Police Shooting Frenzy Raises Concerns

[The Norseman]

LEO's everywhere tend to take it personal when someone shoots at them.

They're supposedly ********** professionals and they need to act like ******** professionals instead of immature children who can't handle the job they've supposedly been trained for. This behavior is absolutely disgusting. I have no words to express the level of contempt I have for these "officers of the law".

 

[jimbob]

However it is better if the innocent inhabitants of the neighbourhood are not shot because the suspects car crashed into a local garden.

I'd also go out on a limb and say that shooting other police officers whilst trying to shoot a suspect is bad form.

or what The Norseman and 3point14 said

 

[ponderingturtle]

It's been my experience in speaking with officers after OIS incidents that they are unable to determine immediately that they've stopped a threat until the threat goes down.

Many officers and others have been conditioned by a lifetime of popular fiction depiction that when an individual is hit by gunfire the individual has an immediate and dramatic reaction to the impact - in the real world experience the officer fires his weapon, sees no reaction from the target, and proceeds as if their fire is ineffective and will continue to fire until they observe the target go down.

After the fact the post mortem examination shows that the subject was hit multiple times, with several individual wounds that in themselves would have caused the death of the subject.

In this particular example, the subjects were inside a vehicle and that could easily lead to confusion as to the effectiveness of their fire - standard issue pistol rounds in any of the popular issue calibers aren't the best choice for effectiveness after having penetrated vehicle body parts or auto glass. It could well be that no officer had good eyes on the interior and they went for quantity of fire over quality.

The loss of life of the uninvolved passenger isn't a good outcome, and the fact that no weapon was found on the scene is going to figure into the sure to come civil actions, but this shooting doesn't sound so out-of-character given that the suspect had fired on another officer earlier.

LEO's everywhere tend to take it personal when someone shoots at them.

Look on the bright side at least this time the people being shot at had actually done something wrong hang were not just delivering newspapers. So view this as an improvement.

 

[a_unique_person]

http://miami.cbslocal.com/2014/05/06/police-shooting-frenzy-raises-concerns/

Apparently, 23 officers fired a total of ~377 rounds at one car with 2 unarmed men in it, one of whom was not a criminal...

Sheesh!

Had they just been watching Bonnie and Clyde?

 

[newyorkguy]

It's generally accepted that in shooting at LEO's, the shooter is going to come to a bad end...

This suspect did more than just shoot at a police officer. From the OP:

Earlier that night, the driver of the Volvo, Adrian Montesano, robbed a Walgreens at gunpoint, and then later shot Miami Dade Police Officer Saul Rodriguez in a nearby trailer park. Montesano escaped in the officer’s patrol car eventually dumping it at his grandmother’s house in Hialeah – before fleeing in her blue Volvo. By 5 am every cop in South Florida was looking for that blue Volvo.

Not to defend the police action: it was bad, very bad.

 

[rcfieldz]

Volvo Town

When did thugs start driving Volvos? Maybe it's s Miami thing?

 

[Bob001]

.....

The loss of life of the uninvolved passenger isn't a good outcome, and the fact that no weapon was found on the scene is going to figure into the sure to come civil actions, but this shooting doesn't sound so out-of-character given that the suspect had fired on another officer earlier.

LEO's everywhere tend to take it personal when someone shoots at them.

Is this a joke? Or is this an illustration why many people hate cops? Let's note what actually happened:

MIAMI (CBSMiami) – On December 10, more than two dozen police officers from across Miami Dade County converged on a blue Volvo that had crashed in the backyard of a townhouse on 65th Street just off 27th Avenue.

As the car was wedged helplessly between a light pole and a tree, nearly a minute passed before officers opened up – firing approximately 50 bullets at the car and the two unarmed men inside the vehicle.

The two men inside the car survived that initial volley of gunfire, according to witnesses, who said they could see the men moving inside the Volvo. Everything went quiet for nearly two minutes before the officers opened up a second time – unleashing an unrelenting torrent of bullets that lasted almost 25 seconds. By the time it was over, the two men inside the car were dead.

CBS4 News has learned a total of 23 officers fired a total of at least 377 rounds.

Bullets were sprayed everywhere. They hit the Volvo, other cars in the lot, fence posts and neighboring businesses. They blasted holes in a townhouse where a 12-year-old dove to the ground for cover and a four month old slept in his crib
....
http://miami.cbslocal.com/2014/05/06/police-shooting-frenzy-raises-concerns/

The car was immobile and surrounded. The cops could have waited the driver and passenger out from a safe position, which is what dispatchers and supervisors were ordering them to do. If they didn't surrender immediately it might have been because they weren't even conscious after the crash. This is murder, pure and simple, and it's absolutely indefensible.

 

[BStrong]

LEO's don't receive training for high-stress situations?

They absolutely do, and they're absolutely human.

I'm not making any excuses for excessive force or for the unlawful use of force (at any level from simply physical restraining to lethal) but even LEO's actions in the heat of the moment are viewed through the "reasonable man" standard:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_person

Does that mean a LEO can observe an individual spit on the sidewalk and empty a few magazines full on them and not face prosecution?

No.

Does that mean that in the aftermath of an incident where a suspect fires on an officer or when an officer is actually involved in actively defending themselves from lethal attack and the after-the-fact examination of the situation calls into question the actions of the officer(s) involved they are expected to err on the side of caution rather than their survival?

No.

 

[newyorkguy]

When did thugs start driving Volvos? Maybe it's s Miami thing?

He stole the Volvo from his Granma, probably the best he could do on short notice. I agree; it's probably a violation of gangster chic.

 

[newyorkguy]

LEO's don't receive training for high-stress situations?

They absolutely do, and they're absolutely human...

Being that these were, presumably, street cops, I have a suspicion they probably don't care what the general public (possibly even their bosses) thinks. This was street justice. This man shot an officer and then stole his patrol car. In many big cities if you do something like that the police will probably use deadly force on you if they can. The Miami cops probably care mostly that the criminal community in Miami get the message: you do something like this to us, you're dead bro.

I lived in a very tough neighborhood in New York City. East Harlem. Some of the guys I knew were literally career street criminals. They told me that in New York City there is an unwritten law: A police officer tells you to stop and you run. If that police officer catches you, you get a beating. Because you ran. The thugs didn't see this as a violation of civil rights. They accepted it as street justice. When I said I didn't think it was right the thugs laughed. They said, "Come on man, police got to do what they got to do. There's a lot of bad people out here, people that want to hurt them."

However, I agree in this case the reaction was so extreme that the officers should be seriously disciplined. It sounds like they put innocent lives at risk. That's not acceptable.

 

[jimbob]

Being that these were, presumably, street cops, I have a suspicion they probably don't care what the general public (possibly even their bosses) thinks. This was street justice. This man shot an officer and then stole his patrol car. In many big cities if you do something like that the police will probably use deadly force on you if they can. The Miami cops probably care mostly that the criminal community in Miami get the message: you do something like this to us, you're dead bro.

I lived in a very tough neighborhood in New York City. East Harlem. Some of the guys I knew were literally career street criminals. They told me that in New York City there is an unwritten law: A police officer tells you to stop and you run. If that police officer catches you, you get a beating. Because you ran. The thugs didn't see this as a violation of civil rights. They accepted it as street justice. When I said I didn't think it was right the thugs laughed. They said, "Come on man, police got to do what they got to do. There's a lot of bad people out here, people that want to hurt them."

However, I agree in this case the reaction was so extreme that the officers should be seriously disciplined. It sounds like they put innocent lives at risk. That's not acceptable.

They also put the lives of their colleagues at risk.

 

[Bob001]

.....
Does that mean that in the aftermath of an incident where a suspect fires on an officer or when an officer is actually involved in actively defending themselves from lethal attack and the after-the-fact examination of the situation calls into question the actions of the officer(s) involved they are expected to err on the side of caution rather than their survival?

No.

But they weren't defending themselves. The people in the car weren't attacking anybody and were trapped in a crashed car. The cops' bosses were ordering them to wait for HRT. On the video a witness says he saw a one guy put his hands up. Some of the cops were actually shooting at each other. Dumb killer cops are a threat to all our lives.

 

[BStrong]

Is this a joke? Or is this an illustration why many people hate cops? Let's note what actually happened:



The car was immobile and surrounded. The cops could have waited the driver and passenger out from a safe position, which is what dispatchers and supervisors were ordering them to do. If they didn't surrender immediately it might have been because they weren't even conscious after the crash. This is murder, pure and simple, and it's absolutely indefensible.

In reading the account from the CBS station they stated the investigation "will take years" which doesn't sound that far out of line given all the individual officers and different agencies involved.

I'm interested in how you can read one account of the incident and bypass any investigation of the facts and come to the conclusion the it's " murder, pure and simple."

It isn't the best day for any of the officers involved or the uninvolved passenger or the individuals in the neighborhood where the shooting took place and it's also not a good day for the officer shot and wounded in the original criminal act.

This incident didn't occur in a vacuum of pure black and white. The many moving parts involved and the threat of continued violence (the CBS report stated that dispatchers continually noted that the suspect was considered "A & D") pretty much predetermined what the final act was going to be. Not much different from this incident:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Dorner

If the CBS report is taken at face value, there were failures at just about every level in the agencies involved and (again not defending the actions, just noting the reality of the situation) the incident will be investigated and if criminal charges are warranted they'll be filed.

The easiest thing in the world is for folks that haven't ever in their life been trained for or involved with the same or similar incidents and make judgements about the actions of others from the safety of time, distance and absence of the totality of the facts.

I'm waiting on a definitive report before I take out the lynching rope.

 

[BStrong]

They also put the lives of their colleagues at risk.

Anytime you mix weapons and fear and adrenaline, mistakes get made. It's not unique to LEO's.

 

[Bob001]

I
.....
I'm interested in how you can read one account of the incident and bypass any investigation of the facts and come to the conclusion the it's " murder, pure and simple."
....

The car was crashed and immobile, and the occupants were trapped inside. The occupants were not shooting at anybody (and subsequently were determined not to be armed). The police on the scene were not under any immediate threat. Their supervisors were telling them to establish a perimeter and wait for SRT. Killing somebody without good cause is murder.

The video has information, including witness accounts, that isn't in the story. And even the story notes that one witness says the occupants were raising their hands, and the cops on the scene were laughing after the killing. Cops don't get to execute people even when they're mad and even when they're scared.

For more about our brave men in blue, read this:
http://www.cnn.com/2014/04/10/justice/albuquerque-police-brutality-report/

 

[newyorkguy]

These kinds of incidents though not common are not unheard of. When you get a large group of LEOs facing a suspect considered armed and dangerous, one that has already shot an officer, everyone is on edge. It's the fog of combat.

In a similar incident in the Bronx a number of years ago several officers opened fire on a subject who turned out to be unarmed. Two or three of the officers when asked why they began firing said it was because the "other officer" had started firing. They presumed that meant he was being shot at so they joined him in answering back. It's partially a psychological response and it's easy to have it happen in the heat of the moment. Another factor is the weaponry police officers carry these days. They can fire a lot of rounds in a very short amount of time. If you have twenty-three officers firing you are going to get a lot of shots fired in a very short time period.

Another problem with a fast moving incident like this one is, a suspect may be confronted by officers before any supervision arrives on scene. Cops are like anyone else, they need supervision.

Again, apparently the officers have not been disciplined and I think they should be. Sound like there were too many shots fired that were way off the mark. It sounds like at least some shots were fired wildly and that can't be acceptable behavior for anyone.

 

[BStrong]

But they weren't defending themselves. The people in the car weren't attacking anybody and were trapped in a crashed car. The cops' bosses were ordering them to wait for HRT. On the video a witness says he saw a one guy put his hands up. Some of the cops were actually shooting at each other. Dumb killer cops are a threat to all our lives.

You're taking one report as definitive, and not even what would constitute an official report - might want to keep the incident in mind and wait to see what the state AG comes up with before making a decision.

The CBS report stated that dispatch repeatedly noted that the driver was considered to be "armed and dangerous" and in general such cases (even cases not involving someone that has shot at officers) LEO's are not expected by agency policy (in my experience) to wait until they're under fire to use lethal force - suspect considered to be A & D doesn't immediately submit to arrest and follow verbal orders from the officers involved and makes (just about any) a move that the officer(s) interprets as threatening and the officer involved then uses force to stop the suspect or effect an arrest that force use would probably be within agency policy and be legally justifiable.

In the incident we're discussing, I have no doubt that there will be so many lawsuits filed that it's going to look like a snowstorm of paper, and in all likelihood if criminal charges are warranted the officers involved will face same and other officers or supervisors may be dismissed from their respective agencies.

None of us posting in this thread know all the facts wrt this particular case, and all I've done here is try to explain how agencies and individuals usually proceed in instances such as this. How someone could view it as defending the alleged actions I don't know, but understanding something and believing that it's a good outcome can be two entirely different things and in this incident for that's the reality for me - I trained a lot of officers over the years and incidents like this are one of my worst nightmares.

The fact that to me it's a nightmare doesn't mean I don't understand how it can happen.

 

[Bob001]

.....
The CBS report stated that dispatch repeatedly noted that the driver was considered to be "armed and dangerous" and in general such cases (even cases not involving someone that has shot at officers) LEO's are not expected by agency policy (in my experience) to wait until they're under fire to use lethal force - suspect considered to be A & D doesn't immediately submit to arrest and follow verbal orders from the officers involved and makes (just about any) a move that the officer(s) interprets as threatening and the officer involved then uses force to stop the suspect or effect an arrest that force use would probably be within agency policy and be legally justifiable.
.....

So if the occupants were raising their hands or just looking around to see what was happening, that would be reason to kill them? Nobody expects cops to be targets. But in this case the police were in a position to take cover safely and wait -- wait to understand the situation, wait for the occupants to give up, wait for SRT to arrive.

And CBS says their investigation took five months. They talked to a lot of people. They have videos from the scene. The authorities have every incentive to cover this up. I'd believe CBS before I'd believe the cops claiming that they were "within agency policy."

 

[ponderingturtle]

So when will the officers who shot other officers get gunned down? #Streetjustice

 

[newyorkguy]

I'm posting this primarily for B. Strong because I think he might find it interesting.

I have a relative who is an NYPD detective. He worked a homicide unit for a number of years and was also occasionally "loaned out" to Internal Affairs. I don't remember who he was working for in the incident I'm about to relate. It concerns the reliability of eyewitnesses. Who they are and how likely they are to be truthful.

Two officers in a patrol car received a complaint that drugs were being sold in front of an apartment house. As they quietly approached they witnessed what looked like a drug sale. They went after the seller and his partner. Both men ran into a tenement building and escaped (probably by hiding in someone's apartment). When the two officers came out they were confronted at gun point on the sidewalk by a young teenaged boy. They drew their guns and ordered the boy to drop his. The boy refused and taunted the police to, "Shoot me, man. You think you bad, shoot me!" They gave him a final warning and then they did shoot, killing this boy.

In the aftermath the boy's gun disappeared. Witnesses started saying the police shooting was unprovoked, that the boy never had a gun. That the two cops had acted like maniacs. NYPD took this very seriously. My relative was assigned to get statements from some of the witnesses. He said he asked the two people he spoke with to accompany him back to the scene and show him exactly where they were standing when the shots were fired. He said it soon became apparent they hadn't witnessed the shooting at all. They heard shots and heard people on the street saying the boy was unarmed.

Ironically, my relative and his partner broke the case (and both received commendations) with the help of one of the members of the drug operation. They spoke with the man who had essentially been the lookout (he was not one of the two men chased by the patrol officers). He told a different story. He backed up the police version and said the boy had been acting crazy. He also explained how the gun disappeared. He said when the police began firing he dove under a parked car. He heard the boy gasp and a moment later the revolver clattered into the gutter about fifteen feet from where he was lying under a car. He said he saw "a hand reach out" and take the gun. He said he peered out from under the parked car and saw the two cops frantically calling for EMS and checking the boy. For the moment they forgot about the gun. My relative said the lookout could not identify the person who took the gun, he said he only saw a hand. He did agree to repeat his account before a Grand Jury and the two cops were cleared. My relative said the cops were very lucky.