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Originally Posted by wittynickname
But this is the issue. Officers are going into situations as if they're against militant opposition. They're literally going in with tanks at this point.
They're jumping straight to 'maim or kill' before assessing a situation. If they want to go in cautiously as if every person is armed and extremely dangerous, fine--but don't act immediately as if the person is firing on you unless they are. The issue is that a lot of the major police issues that have come up are because officers aren't going through that system you just said--they aren't assessing the situation and deescalating the response as need be. They're overly aggressive in situations which don't call for it.
If the actual response from officers was what you listed--there wouldn't be much complaint. But when a couple of officers jump out of a car at a 12 year old with a bb gun and open fire on him in under 5 seconds--none of that assessment you listed is actually happening, and that is a problem.
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True. The response to "Does he have a gun? I don't know, therefore I will treat him as if he does" isn't (or shouldn't be) "better shoot him in the head to be safe." Some American police are having some big issues with their response protocols.
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I wasn't saying you can't kill someone with a bb gun. I was referencing the case in Ohio where the man was in Walmart, some racist moron calls 911, and rather than walking in calmly and assessing the situation and realizing he wasn't a threat, officers shot him down before doing any kind of deducing to see what the reality of the situation was.
All three of those cases I mentioned were based on reality--the only one where the guy got away without any issue was the one who was actually waving a loaded firearm and threatening to shoot people.
The innocent guy with a bb gun in Walmart is shot to death on sight, and the dumb guy dancing got shoved around needlessly.
How is it that one officer is able to talk down a nutjob with a loaded weapon but other officers can't handle non-threats without issue?
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I am well aware of and acquainted with all 3 cases you mentioned. My assessment stands. You treat each situation with a suspect as armed and dangerous until proven otherwise.
As to why one officer can talk someone down and another can't...think about your workplace. Do you have people who are better at one job or another? Better at one aspect of a job, or another. Or is everyone equally as good at everything as everyone else? I have seen a 4 hour standoff ended by a Police Negotiator 5 minutes after the negotiator showed up, because some folks are really good at talking to other folks, and some people, no matter how much you train them, can't talk the weather out of a weatherman. "Police" are not one homogeneous force made of up 100% interchangeable bits. One police officer is not "just as good as" another police officer. Just like any other job, training, job experience, life experience, ability and raw talent affect "a policeperson".