Atlanta shooting

[Pixxie7]

I can’t believe another shooting, so soon. Will this exculpate the protest even more?

I hear what you’re saying, but there is no justification for killing him. The other cops presumably had tasers so could have used that.,

He did, you can see it on his jacket, it’s the yellow piece of equipment.

American police are more aggressive. I dont think anyone argues with that?

And they do not de-escalate. They scream and shout and get everyone hyped up into a panic.

American are allowed to carry firearms; but police are not allowed to kill them if they are not an immediate threat to life. But they do. There is no excuse.

They've gotten complacent. They get away with it, the training the receive is shocking, they can have several complaints in file in regards to aggressive behaviour and excessive force but are still allowed on the streets with firearms. They are trained to think it's ok. It isnt, and their training needs to change.

@bobbydraper I get your point, police should work within the law and they failed to on this occasion, but I wonder how much US police actions are influenced by the right to bear arms? If you are in a tinderbox situation and you know that people routinely carry firearms and someone points a weapon at you, does this influence your response in that split second?
Thousands of people die as a result of gun shot wounds in the US each year and yet the majority of US citizens don't even seem to want gun laws tightened.

My son went through training at a US police academy. He said they were taught to always shoot to kill, not to injure. This is in a state that doesn't allowed either open or concealed carry.

If you are in a tinderbox situation and you know that people routinely carry firearms...

Then you'd expect de-escalation skills to be a core component of their basic training and approach to every situation. Not going in and inflaming everything because they're so drunk on the power of their position.

Even Iran and Saudi Arabia pretend to carry out investigations and trials before conducting public executions.

I am throughly fed up of everyone always saying that they would do better safe in the knowledge that they will likely never be tested on that.

If your response to uncertainty is to carry out public executions then you shouldn't be a police officer.

Some people need higher fucking expectations of their fellow human beings.

The minute her turned round aiming the taser gun at the police - the police had justifiable reason to shoot him. That would have happened if he was white or black.

He was pissed up and fell asleep at the wheel going through a fast food drive through. When the police got there he caught with them and punched one in the face. He then stole the taser and ran off turning round to aim the taser at the chasing police man. He then got shot. It was justifiable shooting from the police. If the police man would have been incapacitated from the taser the man could have taken his gun and turned it on the police man killing him. The police are trained to do this.

user147 You make good points but the suspect here was a panicked drunk trying to get away from the police, not a mad man on the loose. He was running away, not charging them. Yes, he had a taser, but he was unlikely to use it on anyone other than the police, and would likely have abandoned it once he thought he had got away.

@charlestonchaplin

user147 You make good points but the suspect here was a panicked drunk trying to get away from the police, not a mad man on the loose. He was running away, not charging them. Yes, he had a taser, but he was unlikely to use it on anyone other than the police, and would likely have abandoned it once he thought he had got away.

I’ve just watched a video where he clear turns around and aims the taser at the chasing police officer. He was going to taser him

The chasing police officer. Perhaps it would have been more appropriate for the police officers to stop chasing him at that point. Perhaps follow him in their patrol cars at a distance. It isn’t the most clear-cut situation but would British police have called for the firearms police to shoot to kill? My instincts tell me they would have tried harder, a lot harder, to de-escalate the situation, only moving in to shoot when they felt he would pose a danger to the public.

However, America is a different place, and as we have heard from other posters, the emphasis in training is different. They were probably acting according to the culture they’ve been trained in, but it is that which needs to change somewhat. Not every black man is a dangerous gangster who needs to be neutralised ASAP. Then again, maybe they’d do the same to a white man acting the same way.

It's so easy for he war on drugs and the war on crime to become the war on all drug users and the war on all criminals, though. That's why we should be wary of declaring "war" on things. It ends up with the goodies and the baddies and shoot outs and no space for the judicial system or a conversation about social/emotional/racial/economic issues. It becomes clean cut. If you are a soldier (police man) in the war against drugs and crime, then criminals and drug users are the faceless enemy you must shoot to kill. Words have meanings and they are important, calling it war escalated the situation. It's the difference between calling someone a junky or an addict or calling someone a scrounger or a benefit claimant. The words change the outcome of people's responses.

I don’t disagree that the situation should of been able to be handled better and that better training is the way to do so. However, if you can understand the potential reasons for the gentleman’s actions (which is why I wouldn’t condemn him either) then why are some people finding it so difficult to do the same for the cop? I am not defending either as it can be said that they both made choices that put themselves in that situation if you want to go down that route, however I am defending the fact that they are both human who made human choices, not just one of them.

As for the statement that surely the other cop had a taser to use instead, correct me if I’m wrong but didn’t the suspect take it off him? Also why are people automatically assuming that the police would know that the gentleman had no other weapons on him? He hadn’t been able to be apprehended to know this for a certainty.

Apprehending someone in America is a completely different ball game than doing so in Britain when guns are in the mix and this is at the best of times, let alone in this current political climate when some movements are calling for a war of sorts on the police as a whole.

My dad was a policeman many many moons ago. A big, tough ex-army bloke. He responded to a report that the post office in his village had been broken into (back in the days when the village bobby lived in the police station and his wife manned the phones) He went in and was promptly smacked around the head with an iron bar. As he lay bleeding on the floor (he never quite recovered from the injury and was left with half his face paralysed) he told me that if he had been armed he would, in his frightened and pain stricken state, shot the man in the back as he fled.

That is why he has always insisted that the police shouldn’t be armed. They are not judge, jury and executioner. The crime committed carried no death penalty but the man would have been dead regardless. I agree with my dad, the police should never be armed with weapons that kill.

@thegreenlight

Your dad sounds like a good Man. Some would have been calling for revenge, he had a Moment of self awareness and obviously has a strong social conscience.

@thegreenlight

Many people agree with your point that police officers shouldn’t carry firearms. The only problem being is that in a country where the general population have a right to bear firearms and strongly do not want this right removed, you cannot then take away the police forces same means of defence. Simply put, to disarm the police, you would need to disarm all as you cannot do one without the other and avoid any catastrophic consequences.

Your fathers story is a clear example of the point I’ve tried to make and I’m glad that it was able to have a happier ending despite your fathers injury ❤️

He stayed in the police for many years until retirement - he is a good man, but shouldn’t it be a requisite that ALL police officers have a strong moral compass? I don’t think we would be in this mess if they did.

No excuse for shooting this man. They knew full well he was not armed, apart from the taser he snatched which is non-lethal. They are only allowed to open fire if they are in fear for their lives. They were not.

I agree with everything @Jkslays and the police officer who shot him has been sacked and the other police officer is on administrative leave the reason why the chief of police resigned is because her desire was for Atlanta be the model of what meaningful reform should look like and she offered to step down as police chief so that the city could move forward with urgency and rebuilding trust that is needed through out their community. Please read the full story before you make comments on what happened.

American police kill a lot of people. I’m not sure if it’s out of fear the other person has a gun or if they just want to put people down.

There are videos on YouTube showing them killing endless people and in some cases wounding their own police partners.

If the USA wasn’t riddled with guns and stupid gun laws maybe things would be different.

www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-death-by-us-police-by-race/

Killing or wounding endless people *

@pixxie - I don't think you mean 'exculpate'. Do you mean exaggerate?

He was drunk, unpredictable, became violent, resisting arrest and armed with a taser. While 'less lethal' him having it was a danger to the police and the public.
He was already a danger to the public by driving drunk - and that drunk he fell asleep going through a drive through.
All he had to do was continue to do as the police instructed him to do. They had treated him perfectly well throughout. The game changed when he broke free with the taser.
Watch the video linked by @user1475869475 - when running away he turns, points the taser at the pursuing officers, the light on the taser is on and a cloud appears around it. He fired that taser at the police.
It kind of goes without saying that dicking about like that during interaction with the police might get you shot - this cannot be a surprise to anyone anymore. Play stupid games win stupid prizes

tenlittlesignets@ sorry I meant escalate , bad spelling day.

If this was, as some posters suggest, an everyday public execution within the rules, caused by the victim himself, why has the police chief of the city resigned over it and why has the mayor accepted her resignation?

It's obviously not right, nor acceptable, even if it is some sort of ghastly 'normal' for Atlanta, a city I have visited and researched in the course of my career. (Not police-related!)

America is at a turning point, and the police are now facing a very clear message from the public. They must stop killing people unless they are facing an immediate deadly threat. The police call every slightly dangerous act an immediate deadly threat and always play the "I feared for my life" even when it is very clear that their life was no ij danger.

They may be in danger of being injured, the may be momentarily incapacitated but then they have other officers with them, they do not to shoot and kill from a distance.

These officers were not at risk of death. The drunk man was out of his vehicle so the public were no longer at risk of death.

They still killed him.

This is the way it has been for years. They kill at the drop of a hat, and they get away with it because it was an acceptable police culture. The mood has changed now and police training and tactics need to change with it. Now.