Suicide by Cop caught by Body Camera in Idaho

jacobe001
reply to post by opethPA

 

I agree that a taser would have been a better option but the moment the guy started closing in on the cop with a knife, his gun was what he had to use.

Exactly. Also, I was under the impression that most officers are trained to use a taser ONLY if there is another officer on site with a firearm in the event that the taser doesn't connect or do the job. But I may be wrong.

I'm sure that is how training has taught this man to react in these situations, but in my eyes there was no effort at talking or reasoning.

The cop was all about confrontation!

He entered with his gun drawn.

He forcefully stated his authoritative position.

He ordered Eric to come out in an uncompassionate manner.

When ignored he escalated the situation, by confronting the disturbed man with a drawn gun.

He yelled more orders and ultimatums at him.

Finally, as a result of the cop escalating the situation, it turned into a direct confrontation.

Feeling "threatened" he shot the obviously disturbed man dead.

In no way did the cop’s actions ever try to diffuse the situation before turning it into a direct confrontation.
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Imagine how bad the woman who called the cops must now feel... she got that man killed by asking for help to "calm" the man. The cop didn’t help her or the dead man… He left her with a mess to deal with… both physically and emotionally.

How about a simple "Are you alright Eric?"... "I'm here to help Eric."... "I'm an officer of the Law and my job is to protect and serve the public... and I want to protect you from harming yourself."… What can I do to help Eric?”.

The "officer" should really learn to protect the public from himself.

ETA: The video is disgusting on many levels.

puzzlesphere
I'm sure that is how training has taught this man to react in these situations, but in my eyes there was no effort at talking or reasoning.

The cop was all about confrontation!

He entered with his gun drawn.

He forcefully stated his authoritative position.

He ordered Eric to come out in an uncompassionate manner.

When ignored he escalated the situation, by confronting the disturbed man with a drawn gun.

He yelled more orders and ultimatums at him.

Finally, as a result of the cop escalating the situation, it turned into a direct confrontation.

Feeling "threatened" he shot the obviously disturbed man dead.

In no way did the cop’s actions ever try to diffuse the situation before turning it into a direct confrontation.
.
.
.

Imagine how bad the woman who called the cops must now feel... she got that man killed by asking for help to "calm" the man. The cop didn’t help her or the dead man… He left her with a mess to deal with… both physically and emotionally.

How about a simple "Are you alright Eric?"... "I'm here to help Eric."... "I'm an officer of the Law and my job is to protect and serve the public... and I want to protect you from harming yourself."… What can I do to help Eric?”.

The "officer" should really learn to protect the public from himself.

ETA: The video is disgusting on many levels.

edit on 17-1-2014 by puzzlesphere because: (no reason given)

oh come on, the guy was threatening to kill himself, do you not think he also might not also be a threat to others as well?
he was mentally unstable, if i was a cop i would have my gun out too, the very fact that he came at the cop with knives says that having the gun out was a smart option.

the cop was trying to get the guy to come out of his house to talk to him, what else was he supposed to do? he is an authority figure and a lot of people do not respond to authority figures that speak to them in weak wishy-washy voices, you have to be firm.
also he did say he was an officer of the law and he came to help, like 3-4 times, eric refused to so he had to get more forceful about it.

it's almost like cops can't do anything right no matter what, just admit that instead of ignoring reality. clearly people will only accept police dying for stupid reasons or harming assailants just enough to make the complainers feel better, even though often times that can either not slow the assailant down and gets the cop killed or kills the assailant anyway.

It is always interesting to see the comments of those that have no experience of front-line street Policing in this day and age.
I have commented before about the need to swap from 9mm to .45 ACP for LE use.

Have you ever wondered why even armed cops wear the body armour that they do?

It's because crazy people do crazy things and a knife wielding person who,has lost all control of their senses within 15' -20' is regarded as potentially a killer to even a cop with a gun, holstered or not, it's called a danger zone for a reason.

Have you ever wondered why cops carry batons, gas sprays and even firearms, it's not all to do with murderous killing of 'innocent' criminals, there is a fair element of protection of third parties and self preservation involved.

I have a relative in the UK who is a front line street cop now carrying gas spray, baton and Taser along with the obligatory vest of course. Try going up against a mentally disturbed person with a Samurai sword without the last item, then feel qualified to discuss how the Police should or shouldn't shoot someone with a knife who is advancing on them. It's not touchy freely politically correct out there, it's borderline anarchy and that thin blue line as previously stated.

The Tottenham riots that occurred after the shooting of Mark Duggan quickly became total anarchy, houses were being set light with people still in them there is a famous picture of a woman having to jump for her life from a first or second floor window with the flames licking at her heels.

Accidental shooting of innocent people will occur, it happens and will continue to do so, but what do,you want in the place of what is around the corner?

I make no excuses for criminal,acts by Police whatsoever and the full weight of the Law should be brought to bear on them. When it doesn't that is a different issue that still requires attention.

if i was a in the cop position. I would of walked out the door and closed it made sure everyone in the house that was in danger was out . and looked for a non lethal way to disarm the person . Taser etc . think throwing knife is a poor argument. This could've been avoided.

And how do you know at the point that the cop had reached in the house that there were no other people in there and that this guy had no other weapons in there?
Illegal firearms seem pretty easy to get hold of in the States, in fact, easier than legitimate from what I have seen.
I am not sure people can gets their heads around non-lethal weapons and their limitations if they don't understand why 9mm hollow point bullets don't put some people down.
Cops put their lives on the line daily to protect society from a host of people wanting to harm others, it's not like the other emergency services, thankfully, although even they have their own life threatening situations to deal with on a daily basis.
It's just that not many others than the Police have people trying to shoot or stab them as often.

I'm sorry, but one shot to a shoulder of leg would have stopped this easily. Five shots to the core.....good job cop! You stopped that depressed, end of his rope person from hurting himself! Unbelievable. Can you say excessive force?

Did not need to take this man's life. No matter what a single one of you may say. That was messed up. He was trapped in a surrounded house…the officer provoked a trapped man who was obviously mentally ill and then executed him.

Even the home owner was not impressed.

Long live the "right to kill" anyone who may be "ill".

MM

AfterInfinity
Why were five bullets necessary to put this guy down? Why not a taser? I'm not accusing the cops of anything, I'm curious as to what protocol demands given this particular situation and why.

The guy was coming toward the LEO with a knife and was about 8 feet from the officer and repeatedly did not obey instructions despite having a weapon pointed at him. Protocol does not say "Shoot him in the leg" or "Tase him" It says: Protect yourself by eliminating the threat.

This officer will be rightfully exonerated (It happened last summer). The perp here was stupid.

For the benefit of all you armchair pundits, if you have never fired a weapon at a stationary target how in Gods name would you know what it is like to shoot at a moving target, at an angle, in relative subdued light and attempt to hit an arm or a leg when someone is advancing on you with a lethal weapon?

The training as has been repeatedly stated is to hit body mass, not limbs, even with laser sights I don't think it would be that easy to hit a moving limb on a moving target at an angle let alone face on.

These are potentially lethal situations for all concerned.

reply to post by schuyler

schuyler
The perp here was stupid.

Wasn't he, though? And we all know that stupid people are to be executed on sight.

MrMask and Puzzlesphere are exactly right. The cop did what cops now are trained to do when they cannot gain control of a situation -- he escalated the threat. In this case, and far too many others, the other guy called his bluff.

You people who claim that this shooting was justified because the victim was mentally unstable...think about it critically. If it is an unstable person's nature to become violent when cornered, then the cop should have considered that before attempting to subdue him alone. If someone tells you a dog will bite, and you approach the creature menacingly, do you blame the dog for the resultant injuries?

This event demonstrates a widespread problem of police departments being unable to find decent officers. Since everyone uses police work as a stepping stone towards a career goal, there are not enough veterans still on the force to train up the young pups. Consider that young coos these days are mostly Millennials, and the problem becomes even more evident. For those who won't believe anything they haven't read in an article, this was covered in a story on the Drudge report today.

reply to post by OpenMindedRealist


Sorry, but if there is someone with 2 knives who just hit a pole it would seem, with some basic detective work, he tried to ff himself in the accident and it did not happen. He goes somewhere he knows. Thankfully, he did not hurt her and smarter than the average bear of this day and age simply choose a way he wanted to go.

Too many times people like this have been taking weapons to work, schools, malls, theaters...any public place and killing innocents before himself. If someone wants to die and they are serious they will do it. He did. The guy who was shot has more balls to 'do something about it' than most of the people who post on this site.

Sad, but it was inevitable.

There was zero reason to enter with a weapon. He was trapped and surrounded. Sick of people being called armchair generals or wacky because we can clearly see abuse of power.

The dude was sick, possibly injured and trapped with a small army of young warriors outside that could have taken 5 mins to handle this nonviolently. But nope, super macho punk comes running in blazing guns and barking.

I see a nazi murdering a sick man. Most of us do.

MM

Hr2burn
I'm sorry, but one shot to a shoulder of leg would have stopped this easily. Five shots to the core.....good job cop! You stopped that depressed, end of his rope person from hurting himself! Unbelievable. Can you say excessive force?

For everyone saying that the cop should have shot him in the leg or elsewhere here's the problem: in this country, we have a sub-class of disgusting, vile, human vermin known as lawyers that will destroy anyone or any thing that might be 'mean' or offensive to someone with enough gold to pay them. There are home invaders intent on killing tenants/owners who have successfully sued people because the owners didn't finish them off. Death has a way of keeping evil lawyers away it seems.

This cop didn't want to shoot the guy, you could hear him trying to reason with him but it matters not. It appears that getting sued is worse than 'justifiable murder' Don't blame the cops, blame lawyer scum.

This cop did what your trained to do when someone closes on you with a knife. Knife vs. Gun in under 21ft advantage knife, you are trained to never let someone get that close to you with a knife PERIOD, and your trained to shoot center mass. Have you ever seen what a knife could do someone? I have friends who was a blackbelt in karate and he went with the I am going to "disarm" him and after several hundred stitches and staples later his scars are almost gone after several years, and he almost bled out before then. Yeah that was a "great Idea". Think I am wrong, google images and videos of knife wounds, warning it will be graphic.

The officer also HAD a DUTYto check on the victim, if he hadn't he would have been in dereliction of duty. He doesn't check on him and the victim kills himself then you would all be screaming he should have ran in there to "save him".

I have come to see a trend since I have joined ATS that there is a very distinct LEO/GOV attitude growing on here and it is getting worse. There is no debating or discussing it, the mentality is you are ALWAYS wrong. Do not get me wrong there have been some very bad happenings in the LEO and the GOV world to date, I get that and I agree there is becoming more and more. THIS IS NOT ONE OF THEM.

Also the mentality of FEELING and all the stupid useless laws, ordinances and regulations because of such is one reason this planet is in the shape it is today because they "FEEL GOOD" and do not alleviate the problems at all.

Give this officer a break and actually rant on one that actually deserves it.

Grim

The lesson learned from this is If you are mentally ill expect the police to shoot you instead of actually trying to help you.

reply to post by boymonkey74


And this is the mentality I am talking about. This is nothing more than a sneer and baiting statements nothing more, and do not contribute to the discussion at all.

Grim

reply to post by Grimmley


I have already said what I think earlier in the thread but I will expand on it.
I could have done better than the cop not armed, left the building called for back up and a trained mental health team. If he killed himself in the mean time then that is it but If not the mental health team could have talked him down...I worked in mental health and have talked people down from killing themselves but this cop shouts and fires 5 times.
The cops training is rubbish If he is just trained to shoot like that.

reply to post by Grimmley


I have already said what I think earlier in the thread but I will expand on it.
I could have done better than the cop not armed, left the building called for back up and a trained mental health team. If he killed himself in the mean time then that is it but If not the mental health team could have talked him down...I worked in mental health and have talked people down from killing themselves but this cop shouts and fires 5 times.
The cops training is rubbish If he is just trained to shoot like that.

boymonkey74
The lesson learned from this is If you are mentally ill expect the police to shoot you instead of actually trying to help you.

The other lesson learned from this is that if you are holding two knives and are advancing towards an armed officer who has repeatedly told you to drop them, don't expect the officer to whip out a notepad and carry out a full psycho-analytical assessment of your condition.