to demonstrate *danger* at the instant the gun was fired. Not one minute or three minutes earlier. Which, since we have the instant of the shooting on video, will be pretty difficult.
What you’re talking about is somebody taking revenge for earlier actions and then claiming that as self-defense. Which just doesn’t work, legally speaking.
For instance, if I take a shot at you and miss, you can’t turn up a day later, or even 30 seconds later, and gun me down when I am unarmed and therefore do not represent an eminent threat.
Self defense can be claimed for present threats only, not past ones or possible future ones.
That's the point I've been trying to make...possibly badly.Nobody....not *you*...not *me*...nobody on this thread has *nearly* enough info to reach any firm conclusions.All we have at this moment is a dead guy,two short snippets of film (without audio IIRC),a story (which may or not be true) that the dead guy was discharged from the Coast Guard because of drug use and a story (which *also* may,or may not,be true) that he could have been facing more jail time for non-support.
Remember...a couple of days after the Gentle Giant case hit the news all we had was "he was running away with his hands up",a photo of GG in his graduation gown and stories of what a fine,gentle role model he was.And a couple of days after Reverend Al's arrival in Florida all we had was a cherubic photo of 12 year old Saint Trayvon and the claim that he was gunned down for the crime of buying a package of Skittles.
Maybe everyone should wait for a while before declaring the shooting either justified *or* cold blooded murder.
The film raw footage I’ve seen has audio. Not the best quality, perhaps, but it’s there.
Or, we could recognize that if we’d had equivalent footage of the Martin or Brown shootings the uproars would have never developed.
When you have very strong evidence, indeed very nearly dispositive, it is imo very different to say, “Wait and see,” than in the cases you describe, where initially there was very little real evidence.
Not entirely true.Research the SCOTUS decision in "Tennessee v Garner" (1985) and you'll find that you've missed something rather important in the statement quoted above.I'll give you a hint...your use of the words "instant" and "earlier" is where you've gone wrong.
“We conclude that such force may not be used unless it is necessary to prevent the escape and the officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect poses a significant threat of death or serious physical injury to the officer or others.”
Somebody come up with evidence that the officer had such probable cause and I’ll buy it.
It should be noted that the case in question decided the TN statute was unconstitutional because it authorized deadly force in a case not greatly dissimilar to this one.
Except in that case the dead dude was fleeing a burglary, a serious felony, and in this case he was fleeing a burntout tail light.
Note that's an AND, not an OR. The runner was middle-aged and overweight. The cop could almost certainly have run him down. Or pursued in a vehicle. Sirens could be heard as the shooting occurred. At least one additional cop was on site in less than a minute. (He's in the video.)
Is it really reasonable to assume that the shooting was "necessary to prevent the escape?"
That's ignoring the other element of reasonable cause to believe suspect is a potentially lethal threat.
However, somebody come up with evidence, not speculation, and I'm perfectly willing to change my mind.
Someone come up with evidence that the cop *didn't* have such probable cause and I might start buying "murder".We come back (yet again) to that inconvenient fact...*nobody*,at this moment,has enough evidence to declare "cold blooded murder" *or* "justified shooting".
“For instance, if I take a shot at you and miss, you can’t turn up a day later, or even 30 seconds later, and gun me down when I am unarmed and therefore do not represent an eminent threat.”
Scott, the alleged victim, wasn’t unarmed, he had two big fists. He was another big black male, just like the guy in Ferguson, Missouri who was beating on the Cop there in his squad car, and the guy who was beating up George Zimmerman in Florida. It appears this guy Scott was attacking the Cop here also, according to witnesses. We willl see, but as many here on FR have sided with the alleged victim, I’m siding with the Cop, the contrarian position.
The Cop sounded more than reasonable when approaching Scott in his car, and obviously had no idea that Scott would take off running. The Cop had no idea about the background of the guy he was chasing. It could have been an ax murderer for all he knew, and he was stopping a guy with a very possible criminal record, perhaps violent, from escaping to harm others. We shall see how this will pan out, but for now I’m on the Cop’s side and I think once again the initial hue and cry by the media will result in a bum rap for a Cop.
As to the video, the most important part of the transaction between the Cop and the alleged victim, when they were fighting (IMO the Cop was being attacked) is missing, isn’t it. Funny how the guy videotaping the incident somehow doesn’t have his tape rolling when the two were having their altercation. Hmmmm, selective taping? The alleged victim attacked the Cop? Just the part you’d want to have missing, isn’t it. And no one knows whether the taser was placed by the victim or not. No one knows what was dropped, be it sunglasses or something else other than a taser. So, I wait....
http://a.abcnews.com/images/US/ht_walter_scott_shooting_video_new_01_jc_150409_16x9_992.jpg
“The video clearly captured officer Slager dropping the taser alongside the body after the shooting.”
Looks like a pair of sunglasses to me. That’s not a taser shaped item. Look again.
Look at the slow motion video in #37.
That isn’t sunglasses.
Even if it was sunglasses, its illegal to move, or “plant” evidence at a crime scene.
Sorry, you just don’t get it. The cop shows zero indication in the video of being beaten. In any case, the dead dude was running away, as was claimed (untruthfully) for the dead guy in MO.
The two cases have very little in common except for two corpses and the color of their skin.
Brown was charging the cop, and had already beaten him, causing severe injury. Scott was running away. It simply doesn’t matter that he might earlier have punched the cop, he was in the process of doing everything he could to minimize his threat status when he was killed.
If someone is running away from me, it’s simply not possible for me to claim self-defense as I might be able to do if he were charging me.
That’s, I guess, why I haven’t seen anybody else try to claim the shooting was self-defense. Most try to go on the rather better approach of claiming it was necessary to shoot him to keep him from escaping.
Your comments, and most of those I’ve read defending the officer, seem to me to be trying to make it justifiable homicide because he disobeyed/disrespected the cop. I agree he should not have done that.
The problem is that disobedience/disrespect of a cop is not presently a capital crime. Nor do I think it should be.
BTW, your remark about the suspicious nature of the timing of the video is pretty silly. What, you never went to see what was going on when people started shouting. In fact, I’d contend that it would be a good deal more suspicious if somebody had been standing their taping a routine traffic stop. Why would they do that except they expected something more interesting to develop.
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