As are you.

That guns are legal or not is irrelevant in this case.

Asshole steals weapon from cop, and assaults cop with stolen weapon.

How else should it end?

Do you really think that it would be different here?

Tom

Wilhelm Tell?

Which society doesn't?

Tom

Depending on whom you ask, 20-30% of the US police are former military. Soldiers are trained to kill, this is their job, no questions necessary when they're in a suspcious situation, let alone after the first shot. This is how they stay alive.

Even if it were seen as desirable (I don't think it currently is), someone who served for a couple years in a war zone will take a long time to get these automatisms out of their system.

This needs to change, cops need to be limited to reasonable us of force, coupled with the requirement that all lives need to be spared if reasonable, something similar to what applies in CH and Germany.
Here's the Wendy's video.

As sad as it is, this one appears to be from the opposite side of the spectrum than Floyd's. The cop who shoots is using the red car as cover, you don't do that if you know the other guy is unarmed.

It would seem reasonable to demand in this case that the cop has to aim for the legs, the car probably provided good enough cover and the light probably was good enough. However this is the US, where people are trained to aim for the chest/upper body.
Nonsense, there's no way to collect evidence and conduct a fair trial in such a short time.

I just watched the video and it seems very much justified. He got sacked because that police department has no backbone and feared backlash from the media and leftist anarchists. The female police chief also resigned. Another march for yet another criminal, the restaurant has been torched. That's what's wrong with America, the lack of accountability.

Yeah, that made an awful lot of sense. As if it was Wendy's fault, or the franchisee's if that's their business model.

Honestly? In this case (Brooks) I think the sacking and any criminal charges are because of the political pressure right now. It wasn't great timing to have yet another white cop kill a black man, despite the fact he had just stolen the cop's taser.

It's nothing like the Floyd case at all, but "the people" are out for revenge.

Believe it or not, the laws in the USA are very generous when it comes to a police officer using deadly force. The word "entitled" almost fits. Whether or not you and I like it is another thing, but that's the reality. FC posted a good link up-thread with some Supreme Court history.

I don't think the officer in this case will be found guilty, despite the fact the autopsy shows Brooks died from gunshot wounds to the back. Here's a snippet of Georgia's statute on the use of deadly force:
Brooks had already committed a couple of felonies within just a few minutes: DUI, felony resisting arrest, stealing the weapon of a law enforcement officer, and felony assault by firing the taser at the officer to name a few. He possessed a weapon and was running away with it, and could have used it to commit yet another felony against the officers or by attacking an innocent bystander. As soon as he turned and pointed that taser, he was a dead man. The law above pretty much says it was justified, and the cop was trained to react that way.

I said earlier in the thread I didn't see how a cop could feel in danger if the guy was running away. Having seen the video, Brooks did turn and at least try to fire the taser, therefore I could totally see the defense arguing the officer felt he was in danger and returned fire.

Remember - to be acquitted, the defense only needs to convince ONE juror that the act was justified. That's a super low hurdle in the Brooks case with that video. It's a higher hurdle in the Floyd case.

Why do cops not shoot the legs .. This is the humorous version but still just as true ..

Why couldn't they just have pepper-sprayed his foot instead.

Edit: For anybody who's looking for some informative explanations on justified shootings of unarmed people, the youtuber posted above is Donut Operator. A former cop and an excellent source of unbiased, factual explanations of police shootings.

I admit, I do feel a bit 'on the fence' about this particular incident. What I keep finding myself wondering is what protocol is exactly, regarding when a cop can feel that they are being threatened and can therefore feel justified in using their gun. The guy did have a taser and had tried to use it on the cop, and a taser is or can be considered a weapon (it's rare, but some people have died of cardiac arrest from them). And it's not as though a cop can just stop and take a moment to try to rationalize the situation when they are "in the moment" and are forced to make a spontaneous decision and to act spontaneously.

This is a link to the video of when the cop(s) first approached Rayshard Brooks and were talking to him and then gave him the test for being drunk, etc. It cuts out just as Brooks is being handcuffed and begins to suddenly resist arrest.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dhdp...&pbjreload=101

What I find really unfortunate is that the cop was obviously being very nice and respectful toward Brooks, and it wasn't until Brooks suddenly (and probably rather unexpectedly) began to resist arrest that things turned ugly. I have a feeling that this cop would not have wanted to have to use his weapon against this man unless he felt he had no choice. So I also find myself wondering what kind of pressure a cop might feel to NOT let someone get away and also to defend a fellow cop? Is doing "the right thing" a gray area sometimes?

I also came across this study, about something called the "weapons effect" that has shown that when someone sees a taser, they often become aggressive and hostile, which in turn leads to police having to use more force.

Carrying Tasers increases police use of force, study finds

"Criminologists from the University of Cambridge say the findings suggest that Tasers can trigger the 'weapons effect': a psychological phenomenon in which sight of a weapon increases aggressive behaviour.
While the 'weapons effect' has been repeatedly demonstrated in simulated conditions over the last forty years, this is one of the largest studies to show it "in the field" and the first to reveal the effect in law enforcement.
"We found that officers are more likely to be assaulted when carrying electroshock weaponry, and more likely to apply force," said lead researcher Dr Barak Ariel from Cambridge's Institute of Criminology.
"It is well established that the visual cue of a weapon can stimulate aggression. The presence of Tasers appears to provoke a pattern where suspects become more aggressive toward officers, who in turn respond more forcefully," he said."

You're asking the wrong person.

Your clip doesn't provide a reason not to go for the legs, if the situation allows. The fact that hitting a leg can be lethal makes no difference to hitting the torso. And the bleeding can probably be reduced once you can approach the injured, which would remove the immediate danger to the injured's life.

Someone running towards or from you will present the upper legs as two mostly static colums that are close together. In the Brooks case the upper legs probably formed a similarly large target as the thorax, and the distance is mostly "can't miss".

What gets me is that no member of the public went to Brooks to see what was wrong with him -shit, he is holding up the fast food queue -this is a serious problem.
So they delegate the job to the police...............

I occasionally watch the TV show "live PD" on the A&E channel..
It seems to be a fairly common call out for the cops over there, people passed out in their vehicle..

And if that TV show is anything like the reality of life in the USofA .. I sure wouldn't like to be a cop there.

The cop was professional and patient throughout. The conflict started when the man violently resisted arrest and it escalated when he stole a police weapon and tried to use it on them.

Most Tasers are single shot. There are some dual shot versions used by law enforcement.

They shot him 3 times in the back! He was running away and no threat to them

You mean lacking the training, resources, funding, salary, support, clear guidelines, societal prestige, leadership and backup? Yeah. All these incidents point to cops being on their own there..Not a situation anyone would want to find himself in.

And CNN flashes this video of him and George Floyd getting shot with every news program. They have absolutely no respect!

100% this, nailed it. Glad to see there's at least one sensible mod on here.

I'm not American, how racist of you to presume that I am.

Tom