Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => The Roundtable => Topic started by: MechAg94 on March 15, 2019, 12:19:13 PM
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https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2019/mar/08/in-video-officer-heard-ordering-driver--1/
https://www.foxnews.com/us/arkansas-police-officer-fires-at-least-15-times-into-car-while-on-hood-in-deadly-shooting-caught-on-video
Video released Thursday from a Feb. 22 police shooting that left a Little Rock man dead shows the first responding officer firing his weapon at least 15 times, including 12 times after he stepped in front of the car the victim is driving.
Thirteen days after officer Charles Starks made a traffic stop involving a stolen vehicle, the Little Rock Police Department released audio and video footage of the shooting that killed 30-year-old Bradley Blackshire.
I came across this earlier. It brings up some use-of-force questions on when you think it is okay for an officer to draw and fire. From what I am seeing, the guy was driving a stolen car, refused to get out of his vehicle when ordered to, then tried to pull away. At some point after beginning to pull away, the officer started firing, then stepped in front of the vehicle and emptied his gun. There was mention of a gun afterward, but there is no indication the dead guy showed a gun. I also don't see any statement by the officer. It is all under investigation so there is little more than what you see in the video. All I can see if someone refusing ordered and attempting to flee.
Do you think he had justification to shoot?
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Need more info before I weigh in.
Disciplinary records reviewed by the paper showed Starks has been reprimanded 10 times since 2015, leading to nearly a month’s worth of suspensions.
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Another example of police unreasonably demanding "compliance" -- with predictable results.
At 2:35 the officer says "He hit me -- he hit me -- he hit me -- I shot -- I shot multiple times."
No, Officer, he did not "hit you" -- You stepped in front of a moving motor vehicle. You fired FOUR shots before he "hit you," and then after you placed yourself in the path of the vehicle's travel you continued firing to slide lock.
I have no problem labeling this one an excessive use of lethal force. There was a very similar case around here a decade or more ago. The dead driver's family collected several million dollars, if I remember correctly.
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Video appears to show the officer intentionally moving in front of the vehicle as it begins to pull away. A) Not bright. B) Probably against dept policy. If it can be established the move was intentionally made to set up a situation where the officer knew he would be technically justified in firing his weapon, then it's way bad juju. Even short of that, stepping into the path of a moving vehicle is really, really dumb. A decent lawyer could probably turn that into some kind of negligent-action scenario.
*edit to add* Hawk beat me to it.
Brad
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It seems to me this was a perfect storm of idiocy.
The criminal driver was trying to flee. The (I'll be kind) incompetent cop appeared overly eager to shoot someone. (Which might explain why he was fired so quickly. Police don't do that in questionable situations.)
The cop MAY have had an argument that his first four shots were justified. MAY, as the video isn't fully conclusive, though it seems to indicate the cop overreacted. However, the jumping on the hood and emptying the magazine was clearly not justified. This looks like manslaughter, at minimum, to me.
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Unbelievably reckless on the cop's part. There was a female passenger in the car. One of the shots shattered the passenger's window. The cop is lucky he didn't ventilate her along with the alleged perp. (I wrote "alleged" because, while the car had been identified as having been stolen, there was no proof that the guy driving it was the thief.)
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It's never bright to jump in front of a moving car, especially one your engaged in a deadly force encounter with. However, before we all jump on a bandwagon here, a couple points:
Another example of police unreasonably demanding "compliance"
At the beginning of this video I disagree with this. The car is stolen, and the officer pulls it over, and tells the driver to get out at gunpoint. From the voices, at that point he is on the drivers side of the car. It is not unreasonable to demand the person operating a stolen vehicle to get out of it. Depending on what it took to get the car pulled over, or what the driver is doing, it's not unreasonable to do it, from the side of the vehicle, with a drawn weapon.
I would say that at 0:21 of the video in the first link, when the driver asked "What'd I do?", a LEO focused on deescalation would respond "This car is stolen", rather than just repeating "Get out of the car!" Hawkmoon has made the valid point elsewhere that LEO's are being trained to just repeat their demands louder and more command voice in the face of non-compliance, rather than try other techniques. I think this has proven to not be as effective as the trainers might wish.
Unbelievably reckless on the cop's part. There was a female passenger in the car. One of the shots shattered the passenger's window. The cop is lucky he didn't ventilate her along with the alleged perp.
This is untrue. In the same video at 0:48 you can clearly see the passenger start to roll the window down, and it's still intact at 0:49 when the second Police vehicle hits the passenger door of the stolen car and the impact breaks the window.
Even while on a moving hood it's pretty simple marksmanship to keep the shots on the driver's side of the car, and it appears the Officer, for all his other faults, did just that.
In general I think American police are getting too trigger happy these days, and this could very well be one of those cases, but a stolen car, passenger just out of jail (her admission is on the tape) and gun in the car make me think that this is a situation where one should wait for all the details to be investigated and disclosed before damning either side. It might save one from a serving of crow down the line.
On another note, the article said:
According to procedure, the department placed Starks on administrative leave on Feb. 22. Four days later, the department confirmed that Starks had been relieved of duty, and had surrendered his gun and badge.
Officers placed on administrative leave can continue to work in some capacities at the department. Officers who are relieved of duty cannot.
Does anyone have actual info on what that means. I would think if they fired him it would just say "fired" or "terminated". "Relieved of Duty" seems like it's a higher level of "You *expletive deleted*ed up" leave, but is short of being unemployed.
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On the last, I think it is likely "you're probably gonna be fired" leave.
On the former, I don't know if all American cops are getting trigger happy. Certainly enough are getting trigger happy that we see video occasionally and their bosses are very reluctant to make any public comment about it (probably due to legal liability).
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I thought the officer fired the gun initially before jumping in front of the car. I am not sure why he thought jumping on the hood and emptying the gun was a good idea. If the guy had pulled out a gun, I might understand the first shots, but that doesn't explain jumping on the hood. I was trying to come up with a good reason for his actions, but I am drawing a blank. If there is more information released later, I would like to see it.
The more I think about it, this video is certainly stranger than I thought it was when I first saw it.
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This is untrue. In the same video at 0:48 you can clearly see the passenger start to roll the window down, and it's still intact at 0:49 when the second Police vehicle hits the passenger door of the stolen car and the impact breaks the window.
I stand [sit] corrected. Watching it without going to full screen and being focused on the first cop, I didn't notice the second cop car ramming the passenger's door.
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Need more info before I weigh in.
Me, too. A real outlier. Hyperaggressive uncooperative suspect, passenger in stolen car, and it does not look like the officer "jumped in front of the car," but more sort of fell across the hood, perhaps to get a better angle to stop the driver. Past disciplinaryrecords don't necessarily mean he was a bad cop, maybe just an "active" one. I know that's "pushing" a defense, but on the other hand, perhaps others are "pushing" an agenda.
Tough one. More data / testimony needed.
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... and it does not look like the officer "jumped in front of the car," but more sort of fell across the hood, perhaps to get a better angle to stop the driver.
No. At 0:43 the cop is beside the left front fender as the car is moving slowly forward. By 0:44 the car has gained and the cop is beside the left front wheel. At 0:45 the cop fires the first shot while back-peddling alongside the car. At 0:46, after already having fired three or four shots, the cop sidesteps to his left and leans/falls onto the hood of the car.
In other words ... the cop was in no danger of being run over or struck by the car until he (the cop) placed himself in front of the moving car.
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In other words ... the cop was in no danger of being run over or struck by the car until he (the cop) placed himself in front of the moving car.
I bet they teach that at the academy; it comes up too often. Place yourself in the path of a moving vehicle to justify using deadly force in alleged self defense. IIRC, they did that to that pastor they ambushed and murdered outside a convenience store in northern Georgia a few years ago. (that one still pisses me off)
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I bet they teach that at the academy; it comes up too often. Place yourself in the path of a moving vehicle to justify using deadly force in alleged self defense. IIRC, they did that to that pastor they ambushed and murdered outside a convenience store in northern Georgia a few years ago. (that one still pisses me off)
In the case around here several years ago, the cop didn't even try to put himself in front of the car. He was standing beside the driver's door, the driver tried to BACK AWAY from the cop, and the cop executed him and them claimed he was in fear of being run over. In all such cases I've read about since then, it seems the officers somehow magically arrange to position themselves in front of the vehicle even when there's no logical reason for them to be there. I don't think they [officially] teach that at the academies, but I'm sure that the tactic is being disseminated through the ranks somehow.
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Kinda like that "shoot em outside and then drag em in the house" horse pucky that STILL goes around.
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Kinda like that "shoot em outside and then drag em in the house" horse pucky that STILL goes around.
Except your example is horse pucky because we ordinary citizens couldn't get away with it. While police do get away with claiming they are in fear of the lives when a reasonable person in the same situation wouldn't be.
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I wasn't there the first time that was said --probably during the Prohibition era --but I think it was a joke then and still is. I suppose some people might take it seriously, though.
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But Joe said it was okay to blast them through the door
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"...woman involved in a traffic stop committed suicide after shooting herself through the mouth while her hands were cuffed behind her back, Virginia police said."
https://www.foxnews.com/us/woman-shot-herself-in-the-head-while-cuffed-with-hands-behind-her-back-during-traffic-stop-police-say