It happens. The town I grew up had a bank robbery where the police shot the robber and caused him to blow-up. It doesn't matter if it's a deadman switch, it just isn't a good idea to fire a gun at explosives in a pedestrian area.
Honestly, if they thought that a bomb was a realistic threat, they would have started evacuating the area and not fired at him 9 times, and then taser him. That is not a logical response to a bomb threat.
Yep, if this bomb scenario was so plausible why are there people walking around in the area? Hell, why are there people walking around in the area period? An armed standoff and you have pedestrians wandering by?
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When you do a signature and don't attribute it to anyone, it's yours. - Vulcan
Lethbridge police. Dude with knife. "What if he stabs me". They shot him. Officers cleared.
Police response justified by "what ifs".
No, that's a police response justified by a man with a knife who posed a threat that was deemed to meet their standard for use of lethal force. You may disagree with that conclusion, but that's not a what if. A what if is saying "what if he had a bomb?" when there is absolutely no basis to believe he had a bomb.
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I entirely agree with that conclusion, not like it matters since I didn't have the information the investigators had to reach said conclusion. My point is merely that we can't say what's justifiable or not without knowing the whole story.
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I entirely agree with that conclusion, not like it matters since I didn't have the information the investigators had to reach said conclusion. My point is merely that we can't say what's justifiable or not without knowing the whole story.
I have not argued otherwise, I have simply said that justifications must have a reasonable basis, they cannot be hypotheticals.
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Yeah, I don't buy that the guy was a serious threat to anyone unless he had something else with him and considering that they continued to yell "drop the knife", I don't think that was the case.
The guy had a knife. A knife. You can't harm anyone with a knife unless they're within arms reach. Considering he was far from within arms reach and on an empty bus, he was not a threat that justified lethal force.
Just a trigger happy cop that will most likely be protected by the system.
As for the kid, I have absolutely zero sympathy for him. He's the idiot who put himself in that situation.
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This was written by one of the cops over on the Beyond forums and give incredible insight into how cops are trained to handle this type of situation. Might be worth a read...
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I'm going to give it a go, and I'm sure many will disagree. However, everything I'm posting is based on science, well established protocols borne out of real world experiences, and knowledge gleaned from myriad research projects and the like that have combed through hundreds of thousands of lethal force encounters by both police and military. It's the best information we have available to us and we use it the best way we know how.
Some of the numbers are from memory and I haven't looked at them for a few years, but they are close enough that they should illustrate the point. So here we go:
1) Knives are incredibly dangerous implements. Any untrained, crayon chewing idiot can use a knife and kill someone or cause grievous bodily harm. They are not stopped by body armour or thick clothing, and can easily be manipulated for various techniques.
2) Knives are dangerous within approximately 30 feet of those who are armed with a pistol and nothing more. The average person in decent health, and this has been tested numerous times, can cover a distance of 21 feet (the 21 foot rule) in approximately 1.5 seconds. The average time for a well trained LEO to unholster a level 3 holster, put the pistol on target, gain a reasonable sight picture, and fire one round: 2.5 seconds or so.
3) Tasers were NEVER meant to replace or be an alternative to a firearm in lethal force situations. This is the oft most quoted bit of misinformation that comes out whenever one of these situations takes place. The media has really perpetuated this one, but police services worldwide haven't done a very good job tackling that either. It is NOT a firearm replacement.
4) There are strict policies that have been in place for many, many years since the Taser was introduced. Ours makes it very clear under what terms of engagement and situations the Taser can be used during lethal force encounters: When one member has lethal overwatch, and the other with the Taser has a barrier and distance between them and the subject. That is similiar if not the exact same as most other police services.
5) The stopping power of a .40 S&W hollowpoint LE round is variable. People don't generally drop on the first shot, or the second, sometimes even the third. People have fought through upwards of 10 gunshots and still been dangerous.
Also, depending on clothing (potentially body armour) and other factors, it can take even more shots. Additionally, unless you hit a bare area of skin or someone immediately starts bleeding through a white shirt, you cannot see where those rounds are hitting. This is further mitigated by the stress of a lethal force encounter, where you are concentrating on the subject's actions and not where your rounds are hitting them.
6) The stopping power of a Taser is also negligible and varies. If someone is wearing thick clothing, or baggy clothing, the darts may hang up in the clothing or not even penetrate - and thus no electricity making it's way to the subject. Further to that, the useful range of a Taser is 12-15 feet in good conditions. This is WAY too close to an edged weapon to begin with, much less if it fails to stop them. This is not the tool for such a situation where you can try it and then hope that you can still get a shot off in the event it doesn't work. It is also very inaccurate for situations where you don't have a clear and unobstructed line of sight towards someone, like the stairwell of a streetcar.
7) Armed subject on a bus who tells everyone to get off, while brandishing (from what I can tell by the video) a longer blade maybe 5"-6" long, is a public safety threat. There is no ifs, ands, or buts about it. He is terrifying the public, he is holding it in an offensive manner, he is out in public with it. He isn't just casually holding it, he isn't holding it to his neck or body, he is holding it up and waving it around. If he is allowed to leave that streetcar and runs into public, that becomes a volatile and even more dangerous situation.
So... he is now a threat to the public that must be contained. If I was running that call, which could potentially happen, and has actually happened down here on a rush hour LRT car two years ago (however he wasn't shot because he dropped the knife), I would ensure that subject is contained and given his behaviours, terms of engagement would be such that he would not be allowed to leave that streetcar or any further than the immediate vicinity, using as much force as necessary to prevent that. He is a clear danger that cannot be allowed to escape into the public. Unfortunately, you can't contain a streetcar from 50' away with pistols and hope to keep him contained before he beetles off into the night. They aren't accurate at that distance, and trying to contain a streetcar from that far away causes crossfire, among other tactical issues. Not a sound strategy for keeping that subject from hurting people!
8) He is being confronted by uniformed police officers, who are giving him loud verbal commands. There is no question who they are, or what they are doing there. He is told in no uncertain terms to drop the knife, and what they are going to do if he advances towards them. This is common practice so that the subject, the public, and the other officers at scene are acutely aware of what is going to happen. It isn't unprofessional, it's simple and effective language.
9) At around the 38-40 sec mark of the second video that was posted by OP, you can see him take a quick step towards the stairwell of the bus and that is when the first shots are heard. I would hazard a guess that he was advancing on those officers at that point and that was when the line in the sand was drawn and he was engaged with lethal force.
It is the job of the police to protect the public at large. Victims of crime, the public, and the safety and well being of police come before that of the subject everytime. You may not agree with it, but the guy who confronts the police with a gun, knife, or other weapon, despite being a citizen and under the protection of the police does not just get a freebie because of that. In this example, the safety of both the public and those officers was compromised and in my view, they didn't have many other options at that exact moment.
We always have TAC attend these types of calls and they have the tools, training, and ability to deal with these incidents in a less lethal manner - but everyday patrol officers don't have ceramic armour, armoured vehicles, ARWEN baton rounds, shields, or hundreds of hours of monthly firearms training that allows them to use snipers to stop that subject from stepping off the streetcar while keeping officers and people away from it.
Unfortunately, speciality teams take time to arrive and these situations can escalate with incredible speed and without notice, and leads to armed confrontation which ends in the loss of the life. I'm not saying this was handled the right way or wrong way, but I'm just putting all this information out there so people are more aware of the basic foundation of these confrontations and what police are faced with when dealing with them.
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Any writings in this forum are my personal view and all opinions expressed should be taken as such; there is no implied or direct opinion representative of anything but my own thoughts on various subjects.
Seems like he wasn't so great at speaking English.
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Originally Posted by Canuck-Hater
Tear gas? Tazer? Water cannon?
Ineffective. Ineffective. Ineffective. At least I now have the actual words of a law enforcement officer to which I can refer. See stazzy33's post above.
Seems like he wasn't so great at speaking English.
Ineffective. Ineffective. Ineffective. At least I now have the actual words of a law enforcement officer to which I can refer. See stazzy33's post above.
How about:
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Captain James P. DeCOSTE, CD, 18 Sep 1993
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.
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.
"this is my knife this is my gun, this is for fighting, this is for fun"
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Captain James P. DeCOSTE, CD, 18 Sep 1993
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.
I seemed to have missed this
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My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
The video that nightfx just posted is proof that given the distance he was from them, a bit over 10 ft, he was within the range where you might get him, not to mention he has the advantage at lunging down on you from in the dark.
So as far as the safety of that officer is concerned, that's a gun the dude's waving around... unless they all back up to 25 ft. But then, in the event that he comes charging off the streetcar and you have to shoot him anyway, other officers and innocent people are now potentially in the line of fire because of the big buffer you've given him. Now it's really ugly. Given the apparent nonchalance of his comrades, maybe the shooter is the only one familiar with numbers and reaction times similar to those given in nightfx's video.
The cop was "ready" for a potential knife attack and already had his gun unholstered and and pointed at the guy. He was also surrounded by a ton of other cops and the guy was on a freaking bus. It takes a fraction of a second to pull a trigger so I'm not buying the whole "cover 20 feet before the officer could fire" thing.
Rewatch that video that nightfx posted and imagine how it would go if the cops came in fully knowing that the suspect has a knife, is dangerous and the cops had their gun drawn and pointed at the individual... Oh and the individual is on a bus.
Sorry, using the only piece of evidence we have available to us, there is no way you're convincing me that lethal force was necessary. Once more information comes out, my opinion might change.
Last edited by polak; 07-30-2013 at 03:27 PM.
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Two things that will be extremely difficult to explain justifiably
1) The firing of three shots, a pause, and then six more shots fired. The pause is the key here.
Yeah, that's what I'd like to know.
Did he miss with the first three shots? Was the pause to reassess the situation where he deemed that the fella was still a threat and worthy of another six rounds?
Good that there are videos of the incident, less room for cover ups.
Quote:
Mr. Baron’s video doesn’t tell the entire story, of course, and we haven’t heard the police side. But without Mr. Baron’s video, the police might not be on the hot seat today. What it shows is far more damning and immediate than a bunch of conflicting eyewitness accounts could ever be – and it makes a cover-up impossible. A citizen cellphone video was the only reason the truth about Robert Dziekanski’s death ever came to light. He was the Polish man tasered by the RCMP at the Vancouver airport in 2007. His death was eventually ruled a homicide.
The ubiquity of surveillance has plenty of downsides. But the ubiquity of cellphone cameras makes every citizen a potential watchdog. That changes the balance of power between police and citizens – in favour of the citizens. Most police are good guys, but some are not, and never again will it be so easy for them to get away with incompetence, brutality and abuse of power. The people are watching. And they’re putting what they see on YouTube.
The cop was "ready" for a potential knife attack and already had his gun unholstered and and pointed at the guy. He was also surrounded by a ton of other cops and the guy was on a freaking bus. It takes a fraction of a second to pull a trigger so I'm not buying the whole "cover 20 feet before the officer could fire" thing.
Sorry, using the only piece of evidence we have available to us, there is no way you're convincing me that lethal force was necessary. Once more information comes out, my opinion might change.
So you have made your mind up with only a very limited fact picture....
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Captain James P. DeCOSTE, CD, 18 Sep 1993
Yep, if this bomb scenario was so plausible why are there people walking around in the area? Hell, why are there people walking around in the area period? An armed standoff and you have pedestrians wandering by?
That is a real good point. Logic would tell us if this goof was saying i have a bomb etc. Police would have that entire block secured and a bomb squad.
This is just a theory of mine that perhaps the knife wielder may have told police if they come near him he will stab the first one or slit their throat???
If he said nothing threatening then i would have to question the police's excessive shots fired.
He didn't charge at them, it is kind of hard for me to see from that video.
So what was the immediate threat is at this point unknown. But i don't believe the police opened up on this moron because they thought it was going on long enough. I lean more towards they had reason for the initial gunfire but not the second.
I think the answer will be in what he said to them moments before he was shot.
The only thing that i am 100% certain of about this is...the idiot made a real bad decision to wave a knife around and when the police gave him the easiest way out of his self created dilemma he refused multiple times.
The pause after the gunshots and then when the officer is at the door the firing starts up again is what i found most intriguing about how this all went down and why was the guy not tased as the first solution to end his stand off.
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Last edited by Stay Golden; 07-30-2013 at 03:34 PM.
