The Seattle police have another controversial shooting on their hands. In this case a man was sitting on a fence and whittling what looked like a wooden doll’s head. A police officer stopped and demanded to know what he was doing. According to an eyewitness, the man stood up and walked toward the officer despite demands that he stop. He was then shot and killed about 4:15 p.m.
A witness Court Roberson said that he witnessed the police shoot the man four or five times.
Source: KIRO
Radley Balko links to this MSNBC report stating that the whittling man was Native American, had a legal to carry knife, was deaf in one ear and was shot in the back and side. Looks more and more as if the cop was implementing the SeattSeattle’s ethnic and social hygiene policy.
Cops in the twin cities (MN) shot and killed a naked man last year. Another MN cop recently killed man dressed in a speedos-type bathing suit (no place to conceal a weapon there) after pulling him over for driving a few miles over the limit. Cop said he had to cuz the guy was trying to kill him with his (the cop’s) gun. Now how the cop let that happen is beyond me. Besides the cop was off duty in his own car and chased down the man who probalbly thought the non-uniformed cop was some kind of nut job.
W=c,
You’re welcome.
And thank you for the wonderful link. What interesting art!
http://koikoikoi.com/2010/08/micro-sculptures-by-dalton-ghetti/
“Fear of a knife when armed with a gun and at a distance is irrational.”~BIL
Thank you for being a rational soul.
“Again, the police officer probably did place himself in a really dicey situation by needlessly harassing a man who was not causing any problems. He needlessly started a interaction with an attitude that was reckless and belligerent. ”
This sort of interaction happens a lot methinks, and I wonder that whittling mans apparent homelessness and vulnerability made him an easy target for that sort of treatment. If so, then big ick factor…
First I will stipulate that police training is a form of martial arts training.
Do the words “disproportionate response” ring a bell?
He shot the guy 5 times.
Once was enough and need not have been a kill shot.
One is trained to act rationally under pressure as this is the point of learning any martial art – armed or open handed – to not let your emotions dictate your reactions and to resolve the conflict with the minimal amount of force required. In short, to control not just yourself, but the situation.
Fear of a knife when armed with a gun and at a distance is irrational. Outside arms length, the gun always has the superior advantage. Even inside reach it’s still the dominate weapon although the probability of proper use changes based upon the skill of your attacker.
In the confines of deadly force, he acted stupidly and disproportionately.
Other than that, you’re almost right.
The comment stream is exactly what one would expect from a bunch of lawyers trying to be arm-chair police officers. Not a one here seems to have a clue about rules for deadly force.
The police officer was responding to a threat. The man had a knife, that is a deadly weapon. He attempted to defuse the situation by verbal command, but the man with the knife did not comply.
At that point he used deadly force to prevent harm to himself from a man who’s intentions appeared to be hostile. Once engaged he followed his (perhaps poor training) and shot at the center of mass to end the physical threat to his person.,
We can argue that the Police officer should had never gotten himself into a situation where deadly force is needed. After all whittling is not a crime; not even in Seattle.
But once that whittling man started approaching the Police officer with a weapon, it was game on. The Police officer was unable to determine the whittling man’s intentions. Unfortunately, many homeless persons (if this was a homeless person) are mentally unstable, and the Police Officer has a short time to discern what might be going on in a malfunctioning mind. For all the police officer knows, he is now up against a man who has suffered a psychotic break. With hindsight you might see a totally innocent man who is just trying to engage the officer in conversation. What the police officer may have seen through the fog of adrenaline, is a crazy man on a mission to perforate him multiple times with a knife.
Again, the police officer probably did place himself in a really dicey situation by needlessly harassing a man who was not causing any problems. He needlessly started a interaction with an attitude that was reckless and belligerent. That initial interaction quickly deteriorated to a point where he was forced to make split second decisions that ended at point where deadly force was enacted.
Once the weapon was up and barking, fear and adrenaline took over. The officer just kept shooting until his target was well and fully down. Five shots fired in such a situation, while perhaps excessive, are not uncommon. It is not uncommon for entire clips of semi-automatic handguns to be emptied in such a event.
Not being a lawyer nor even playing one on T.V., I will not even guess how this event will play out in wild, wacky and weird land of Tort law. It would probably be a good idea that the shooter be encouraged to find new avenues of employment; he just does not appear to have the skill sets to be a good police officer.
But in the narrow confines of deadly force, and this does hurt, he acted correctly. He gave a verbal order to comply, to put down a weapon, the whittler did not comply, the officer felt in danger for his life, he shot what he thought was an assailant, as trained, in the center of mass. You do not shoot a leg or an arm, those targets are too small for a sucessfull hit. Once deadly force is activated, what is required is to kill or grievously wound your assailant. Once the weapon is drawn, you shoot to kill; period.
In the continuum that is difference between evil and stupid, my best guess is that the police officer was very stupid; perhaps criminally. Not that there is much of chance of a Jury finding him so. With the strangle hold most Police Unions have, there is good chance the officer may even get to keep his job. The best that can come out of this is that good citizens of Seattle demand a little more professionalism out of the men and women in blue. Maybe a review of appropriate interactions with the civilian population, and the ground rules for deadly force as a beginning of the refresher course all police officers in Seattle? One can hope.
If this was Chicago they’d find nothing wrong even after paying out millions of dollars in lawsuits.
QUOTE “Two civil juries have recently awarded multimillion-dollar settlements to men who said the police had abused them. The department will pay $4 million to one, Coprez Coffie, who testified that he was sodomized with a screwdriver. A jury awarded the other man, Timothy Finwall, $2 million for being framed and falsely arrested.
Jon Loevy, whose law firm represented the men, said the Police Department had shown no interest in dealing with the problem, noting that internal reviews had found no wrongdoing or need for disciplinary action in either case.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/us/26chicago.html
what the main stream media needs to be talking about is the fact that the bilderbergers say that 6,000,000 people have to die because WERE USING UP THEIR EARTHLY RESOURCES!the police are killing any and everyone these days.
It is quite likely that the whittling man did not understand what the cop was shouting and approached so that he could hear clearly or to ask “what is that you are saying?”.
The fact that the policeman pumped not one but five bullets into the man’s chest is a pretty good indication that he did not want to leave the man alive to contradict his story.
The USA is a police state. US police believe that they are entitled to bark orders at people and expect the people to comply instantly as with military discipline. As well a large proportion of the US population as indicated by comments on newspapers sites following articles on such issues support the police and their assumption. This means that people who fail to hear or fail to understand or who are outraged by the authoritarian behaviour of the police and react against it or try to explain that the police have jumped to an invalid conclusion are in danger.
Perhaps a concerted multi-language advertising campaign is needed to inform people who think they have rights or react badly to bullying the correct way to submit when a cop shouts at them.
We have an interesting mirror image to this case in Turley’s Torts class coming up. In Courvoisier v. Raymond, a jeweler’s store was attacked at night by a gang throwing stones and brickbats. The jeweler tried to frighten them off by shooting in the air. A deputy heard the shot and approached the store owner, saying he was an officer, but the store owner thought the deputy was one of the gang and shot him (he survived). The deputy sued, and the court found that the store owner could have reasonably thought he was acting in self defense; it would be up to a jury to decide.
No, they didn’t have to kill him. They chose to kill him.
You never hear about officers shooting someone in the leg to disable them anymore. No gun was visible. Why shoot-to-kill? Disabling a suspect used to be common practice. Now, it’s always shoot to kill. Why? Does it make the post-shooting internal investigation go more smoothly? Less hassle with risk management settling claims by victims?
The elected officials who are elected to exercise OVERSIGHT over the agencies, departments and organizations that they fund better start asking some serious questions of leaders in law enforcement. It is their responsibility and obligation. The constant refrain of “we don’t question law enforcement” has got to go. It is the easy way out and it is jeopardizing Americans’ safety.
Violent crimes aren’t that common in Seattle, but lately almost every time we hear of one on the news it’s been committed by a cop. There’s something just not right about that.
>A witness Court Roberson said that he witnessed the police shoot the man four or five times.
The unidentified man in the video(claimed to be a witness) said “they didn’t have to blast him in the chest six times.
Also, beware next time you eat a steak or any other knife-requiring food al fresco
I think Scandinavia looks nice. I enjoyed living in the US when it was an actual democracy…or at least a potential one. How do I get my ticket?
Are you sure he was not on the hit list?
This is a pretty common practice in Seattle.
Seattle Police has a history of shooting
disturbed, homeless men. Here we have
another poorly trained and ill-thoughtful
cop trying to ‘look-big’, followed-up by
a stupid response. This cop could have
handled the situation much differently-
The friend appeared to be a homeless person. Was the victim also homeless? Are police officers aware that some people are hard of hearing, or maybe even deaf? I know if I was outside in a traffic area, I’d have a difficult time hearing.
Are we now required to lay down on the ground so a cop will feel ‘safe’ to approach? I know cops have a difficult job, but can’t they use a little common sense? Shoot to kill and when someone protests, cuff ’em and cart them away.
Sounds to me like the cop provoked a crime scene and then acted it out. I don’t understand how the cop failed to see that the guy was sitting on a fence using his knife to whittle. Its not like the whittler was engaging anyone else with the knife. Since when is it a crime to have an exposed knife in public. The victim was probably just walking over to the cop to show him what he was doing with the knife, never expecting to be shot. Over reaction r what? Sad.