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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsHow come the police always seem to be cleared when they do shootings?
Almost every time I hear about a police shooting resulting in death and an investigation is conducted, the police always are cleared and that they did the right thing. It doesn't matter really the circumstances either, if the victim didn't have a gun for example, or was a homeless person and just got a little ornery. Can you think of any recent wrongful death case or any kind of investigation where the policemen were found guilty? I can't.
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slackmaster
(60,567 posts)...from liability for ANY kind of inappropriate actions, errors, etc.
Take it from there.
FightingIrish
(2,716 posts)quinnox
(20,600 posts)I am curious when the last time a policemen involved in a controversial shooting was found guilty, it must be an extremely rare event.
golfguru
(4,987 posts)trouble being caused by some person? They have never pointed guns at me
or shot at me. And I have been driving for 50 years, and have visited 1000's of
public places and events.
quinnox
(20,600 posts)almost never make a mistake when they are involved in shootings, since they are invariably found not guilty.
golfguru
(4,987 posts)To repeat, police almost never shoot at any person who is not causing trouble,
creating a disturbance or refusing to obey the police.
You are always better off obeying the police even if you disagree, and settle the
issue later in court instead of confronting the police.
teddy51
(3,491 posts)outside investigators.
Bozita
(26,955 posts)
MicaelS
(8,747 posts)
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)they don't face the same charges a civilian would. No capital murder rap. And any prison time they do, they're out in relatively short order.
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)On RARE occasions (and I can't think of one off the top of my head) you MIGHT find a cop who was arrested for killing somebody, but they never face the death penalty like a regular citizen would. When they do get into some grief it's some lesser charge, even if somebody's dead because of them. And even then, most of the time they get off.
I'll always remember one story in Nashville back in the 80s or 90s. A clinically mentally disturbed woman was shot 4 times in the chest by a cop sitting in his car. She had a small, serrated steak knife in her hand and was talking/arguing with him from his passenger side window while he was sitting on the driver's side. The reason I remember it so well was because of the discrepency in sizes between the two. She weighed 110# and he weighed about what I did at the time (about 220#- twice as much). She was at least 5 to 6 feet away from him "armed", if you will, with a small kitchen knife. And he shot her FOUR TIMES IN THE CHEST.
They way the rules are de facto set up RE: cops and citizens, he got away with it. If I had broken the neck of that woman, I would have been facing a murder charge because of the discrepancy in size even though she was "armed". But because he was a cop, he got away with it.
Lurks Often
(5,455 posts)First Google "Tueller Drill" it states that a person with a knife can cover 21 feet in less then 2 seconds.
Second, police are trained to shoot until the threat is stopped and he likely fired all 4 shots in about 2 seconds.
aaaaaa5a
(4,667 posts)scared of black people.
Thus... we have spent nearly 2 generations granting police increasing power without increasing responsibility.
Dawson Leery
(19,348 posts)They are above the law. It never made sense why so many common people would support LEO's.
In addition, their unions lobbied to change the laws as to shield their members from ANY liability.
saras
(6,670 posts)Civilian oversight committees, with hire/fire power and the power to recommend criminal charges to the DA, would be the one best thing that could happen to police in America, but they are as terrified of it as Joe McCarthy was of Communism.
raouldukelives
(5,178 posts)JSnuffy
(374 posts)... it is because the vast majority of them are acting in good faith.
It is easy to judge after the fact and with all the knowledge that they didn't have at the time. It isn't so easy to make an informed and split second decision that will always be correct.
nadinbrzezinski
(154,021 posts)Two main reasons...
It is usually the cop vs the dead person's word...why tape is essential when there is wrong doing...
When they happen they usually do follow escalation of force and the victim usually is (insert disadvantaged group here) So of course few believe victim.
Why citizens must insist on two things.
All encounters have to be recorded, for everybody's sake.
All laws that are being passed to forbid citizens from taping cops should be found unconstitutional.
I suspect there are more bad shootings than are found, but sadly perhaps, why we need the dang tapes, not that many more. At least I hope this is the case. (Incidentally some lethal shootings might not be if officers had access to less than lethal, like your homeless example).
Why am I saying this? Ten years of working side by side as EMS provider and recent experience in the streets.
"We are not gloating the cops!" Never mind I have it on tape.
Good cops are trained to treat all as the Mayor, while still being weary. In very charged situations we should remember the individual officer at times, not always, but I'd say most of the time, doesn't deserve them creative names either.
gulliver
(13,180 posts)I really can't imagine why that would happen. I'm flummoxed. I'm drawing a blank....
Seriously, though, Republicans love posts like this, because they make Dems look either really dumb or really biased against police (but I repeat myself). In fact, the vast, vast majority of Dems get the obvious answer.
a: Because nearly all shootings by police are justified.
Black and Gold
(28 posts)it always surprises me when a policeman who I thought should be thrown in jail gets off with a slap on the hand.
But, at the same time, I have an uncle who is a police officer. He was off duty one day dropping my little cousin off at school and he heard on his radio that police needed back-up. He was close so he decided to help out.
This lady in a van ended up taking off and trying to run my uncle over. He ended up shooting at her and as a result she crashed into a telephone pole.
Then the cops find out there was a baby in the very back of the van. There was no way they could have known that.
Then the news story portrayed the woman as innocent like she was just trying to get away and they shot at her while there was a baby in the van.
They made no mention of her actually trying to run my uncle over, and no mention that there was no possible way to know there was a baby in the back of the van.
So since then I take news stories like that with a grain of salt.
sgsmith
(398 posts)Just a few weeks ago, a Georgia State Patrol officer was responding to a failure to stop call. This officer broadsided the SUV of Atlanta Braves coach Jeff Porter, killing Porter's wife, injuring Porter, his son, and a teenage girl. To this date, the officer has not been charged with vehicular homicide, although he was fired from the GSP. The officer had four at fault crashes prior to the Porter accident.
There have been several speeding crashes resulting in fatalities since then in the Atlanta area, and in nearly every single one of them the driver has been charged in some manner.
Cronyism. Pure and simple blue shield watching out for themselves and their associates.
Stinky The Clown
(67,790 posts)I think most of the time the investigation gets it right. I am not so stupid as to think some bad caps didn't get away with shit, but mostly they don't.
