[OptimalTates]

For what it's worth and to reiterate, I have no issue about the officers' actions after the second ARWEN shot. If anything, I think they showed restraint in using their firearms from when I watched that part of the video the only time. Didn't really want to watch it again.

In my mind, although I'm sure a lot of Europeans would disagree, once he slammed the stick to show his aggressive intent and began running at the officer with a knife pretty much anything was justified despite the unfortunate outcome. I know North Americans like myself have that apparently archaic 21 feet rule with knives that apparently doesn't really have a basis, but from the officers point of view, better him than yourself or fellow officer. With all due respect to Mr. Tuel's family.

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

only the officers involved have a clear picture of why that is

I would strongly strongly disagree with this though. I can pull a cop-Godwin and say that Chauvin with his cronies thought they had a clear picture of what was necessary too but even without that, usually even ASIRT comes back with "officer was reasonable" and that's that. And I'm not saying they weren't reasonable. But often times there were other methods/actions available beyond just being reasonable.

In the 2016 killing when CPS shot that lady, they were justified based on the Criminal Code, based on policy, based on use of force, based on threat level, based on public perception, and based on training. Probably could make a case they had a clear picture of why it was necessary. Could almost tie this one into a nice little bow where we would all agree with the cops having no choice. And then an expert looks at it and recognizes deficiencies.

After the seemingly frantic woman didn’t respond to three shouted commands to drop the knives she held in each hand, she ran toward the officers, one of whom pulled the trigger. Today, Calgary police officers receive special training to de-escalate similar confrontations — but best practices weren’t used in November 2016 incident, according to University of Alberta psychiatry professor Peter Silverstone.

“I’m not saying for a moment that it would have made any difference,” said Silverstone, who has helped pioneer techniques for officers in such situations.

“Sometimes (the best practices) fail. But it’s well recognized in the literature that simply shouting at disturbed people to stop is not an effective way of dealing with someone in that crisis.”

This week, the province’s police oversight agency, the Alberta Serious Incident Response Team (ASIRT) cleared the officers involved in the November 2016 shooting of any wrongdoing. ASIRT executive director Susan D. Hughson found that although the officers didn’t make any attempts to de-escalate the situation beyond the shouted commands, there “wasn’t time” to do more.

It's potentially similar to this one. Of course there's a chance that regardless of being hit by a plastic bullet twice, he eventually charges at the police and the result is the same. And I imagine ASIRT will find this one reasonable too. Armed and recently violent man unresponsive to verbal commands has less-lethal method used on him before lethal forced is used when necessary. There's nothing coming out of this legally.

But I still think it could have been handled better based on the teachings of PERF and other leaders in de-escalation techniques.

Here's two ostensibly similar cases where the ARWEN was used on a knife wielding irrational person before an officer ultimately shoots and kills a knife wielder. I would be less likely to criticize the actions of any officer involved because they tried to use de-escalation mostly through the use of time.

https://open.alberta.ca/dataset/1151...-concludes.pdf

As the presence of police seemed to be a particular source of agitation for the man,
and since he appeared to want a confrontation, one option was for the officers to stand down and
leave the immediate area to de-escalate the situation and give the man time to calm down. They
knew the man’s identity. He could be arrested for the driving-related offences on another day, and
they had diminished the risk to public safety by removing his vehicle. The family was advised to find
another place to stay for the night and not to return to the home. The family was not happy with the
decision.

https://open.alberta.ca/dataset/f141...-save-life.pdf

On May 17, 2018, at 11:12 a.m., CPS received a call from a person who reported that someone had
broken into a secondary basement suite in his bi-level house located on Penbrooke Close SE in
Calgary, and that the perpetrators appeared to still be inside
...
At 12:11 p.m., one of the tactical officers reported that a female voice from
inside the room was calling for help. The officers sought permission from a supervisor to make entry
into the room, which was granted.

The first took place over six hours, where the police simply got up and left instead of risking escalation at one point. Of course in Tuel's case they could not simply leave him as he posed a clear risk if they had but the point is there was no need to force the issue. The other took an hour to get into the room which was prompted by a call for help. In the meantime they secured the area, got backup, got the tactical unit, they acquired information about the house, they didn't go guns a blazing. When the ARWEN was deployed it in these circumstances it was due to real risks. A boy with a knife in close proximity to a woman in distress and an uncontained armed man approaching nescient residences. The man was also coherent so using it as form of pain compliance was a reasonable usage as the officer could have expected a more reasonable response than the non-lucid Tuel, unfortunately as the cops would not know at the time the young man was also suicidal.