Sorry, but the idiot with the sword was the one who put everyone at risk. Why you don't support the action of the police who tried to minimise the risk is beyond me.
I've made my point, so that's it for this thread for me.
When are police killings justified?
- Thread starter lionking
- Start date
Sorry, but the idiot with the sword was the one who put everyone at risk. Why you don't support the action of the police who tried to minimise the risk is beyond me.
I've made my point, so that's it for this thread for me.
What I am saying is that dealing with a lunatic with a sword in a quiet residential area is different from dealing with one in a busy, inner urban area. You think otherwise?
Of course the swordsman was putting people at risk and the police had to take action and it may have been under some circumstances the only appropriate action was to shoot the swordsman dead. However in this particular instance the police officer's actions not only increased the risk to himself, his partner and the public but also meant he had to shoot the swordsman.
I would support a police officer who tried to minimize the risk even if it meant they had to kill someone however in this instance that is not what happened.
The police officer did not minimize the risk, he actually increased the risk. Having a police officer that will put himself and his partner and the public more at risk because he did follow his training is not a good thing.
ponderingturtle
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Do we have any more real information, or are we all just arguing hypotheticals?
My comments are based on what is in the reports, of course if there are additional facts or the reports are shown to be erroneous my conclusions may change.
Careyp74
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I said:
"Basically, from what the coroner said, he was wrong to get out of the car. "
Perhaps the issue with safety was not that he had gotten out of the car, but that he got out alone. From the article:
Sgt Cahir had got out of his police car to confront Biggs, leaving Leading Senior Constable John Hawkins inside.
Ms Jamieson said Sgt Cahir did not follow operational safety procedures, placing himself and his junior at risk.
The coroner said that once Sgt Cahir decided to go it alone, he was left with only enough time to defend his own life and had no choice but to fire.
"Sgt Cahir created the scenario which led to Mr Biggs' death when he single-handedly confronted Mr Biggs, a man armed with weapons in a busy residential area, acting in a dangerous, violent and irrational manner," she said.
"Basically, from what the coroner said, he was wrong to get out of the car. "
Perhaps the issue with safety was not that he had gotten out of the car, but that he got out alone. From the article:
Sgt Cahir had got out of his police car to confront Biggs, leaving Leading Senior Constable John Hawkins inside.
Ms Jamieson said Sgt Cahir did not follow operational safety procedures, placing himself and his junior at risk.
The coroner said that once Sgt Cahir decided to go it alone, he was left with only enough time to defend his own life and had no choice but to fire.
"Sgt Cahir created the scenario which led to Mr Biggs' death when he single-handedly confronted Mr Biggs, a man armed with weapons in a busy residential area, acting in a dangerous, violent and irrational manner," she said.
Careyp74
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What court decided this? Wait a minute. Can someone give me the definition of "Coroner" as used in these articles? Is that what we here in the states call a judge?
BTW, We don't know for sure that anyone judicial is blaming Biggs, all we know is that the police should have tasers, and anything else could be speculation on the reporter's part.
Yes we do - the coroner is. (And the coroner did not say that the police should have tasers.)
ETA: Guide to Aussie Coroners' Courts: http://www.apla.com.au/legal/coroner.php
Kevin_Lowe
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ponderingturtle
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It seems to be mostly people reading in what they want to see in the reports with out significant evidence either way.
Well I've tried not to do that, and if I have done so I am ready to be corrected.
The most worrying aspect of this thread is that, in the main, those who are PRO the police action refuse to or are incapable of understanding the (admittedly scant) the report. Darat has had to consistently reference previous posts and often ask the poster to actually read the reports
Not so much as a "book 'em Dano" more of a "shoot 'em and we'll sort it out later" scenario.
Not so much as a "book 'em Dano" more of a "shoot 'em and we'll sort it out later" scenario.
staunch
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You are misquoting or you don't understand what the standards of of deadly force is. You lack a legal understanding of the law. Police officer's do not have a license to kill. I have explained in an earlier post, police in a deadly force situation will use a gun to stop a suspect. They shoot to stop.
Reasonable force is the amount of force that a reasonable person would use under similar circumstances. For example, if an officer is attempting to arrest an unarmed suspect who refuses to physically comply, it may be considered reasonable for the officer to use a taser or pepper spray to force the suspect into compliance.
One of the obvious problems created by a reasonableness standard is determining the appropriate level of reasonableness. I can only guess that reasonableness is a mental state, what the officer believes is reasonable at any given time.
Police may use only that force which is both reasonable and necessary to effect an arrest there are three circumstances when an officer can use deadly force: first, when the officer is threatened with a deadly weapon; second, when the officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect poses a threat of serious physical harm or death to the officer or to another; third, when the officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect has committed a crime involving threatened or actual serious physical harm or death to another person.
WildCat
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Maybe that's because the title of the thread bears no resemblance to what is actually in the report?
And we're told to stick to the topic...
Kevin_Lowe
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Arguably I should have been precise in my use of words to head this off, but in any case we can replace "kill" with "use deadly force on" and my position stands. In other words, you're hunting for nits to pick on so you can find something to be right about, even if those nits are meaningless.
So make that: There have to be reasonable limits on the extent to which police officers are allowed to use deadly force on citizens in order to ensure their own safety. It doesn't seem reasonable to me to say "I had no choice but to use deadly force on that guy - if I didn't use deadly force on him, there was at least a one in a million chance he could have used deadly force on me if he wanted to! It could even have been higher than one in a million - can you prove otherwise?".
For those who have trouble tracking threads, I should probably emphasise that the above post was not written as a criticism of the actual cop in the actual story. It was written before we had found details of the actual scenario, and referred to a hypothetical case where a police officer felt obliged to shoot someone with samurai swords twenty feet away on the basis that there might be a car crash or something that distracted the police officer long enough for the sword guy to throw his sword like in the movies and instantly kill the cop.