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VMI77 wrote:

baldeagle wrote:First, the video is not very revealing. The camera is pointing downward, and it's hard to see what the suspect is doing. It's impossible to tell exactly what happened, but the officer who did not fire said he saw the suspect reaching for something. Whether he really was or the officer was reacting to the trauma is hard to say. We don't know what led up to the confrontation. Why was he singled out and three other males were ignored? What information did the officers have when they arrived on the scene? Based on the video alone, it's impossible to say whether the shooting was justified or not.

They had an anonymous call about a man with a gun. From what I've read, sounds like someone "SWATTED" him.

To my knowledge, all states have a "felony murder" statute. If making a false report to a police officer/agency is a felony, then someone swatting can and should be charged with felony murder.

Chas.

cb1000rider wrote:My apologizes. If it makes any difference, weren't intentionally misquoted, so perhaps I missed your point. You're right, body cameras do nothing for pre-incident facts. They just contribute to post-incident recall. And perhaps I'm overly-passionate about it.

Thanks, but no apology was necessary. If I were still a street COP, I'd buy my own body camera to defend myself against false allegations. My point is that they won't help me figure out what's going on while events are unfolding.

Chas.

cb1000rider wrote:

Charles L. Cotton wrote:determine what are the facts, so give yourself and the LEO that time by complying with their commands.

What would help in determining the actual facts and go a very long way to promote public confidence, protect good officers, and make sure that people with "inaccurate" accounts are treated properly is requiring body cameras on officers.
There are simply too many instances where we have only one surviving narrative. And we've certainly seen instances where public sentiment is so anti-police that it wouldn't take much for several people to concoct the same story against a single officer.

The sooner this gets done the better.

You only quoted part of my post and it's clear that I was talking about an officer responding to a call and determining the facts; i.e. who's who, what happened, why it happened, etc. Body cameras don't help one bit in that part of the interaction. Body cameras only come into play when investigating the incident.

Chas.

I get the impression that some folks who have not been in situations LEOs face seem to think that it is always clear whether or not a subject is a threat, if you wait long enough for it the facts manifest themselves. Simulators are better than no simulators, but they are no match for force-on-force training with Simunitions. Houston's convicted felon and rabble-rouser Quanell X has condemned pretty much every shooting of a black person by a police officer as murder. However, after recently going through force-on-force scenarios (See ShootDonTalk's link to the TV news story), Quanell changed his tune. He had very good advice for everyone - when the COPSs tell you to do something, do it! As he learned, facts are not always clear and as stress levels increase, the human brain can fill in factual gaps. When a subject refuses to comply with a LEO's commands, he may be doing so out of defiance or disrespect, but the LEO is likely view his failure to comply as being a tactical threat.

It often takes time to determine what are the facts, so give yourself and the LEO that time by complying with their commands.

Chas.