Unnarmed man lying on ground with arms up shot by police

[Kellhound]

Accidental police shootings.

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What you're referring to is negligence.

Hitting the wrong target at close range is even more negligent, or just utter total incompetence.

[InventiveMeasures]

They've also suspended the police commander for "inconsistencies in his statements about the shooting".

[Keosen]

The good thing about this is that the argument "Comply with the police and don't do anything stupid to not get shot" is no longer valid.

In the land of the free even then you can get shot, you literally must be afraid the police more than any criminal in Amurica, they have the licence to kill you and you will also going to be blamed after.

[Mayhem]

Sooo what are the real facts now?

I´ve heard the officer shot 3 times and missed all 3 despite hitting the therapist, because he actually wanted to shoot the handicapped person and not the therapist.

Is this true?

[Meldetia]

Sooo what are the real facts now?

I´ve heard the officer shot 3 times and missed all 3 despite hitting the therapist, because he actually wanted to shoot the handicapped person and not the therapist.

Is this true?

Basically yes that is the officers side of the story. He thought the autistic person was an imminent threat to the therapist which would legally allow him to fire. So to save the therapist he shot at the autistic person...missing him three times and hitting the therapist.

I'm not convinced about this side though - it could very well be the officers/departments twist to try keep people calm as well as absolve at least some of the wrongdoing on the officer. There are some problems with their story. They say he was out of range to hear what the therapist was saying, but "He shot after another officer, in a radio transmission, suggested the autistic man was loading his weapon, which turned out to be the toy truck." So the officer had radio contact with other police officers which were closer to them (as shown on the video) who said they were in the process of negotiations with the two on the ground. Why those closer officers couldn't determine that it was a toy or to hear the therapist they were supposedly negotiating with and pass that information on the radio I don't know. In the video I can see an officer behind a telephone pole that appears (hard to tell on video) to be 30 maybe 40 feet from the men. The therapist was speaking loudly and clearly to me.

I do see the possibility that this was actually a negligent discharge with a 3-round burst weapon - haven't seen any source showing what type of weapon or if it had that capability. This would explain the exceptionally poor aim as well as the "I don't know" response when asked why he was shot. Although if true it seems rather poor judgement to have it on burst in the first place.

Anyways the above really is hindsight speculation...but I find this suspicious in any case.

[Dug]

That they were even planning on shooting the autistic man is just... grossly incompetent. Even in the shitty quality videos we have available one can see that he wasn't armed with anything but a toy.

[zenkai]

I just want to know who the dumbass 911 caller was who thought a toy truck was a gun, that helped escalate the situation.
The office who shot though, clearly incompetent and should never wear a badge again.

Every profession has a C student, police are no different.

[TwoNineMarine]

The good thing about this is that the argument "Comply with the police and don't do anything stupid to not get shot" is no longer valid.

In the land of the free even then you can get shot, you literally must be afraid the police more than any criminal in Amurica, they have the licence to kill you and you will also going to be blamed after.

You're right.

One incident of a police officer being a complete idiot means all police are complete idiots and will shoot everyone they interact with.

Totally makes sense.

[Svifnymr]

Sooo what are the real facts now?

I´ve heard the officer shot 3 times and missed all 3 despite hitting the therapist, because he actually wanted to shoot the handicapped person and not the therapist.

Is this true?

That's the statement the Police Union released as the officers version. "I was aiming for the autistic guy but missed 3 times, one of my misses hit the other guy in the leg." (Not actual quote, just synopsis.)

The guys lawyer is saying that's a lie, trying to say they were aiming for his client, but frankly I think that's silly. You can't PROVE anything of the sort, so it just feels like race-baiting to raise the lawsuit $.

ALSO, they just fired some other guy for making false statements except they haven't released any real statement other than "3 rounds fired", so I assume it's something he said in the internal investigation that was later disproved or contradicted.

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I just want to know who the dumbass 911 caller was who thought a toy truck was a gun, that helped escalate the situation.

As I said before, I wouldn't doubt if one of the neighbors hates having this facility in "his backyard" and made a call like that rather than "autistic guy is sitting in the road playing with his truck".

The office who shot though, clearly incompetent and should never wear a badge again.

Every profession has a C student, police are no different.

Yeah, public apology, payoff the victim, fire the officer, try to make sure that officers responding to at least this area and others with similar facilities understand what they're responding to.

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They say he was out of range to hear what the therapist was saying, but "He shot after another officer, in a radio transmission, suggested the autistic man was loading his weapon, which turned out to be the toy truck." So the officer had radio contact with other police officers which are closer to him (as shown on the video) who said they were in the process of negotiations with the two on the ground. Why those closer officers couldn't determine that it was a toy or to hear the therapist they were supposedly negotiating with and pass that information on the radio I don't know. In the video I can see an officer behind a telephone pole that appears (hard to tall on video) to be ~30 maybe 40 feet from the men. The therapist was speaking loudly and clearly to me.

I don't have answers, obviously, but just theories to explain the shooting (other than "cubans hate black people and shoot them when they're on the ground!" or something). I saw the one video fragment as well as some still photo's and stuff, but nothing like an ordered, sequenced thing that shows the actual shooting. There was a still photo showing a cop getting his AR out for instance, but was that right before the shooting happened? Did he arrive, get on target, then shoot based on a radio message from someone saying "he's threatening the guy on the ground, he has something in his hand!"? Still rings as "negligent" to me anyway.

The cops closer to the guys may have been yelling back and forth, so didn't have their radio mic's open. A lot of these situations they try to keep the radios clear for important information. So while they were handling the situation, someone else may have said "danger" and the guy fired, before they could clarify.

I do see the possibility that this was actually was a negligent discharge with a 3-round burst weapon - haven't seen any source showing what type of weapon or if it had that capability. This would explain the exceptionally poor aim as well as the "I don't know" response when asked why he was shot. Although if true it seems rather poor judgement to have it on burst in the first place.

Anyways the above really is hindsight speculation...but I find this suspicious in any case.

I'd also appreciate some kind of official word on whether it was actually the shooter that said 'I don't know" at the scene. There were quite a few officers about and it's just the victim so far making that claim, especially since I don't see how he'd know who shot him.

[Meldetia]

I don't have answers, obviously, but just theories to explain the shooting (other than "cubans hate black people and shoot them when they're on the ground!" or something). I saw the one video fragment as well as some still photo's and stuff, but nothing like an ordered, sequenced thing that shows the actual shooting. There was a still photo showing a cop getting his AR out for instance, but was that right before the shooting happened? Did he arrive, get on target, then shoot based on a radio message from someone saying "he's threatening the guy on the ground, he has something in his hand!"? Still rings as "negligent" to me anyway.

The cops closer to the guys may have been yelling back and forth, so didn't have their radio mic's open. A lot of these situations they try to keep the radios clear for important information. So while they were handling the situation, someone else may have said "danger" and the guy fired, before they could clarify.

I don't think there is a recording of the actual shooting - the second video on http://www.miamiherald.com/news/loca...e91160077.html is what I watched which is some unknown time before the shooting. Watching it again just now I see I missed an officer on the other side of the street behind a utility pole. That is an excellent point about radio protocols but I think that things like "autistic", "behavioral therapist" and "toy truck/no gun" would have been important information that to me should have been conveyed. Their statement release though says that "many" (it did not say all) officers on the scene thought he was holding a gun until they were taken down after the shots.

I'd also appreciate some kind of official word on whether it was actually the shooter that said 'I don't know" at the scene. There were quite a few officers about and it's just the victim so far making that claim, especially since I don't see how he'd know who shot him.

This is a good point - it could have been any of other officers other then the shooter who he asked and then they responded.

[Svifnymr]

I don't think there is a recording of the actual shooting - the second video on http://www.miamiherald.com/news/loca...e91160077.html is what I watched which is some unknown time before the shooting. Watching it again just now I see I missed an officer on the other side of the street behind a utility pole.

I'm just not sure why that video stops where it does, other than the lawyer only releasing that snippet.

That is an excellent point about radio protocols but I think that things like "autistic", "behavioral therapist" and "toy truck/no gun" would have been important information that to me should have been conveyed. Their statement release though says that "many" (it did not say all) officers on the scene thought he was holding a gun until they were taken down after the shots.

As you say, there's a cop behind the pole, another is near another pole, but the ones shown are not on the side of the video-taker. It's also worth noting that they're set up on the right of the video, with the autistic guy in the middle, so a missed shot could easily hit the victims leg from that angle. And of course, since they're at such a poor angle, they quite possibly can't actually see what's in the autistic guys hands. So, again, theoretically, two officer arrive on the scene of "guy with a gun in street", they report "guy in street, object in hands, can't make it out" over radio, then they begin engaging with victim, while autistic guy screams at victim.

SWATDude appears behind them, grabs rifle, takes aim...


And sure, the video is great, but maybe if the guy had used his phone to call 911 and say "hey, I'm right here, the cops have this guy at gunpoint, but it's just some nutjob with a toy truck!"? Not that it excuses the shooting, but the victim is laying there in danger, doing his best to help the situation while in danger, maybe use speaker phone so you can video tape while talking to 911?

[Keosen]

You're right.

One incident of a police officer being a complete idiot means all police are complete idiots and will shoot everyone they interact with.

Totally makes sense.

Oh so you are saying that this won't happen again right?

[TwoNineMarine]

Oh so you are saying that this won't happen again right?

It very well could.

Doesn't mean that all police are terrible and that "the argument "Comply with the police and don't do anything stupid to not get shot" is no longer valid." as you so eloquently put it is dead.

The vast majority of police (99% or so) will continue to do outstanding work and have great interactions with the citizens they work around.

[Zoneseek]

It very well could.

Doesn't mean that all police are terrible and that "the argument "Comply with the police and don't do anything stupid to not get shot" is no longer valid." as you so eloquently put it is dead.

The vast majority of police (99% or so) will continue to do outstanding work and have great interactions with the citizens they work around.

Until those police start calling out other cops who do a bad job and lose the insane protectionism seen within police departments, the public will continue to lose trust in ALL police including the good ones. I think this guy really nailed it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZiIGR2qVLs - in my opinion his rant is spot on and applies to all recent excessive force cases with police, not just the one hes talking about.

[TwoNineMarine]

Until those police start calling out other cops who do a bad job and lose the insane protectionism seen within police departments, the public will continue to lose trust in ALL police including the good ones. I think this guy really nailed it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZiIGR2qVLs - in my opinion his rant is spot on and applies to all recent excessive force cases with police, not just the one hes talking about.

And a lot of cops do. It just gets shut out by our media.

I'm not a cop but I work with a lot because of my job and they all berate the living fuck out of these dipshit officers that do stuff like the one in the OP.

Sadly most people realize that cops do great work and that it's only the very very few that fuck up (intentionally or otherwise) yet the vocal minority makes it out to seem like some epidemic.

[Chrysia]

And a lot of cops do. It just gets shut out by our media.

I'm not a cop but I work with a lot because of my job and they all berate the living fuck out of these dipshit officers that do stuff like the one in the OP.

Sadly most people realize that cops do great work and that it's only the very very few that fuck up (intentionally or otherwise) yet the vocal minority makes it out to seem like some epidemic.

Because police unions also make it almost impossible to fire these cops, so they stay on the job in the vast majority of cases. Also, the "thin blue line" absolutely is a thing. The cops in your area may be saints, but there's an "us and them" mentality in many police precincts that excuses virtually any behavior of fellow officers.

[TwoNineMarine]

Because police unions also make it almost impossible to fire these cops, so they stay on the job in the vast majority of cases. Also, the "thin blue line" absolutely is a thing. The cops in your area may be saints, but there's an "us and them" mentality in many police precincts that excuses virtually any behavior of fellow officers.

I think you'd be surprised how many officers actually disagree with that stuff even in the shittier parts of the country. They just don't have a voice to make that known.

I'm not advocating that all police are perfect. Not by a long stretch. I certainly believe that the officer involved in the OP should be fired and jailed for shooting that man.

What I argue against is when people try and claim all police are bad m'kay when an officer does something like this.

[Chrysia]

I think you'd be surprised how many officers actually disagree with that stuff even in the shittier parts of the country. They just don't have a voice to make that known.

I'm not advocating that all police are perfect. Not by a long stretch. I certainly believe that the officer involved in the OP should be fired and jailed for shooting that man.

What I argue against is when people try and claim all police are bad m'kay when an officer does something like this.

I don't think anyone is claiming that literally all police are bad. I think the problem is that the current framework of both typical officer mentality and the extremely protectionist setup of police unions makes it very difficult to distinguish good cops from bad cops at a distance. 99.999999% of them could be great, but the current system makes it almost impossible to pick out and remove that 0.000001%, which is a problem.

[TwoNineMarine]

I don't think anyone is claiming that literally all police are bad. I think the problem is that the current framework of both typical officer mentality and the extremely protectionist setup of police unions makes it very difficult to distinguish good cops from bad cops at a distance. 99.999999% of them could be great, but the current system makes it almost impossible to pick out and remove that 0.000001%, which is a problem.

Oh there are.

I do love unions but sometimes they cause more harm then good and I think in this situation that is the case. It also stems though from our entire judicial network in that cops are found innocent all the time of things they prolly shouldn't be. I bet most officers are innocent but there are some that have gotten off that certainly should not have.

[Chrysia]

Oh there are.

I do love unions but sometimes they cause more harm then good and I think in this situation that is the case. It also stems though from our entire judicial network in that cops are found innocent all the time of things they prolly shouldn't be. I bet most officers are innocent but there are some that have gotten off that certainly should not have.

The judicial problems have way more to do with cop attitude than you realize. Prosecutors that successfully bring police to trial and convict often find very uncooperative police when they get involved in later trials.