You know the old saw: if you can’t dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit. Words to live by if you’re in government. Or journalism for that matter. Do whatever you can to gloss over a bold-faced screwup. It’s hard to distinguish what’s worse in this case. Is it the knee-deep BS story fed to the Newark Post by cops trying to cover their conspicuously crappy gun-handling skillz? Or the Byzantine wording of the published story by an unnamed reporter (would you want your byline on a punchbowl turd like this?) that makes it as difficult as humanly possible to decipher what happened? And by the way, is there a rule against identifying a public employee involved in a shooting when that might be embarrassing? Either way, it’s not all that hard to ID the issue here…
The problem was that the offending cop appears to know next to nothing about safe gun handling. He sure didn’t know enough to keep his damned finger off the trigger. Never mind keeping the muzzle pointed away from his buddy’s leg.
Officers had completed firearms training and were at police headquarters when one officer noticed what he thought was an abnormality with the physical condition of his handgun. He handed the gun to a second officer so that officer could inspect the weapon and render an opinion on the perceived abnormality. The handgun fired shortly after it was transferred to the second officer.
Sure is a good thing they’d completed their firearms training. Otherwise someone really could have gotten hurt.
The fired round struck the initial officer in the lower leg. First aid was rendered and the officer was transported to Christiana Hospital, where he was treated for the non-life threatening injury.
So welcome to the IGOTD fold, Mr. Incognito Officer, sir. We’re sure you’ll be quietly returned to duty soon, no worse for wear. Too bad we can’t say the same for “the initial officer.”
One can only imaging reporting had such a negligent discharge happened to a pair of law abiding NJ civilians. The J-skool grads at the Newark Post would have taken a snarky, contemptuous tone describing the incident. Then maybe a quip or two from a DA about guns being inherently dangerous and how the two involved may lose hunting and firearms permits.
“The handgun fired shortly after it was transferred to the second officer.”
“The handgun fired…” There you go – proof from the Newark PD that guns shoot people ALL BY THEMSELVES!!! Apparently, no one held the gun and pulled the trigger – it simply fired itself “after it was transferred to the second officer”. Maybe the gun didn’t like being transferred without notice? Was the gun’s union notified of the pending transfer? Did the gun have legal representation prior to the transfer? Was the transfer a demotion for the gun? We need to have these issues resolved so we can understand what made the gun lash out at its prior assigned police officer. We should not judge the gun for its actions until we understand it’s motivation!
Or maybe it was a negligent discharge of a firearm by a highly trained police officer.
NAAAH, never happens. Had to be the gun’s fault.
ROFL!!
And Ralph’s comment below, as well!
Youse guys and your jokes…
JSG
one officer noticed what he thought was an abnormality with the physical condition of his handgun
At the very same time, the handgun noticed what it thought was an abnormality with the mental condition of the officer. So it shot him.
+1
I was going to ask what kind of handgun shoots a person on its own but that is answered here. A smart one.
Initial officer: Uhhh… there’s somethin’ wrong with my gun.
2nd officer: Give it to me. Let me see…
BANG!
Initial officer: Ouch.
2nd officer: Nope… it’s workin’ fine.
What you never heard of a ‘leg pop’?
“The second officer negligently fired the handgun shortly after it was transferred to him.” Fixed that for ya
I think you guys are being a little mean, because a cop should be able to shoot another cop without everyone busting his balls.
Guys! This is Newark DELAWARE, not Jersey…..New-ARK Delaware, not New-ick NJ.