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TTAG commentator Joe sent us a link to this YouTube video of an Officer Involved Shooting outside Carl Jr.’s restaurant in Monterey Park, California [as reported by nydailynews.com]: “The man did not swing the pipe at the officer. When are these people going to understand that if the man had successfully swung the pipe at the officer we would have a dead man and a dead officer? A pipe bender to the skull is deadly, this is not Nerf.” A few minutes later, our correspondent sent a second electronic missive. “What in the world is wrong with the passengers in the car that filmed this? They laugh when the man is shot. Not that he didn’t present a deadly threat the the officer, but it should be sad to anyone when a human being is killed, even when the death is justified.” Amen.
I watched a similar video of a similar incident in London. A disturbed man was flailing a sword around him surrounded by Police. He was eventually subdued sans gun fire. The comment made by the videographer was that the man would have been dead within a minute. In the US video why did they bring a dog if they were going to shoot him?
This was a K-9 Officer. ALL officers (even K-9 Officers) respond when an “armed public disturbance” call goes out over the air. Supposedly, the Carl’s Junior employee said over the phone, “…some guy is trying to hit people in the head with a pipe”. A “pipe” (it was actually an aluminum tubing bender, but it weighed about 5 pounds) is considered a “deadly weapon” in most jurisdictions, because you CAN kill someone with it, if you hit them in the head. Even if you “maim” someone with a pipe, that is still committing a “forceable felony which is dangerous to life”, and deadly force can be used to stop that action.
A K-9 Officer CAN NOT release his dog, unless a threat becomes “dangerous to human life or property”, so the officer did not release the dog because the man was walking away (clearing being non-agressive / non-compliant). However, as soon as the man turned around, and adopted a “fighting pose” (boxer’s skip, facing the officer, movement toward the officer, pipe at the ready), he became an agressive/defiant subject holding an object which could be used to take a life. And, because the dog could not get there as fast as could the BULLETS, the K-9 officer chose to release bullets, instead of his dog.
Also, I can guess the cops in Britain subdued the sword-weilder, because they DIDN’T have guns. I’m all for “negotiating until the cows come home”, and I OFTEN did that to knife-weilding subjects on the street, in mental institutions, and in prisons, but, I’d HATE to be the guy who had to go in first on a sword-weilding man!