It's sad but to be honest I give the officer(s) the benefit of the doubt until all the information is gathered. I think this is a case of where we simply see guy with knife and cop with guns and wonder how the cop with a gun can feel at all threatened. The post above explains why in good detail. Now of course in this situation the cops had already drawn weapons but once a person starts advancing with a knife they have about a second to:
assess the threat
aim
and start firing.
Mythbusters actually did this in their "don't bring a knife to a gun fight" myth. Sometimes it is very worthwhile to bring a knife to a gun fight because people can indeed cover a lot of distance in under two seconds. A cop does not have the luxury of waiting to see if the guy is actually going to continue to advance or stop at a quick taunt. It's why they give very clear demands of what to do and what may happen. Do not ignore what the police want you to do. If you advance you may be brought down.
I wonder how many people protesting this will continue to protest it once the facts come out. The first fact right now is he was threatening women on the bus with the knife while exposing himself. He may be a victim of a bad shooting when the facts come out but it also doesn't seem likely this was a kind, mixed up and misunderstood innocent.
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