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The behaviour of US police officers

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acbytesla said:
Except some officers never pull their firearm let alone fire it. If it's seldom in your hand are you going to notice?

(I'm just playing devil's advocate...attempting to be as reasonable as possible.)
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And conversely if they are a cop who regularly draws their gun for trivial reasons that is going to be the ingrained muscle memory not to go for the taser.
 
ponderingturtle said:
And conversely if they are a cop who regularly draws their gun for trivial reasons that is going to be the ingrained muscle memory not to go for the taser.
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Hey, this brave officer went home alive at the end of her shift, and all her training tells her that this is the only thing that matters.

Sure, American cops are fast and loose with drawing firearms on people not posing any obvious threat, but that's the risk the public has to face in order to keep our heroes in blue feeling safe. Sometimes a cop is gonna have an oopsie-doodle and terminate a citizen's existence, but that's just the price we pay for backing the blue.
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
They pulled this car over on a mostly bogus charge in the first place. Apparently illegal or not to have anything hanging off your rearview mirror, more blacks are dinged for this than whites. This is the typical traffic stop for: Those people look suspicious.
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The CNN website has an article about "illegal air fresheners" on their site today.

Some police admit it's just a pretext to stop people whom they suspect of committing other crimes. I can't imagine what they would base those suspicions on.

Police say 'pretext' stops are necessary to fight crime
So-called "pretext stops" allow police to use minor traffic infractions or broken taillights as grounds to investigate motorists for more serious crimes.
Police have defended the stops as crucial for fighting possession of illegal drugs, weapons possession, human trafficking and drunken driving.
But civil rights groups say the tactic unfairly targets Black drivers.

In 2018, the American Civil Liberties Union sued the Bakersfield Police Department in California after its officers jailed a Black man who was driving a car that had an air freshener hanging from its rearview mirror. The police also demanded personal information from the man's passengers, the ACLU said.
The city of Bakersfield settled the lawsuit in 2019 without admitting any liability.
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Here's a somewhat scary thought.

Am I the only who thinks this wouldn't have even made the news, except maybe in passing, if the officer hadn't announced she was going to use a Taser and then loudly tells us all that she effed up?

Like seriously run the clock back and replay the scenario except she doesn't basically scream out "I'm about to make a mistake! Oh crap I made a mistake!" during it?

Then it just turns into "I shot the suspect during a struggle."
 
Look SOP is to have the gun in hand when doing traffic stops we hear that all the time, and she simply forgot to put it away and pull the taser, this is the kind of minor mistake that you have to expect to keep the police feeling safe.
 
ponderingturtle said:
Look SOP is to have the gun in hand when doing traffic stops we hear that all the time, and she simply forgot to put it away and pull the taser, this is the kind of minor mistake that you have to expect to keep the police feeling safe.
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Well, she certainly kept a good grip on that receipt in her left hand. I'm guessing that it's the printout of the misdemeanor warrant.

If she had not interjected herself before the guy got cuffed I don't think any of this would have happened.
 
JoeMorgue said:
Here's a somewhat scary thought.

Am I the only who thinks this wouldn't have even made the news, except maybe in passing, if the officer hadn't announced she was going to use a Taser and then loudly tells us all that she effed up?

Like seriously run the clock back and replay the scenario except she doesn't basically scream out "I'm about to make a mistake! Oh crap I made a mistake!" during it?

Then it just turns into "I shot the suspect during a struggle."
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The increasing availability of POV cameras from police is causing them a lot of problems that they would not have had even a couple decades ago.

It turns out, the longstanding complaints coming from these communities about brutal policing tactics were not nearly has hyperbolic as many thought.
 
This is not unprecedented, I can think of at least two cases where the officer believed they were grabbing the Taser and instead shot the person.

Most departments require the officer to carry the Taser on the “weak” side, in a cross-draw holster. The new models are all bright yellow and must be manually turned on before firing.

But there are still plenty of the (cheaper) older black models out there, and some departments still have the Taser on the “strong” side, usually in a leg holster.

Shouting “Taser, Taser, Taser” before firing is standard procedure, and tells other officers to back away from the suspect.
 
Bikewer said:
This is not unprecedented, I can think of at least two cases where the officer believed they were grabbing the Taser and instead shot the person.
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A 73(!) year old police officer shot and killed a black man in Oklahoma in 2015, claiming he meant to taze him. He was convicted of 2nd degree murder and served 2 years of a 4 year sentence.

Another case, again against a black man* was non-fatally shot in Kansas in 2019, again claiming they only mean to taze them. This case was dismissed. There's news reports of a intended subsequent civil case in 2020, but I can't reference to how or if it was resolved but given what a weird year 2020 was it might still be in the legal pipeline.

*Which is why I'm not engaging with the "OMG why do you have to make it about race" baiters. Either the police are racist or random chance is since literally all the cases I can find are black men. Once is an accident, twice is a coincidence, 3 times is neither.
 
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SuburbanTurkey said:
Or like the streets of Minneapolis in 2020, or 2021, or 2022, or 2023 on and on as cops keep killing people and sending out the riot squad to quell unrest.
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Edited by zooterkin: 
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Edited for rule 0 and rule 12.
 
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JoeMorgue said:
Edited by zooterkin: 
<SNIP>
Edited for rule 0 and rule 12.
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Is it really that out of line though? I mean, objectively.

Polling after the Floyd murder showed that a slim majority of Americans felt that torching the police precinct was at least partially justified.

The notion that we must respond to these heinous acts of barbarity impartially is one that is increasingly unpopular.
 
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I'd expect there are very specific rules on drawing guns. I'd expect it's something like: routine stop - guns must not be drawn. Report of violent crime, or warrant for violent crime - guns must be drawn, and even things like one of the cops draws taser instead of gun. I'd expect individual cops do not decide things like this, they just follow procedures.
But that's just what I'd expect ..
 
OK, maybe this is a "chick" thing? I remember back in the day, E-Baum's World had a video of several LEO's with a suspect on the ground (can't remember if he was handcuffed) and a Female Officer almost shooting him in the head when her sidearm accidentally discharged as she was pulling the gun out of the holster. And then Amber Guyger. And now this incident! Well, that's three!
 
SuburbanTurkey said:
Is it really that out of line though? I mean, objectively.

Polling after the Floyd murder showed that a slim majority of Americans felt that torching the police precinct was at least partially justified.

The notion that we must respond to these heinous acts of barbarity impartially is one that is increasingly unpopular.
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Yeah, Americans just love torches. Also looting store or two, just so the justice is served. :rolleyes:
 
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