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Police Shoot Man Attempting Suicide

subgenius

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FORT WORTH - Police are investigating whether two officers violated department policy when they shot a man twice in the shoulder to stop him from repeatedly stabbing himself in the stomach and chest.
....

Police Chief Ralph Mendoza and Lt. Jesse Hernandez, a police spokesman, said they did not know whether shooting a man attempting to commit suicide is an issue addressed in the department's general orders.

"It is concerning, and we are going to have to look at that aspect of it in regards to whether they were authorized to use that type of deadly force in that situation," Mendoza said.

http://www.dfw.com/mld/startelegram/news/local/6875563.htm

Rather ironic. Using deadly force to stop a suicide.
 
subgenius said:
FORT WORTH - Police are investigating whether two officers violated department policy when they shot a man twice in the shoulder to stop him from repeatedly stabbing himself in the stomach and chest.
....

Police Chief Ralph Mendoza and Lt. Jesse Hernandez, a police spokesman, said they did not know whether shooting a man attempting to commit suicide is an issue addressed in the department's general orders.

"It is concerning, and we are going to have to look at that aspect of it in regards to whether they were authorized to use that type of deadly force in that situation," Mendoza said.

http://www.dfw.com/mld/startelegram/news/local/6875563.htm
Rather ironic. Using deadly force to stop a suicide.
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Another case of truth imitating art, in this case
A Funny Thing Happened On the Way To the Forum

Hero: I'll commit suicide
Pseudolus: Can't commit suicide. It's illegal. The punishment's death.
Click to expand...
 
It was a tough call for the cops. They would have been pilloried if they stood around and let the guy stab himself to death. It would have been foolish to attempt to physically restrain him. They had tried every other method to stop him. I guess shooting him in the shoulder was the best option.
 
Bamboozlers to the rescue!

If only the Yellow Bamboozlers were there! They could've stopped him with their yell/tazer combo.:p

And why didn't the police have a tazer? That's inexcusable.
 
Re: Bamboozlers to the rescue!

Hand Bent Spoon said:
And why didn't the police have a tazer? That's inexcusable.
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Police in the US don't necessarily carry non-lethal weapons. I'm a little hazy on why, but I think it's partially due to tradition, partially due to cost, and partially due to the fear that given non-lethal options they're likely to use it more often. Why try to talk a guy down when you can just zap him?

That being said, I think it makes a lot of sense to give cops some more options in this sort of situation. None of the current tech makes it to the "phaser set on stun" that would be perfect, but some of the pepper gun, taser, and stun gun options seem good enough to start trying out. Of course, even if they started deploying it nationally it'd take decades for it to filter into all the local PDs in the country.

Others likely know more, my knowledge comes largely from some History/Discovery channel shows on "less-lethal" weapons.
 
Well, why not? If the police had happened on a man stabbing another man, they would have been justified in most people's eyes for shooting the knife wielder.
 
"Hepatitis C causes inflammation of the liver, which can lead to cirrhosis, liver cancer and liver failure. About 3.9 million Americans have the disease. Anti-viral drugs are a standard treatment, and therapy is successful about half the time.

But Anderson isn't taking interferon, the injectable drug hepatitis patients often use. Her homeopathic doctor, Wendy Hewland, tells the magazine she "made a single remedy specifically for Pam" that Anderson is using as an alternative form of medicine."
http://entertainment.msn.com/news/article.aspx?news=138109

This is probably good fodder for a new thread but Pam Anderson is killing herself slowly by refusing real treatment for her hepatitis.
Guess the police would not be justified in shooting her at this point.
Sure wish they would prosecute the "homeopathic doctor."
 
Sounds quite ironic, at first, this event. But it seems to me they did the right thing, when considering the other options. They probably saved his life by shooting him.
 
if you read the article, you will see that the police did spray him with pepper spray. less than lethal means were tried.
 
subgenius said:
"Hepatitis C causes inflammation of the liver, which can lead to cirrhosis, liver cancer and liver failure. About 3.9 million Americans have the disease. Anti-viral drugs are a standard treatment, and therapy is successful about half the time.

But Anderson isn't taking interferon, the injectable drug hepatitis patients often use. Her homeopathic doctor, Wendy Hewland, tells the magazine she "made a single remedy specifically for Pam" that Anderson is using as an alternative form of medicine."
http://entertainment.msn.com/news/article.aspx?news=138109

This is probably good fodder for a new thread but Pam Anderson is killing herself slowly by refusing real treatment for her hepatitis.
Guess the police would not be justified in shooting her at this point.
Sure wish they would prosecute the "homeopathic doctor."
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I'm going to take a wild guess that you posted this in the wrong thread. :D
 
EdipisReks said:
if you read the article, you will see that the police did spray him with pepper spray. less than lethal means were tried.
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Er... yeah... I never post without reading the article... really...

The officers attempted to stop Torres, first verbally and then by spraying him with pepper spray, but the man became more agitated, stabbing himself with more vigor, police said.

"He never harmed anybody else," Hernandez said. "In terms of threatening them, I don't know."

Hernandez said the officers did not have a Taser, an electronic shocking device used as an alternative to deadly force.
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Um... nevermind...

:D
 
This is probably good fodder for a new thread but Pam Anderson is killing herself slowly by refusing real treatment for her hepatitis.
Guess the police would not be justified in shooting her at this point.
Sure wish they would prosecute the "homeopathic doctor."
Click to expand...
Try the pepper spray first.










On the homeopathic doctor.
 
I keep seeing more and more evidence that most Americans despise the act known as suicide.

The argument I hear against it is ridiculous. The general argument is that it is evil because your friends and family members never get to socialize with you anymore. It's noteworthy that we also don't get to socialize with a person anymore when he or she moves far away to some other country and doesn't make any attempt to contact us.
 
As far as I'm concerned, suicide is a right just like any other. You have the right to live, so why not the right to die? I don't think, however, that that gives you the right to disrupt other people's lives. If you want to commit suicide, do so quietly. That's all I have to say.
 
plindboe said:
Sounds quite ironic, at first, this event. But it seems to me they did the right thing, when considering the other options. They probably saved his life by shooting him.
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It IS ironic. They shot the guy and basically risked his life (i.e. missing and hitting vital organs) to stop him from committing suicide. Other possibilities are missing the guy completely and hitting a bystander.
 
Prospero said:
As far as I'm concerned, suicide is a right just like any other. You have the right to live, so why not the right to die? I don't think, however, that that gives you the right to disrupt other people's lives. If you want to commit suicide, do so quietly. That's all I have to say.
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I think most of us agree here. The problem with the "self stabber" is that he is obviously crazy, and a crazy person with a knife is a very real danger to the public, especially if some well-intentioned person tried to stop him.

However, when I see someone in a deep depression who is talking about suicide, I will try to talk them out of it, as I don't believe that most suicidal people are rational. However, if they were determined to carry it out, I probably would not physically intervene.

But it does bring up an interesting question. If discovered someone you love planning, or in the midst of committing suicide, would you stop them? How far would you go?
 
JAR said:
I keep seeing more and more evidence that most Americans despise the act known as suicide.

The argument I hear against it is ridiculous. The general argument is that it is evil because your friends and family members never get to socialize with you anymore. It's noteworthy that we also don't get to socialize with a person anymore when he or she moves far away to some other country and doesn't make any attempt to contact us.
Click to expand...

The religious loonies hate it I suspect most Americans support it.
 
panduh said:


Other possibilities are missing the guy completely and hitting a bystander.
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If you read the article the shooting took place inside an apartment, so I'm not sure that was a real issue here.
 
Tricky said:




But it does bring up an interesting question. If discovered someone you love planning, or in the midst of committing suicide, would you stop them? How far would you go?
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I would go as far as i reasonably could to stop anyone killing themselves. I believe in the intrinsic value of human life, and that everything should be done to preserve it.

If there was even the slightest chance that in the cold light of day a person might regret their actions i would consider it an obligation to physically intervene.
 
Tricky touched on an issue that was/is a legal issue here in Michigan: is suicide ever a rational act? I'm not sure how the courts ended up on it, not that a legal determination has much to do with the science of it. I think it can be.
It is usually, however, a permanent solution to a temporary problem.
 
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