When Fear of the Police Is Not Living Free

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by Glenn R. Geist

It’s getting very hard for me to maintain the opinion that unnecessary and illegal shootings by police officers are a rare and statistically unimportant thing. It’s harder and harder to believe the cover stories that have traditionally justified such things now that most of us have video cameras in our pockets and are able to post to the internet in real time.

The LA Times posted a video a short while ago: a close-up of a young man apparently trying to get up off the ground and  being shot repeatedly by an officer. After staggering and falling in terminal agony after the first 6 shots, he gets another as a gratuitous point-blank coup de grace. There is something in his right hand that certainly looks flexible and not gun-like. You can see that as it hits the ground. My stomach turned as I heard him saying no, no, no until the last shot silenced him.

No, I wasn’t there, didn’t see what led up to it, but I’m not blind or stupid and I’m sure I witnessed a murder. I’m sure this wasn’t a twitchy trigger finger, but an officer determined not to stop shooting until the target was stone cold dead. I could hear a voice in the background saying “what the fck.”   Indeed, that’s my question: what the fck?

There’s too much of this these days to write off as an isolated incident or poor training and I have a hard time dismissing the notion that it’s deliberate, cowardly and even malicious. We are or should not be in a war where anyone can be presumed to be an enemy and shot at will.

Some of us laughed at Donald Trump’s assertion that he could shoot someone in broad daylight on 5th Avenue and get away with it, but it’s happening all across the country on national TV and rarely are there repercussions. Are cops being trained to empty the last round in the magazine into anyone suspicious, to interpret the slightest thing as grounds for summary execution? Is it to the point where a speech impediment, bad hearing or just slowness born of fear is interpreted as resisting arrest with violence even when no arrest has been suggested? Any object in one’s hand is too often an excuse to remove any imagined danger with a hail of bullets, and any excuse seems too often to end in an acquittal.

I’m not an anti-gun nut. I’m licensed to carry a concealed weapon, but who in their right mind would dare risk a traffic stop during which admitting that’s there’s a gun in the glove gets you shot to death? If the wind lists my shirt and exposed a weapon, am I subject to any policeman’s panic reaction?  My guns stay locked up at home, thank you.

I’m not an activist or extremist. I don’t belong to any groups protesting police or their actions, but as I said, I’m not blind or stupid or uncaring. It’s not just black people and even if it were, living in a country where one is afraid of the police is not living free.

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Glenn Geist

Glenn Geist lives in South Florida and wastes most of his time boating, writing, complaining and talking on the radio
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Glenn R. Geist
6 years ago

Is there a difference between a “double tap” and emptying a 15 round magazine? There is a difference between a real threat and an inert object like a wallet. Do we stop the threat of someone trying to show his CCW permit by shooting someone? Sometimes it’s not hard to put yourself in the place of someone in mortal terror with a gun stuck in his face being shrieked at. Could I be sure of not somehow doing the wrong thing?

Of course it’s better than it was in the 60s but some of these high profile acquittals are hard to ignore and there have been more than one or two. I can understand that there is media hype. I was on the side of the police officer in the Ferguson case, for instance, It was a perfect example of the “Innocent Child” trying to murder a cop, but I don’t think it explains many of the more egregious incidents.

A few innocent people being killed is a few too many. I’m not against re-visiting concealed carry permits, and I no longer am willing to do it, license or no license, but I’ve seen too many videos that can’t be explained away easily as self defense and seem hard to view as anything but an officer or officers losing control out of sheer panic. There are threats that are not threats and my biggest concern are shootings of impaired people trying to comply or unable to hear a command or too afraid to comply instantly.

6 years ago

In America anyone can buy and carry a gun, even assault rifles. America is a dangerous country, depending on where you are, so the police need weapons to defend themselves. Britain doesn’t have nearly the crime rate or the violence except maybe for the terrorists, and this should mandate police carry guns.

Neil Bamforth
6 years ago

Some want all British police armed.

Lots of time and respect for them but have had contact with some I wouldn’t trust with a catapult.

Bill Formby
6 years ago

Never Mind, see my next post.

6 years ago

People (including the idiots of cable news) keep saying cops are “worse” and more “aggressive” than ever. Not true as Mike will tell you. We were both cops in the ’60’s and I can tell you it’s A LOT BETTER now than it was then.

Glenn R. Geist
6 years ago

I really can understand that point too. I simply wouldn’t want to be a cop when anyone you confront might be packing. Hell, around here preachers and old lady school teachers carry guns. I’m aware of how much courage much police work takes and for how little reward.

I know that this is a huge country where a one in a million circumstance is made to appear commonplace, but when I read about people being shot because they couldn’t hear, or were unable to speak or when a wallet is mistaken for a gun or because they tell an officer they have a legal gun during a traffic stop – when I see videos where the policeman is near hysteria and panic. I get sick to my stomach. Law abiding people should not have to be afraid of the police but it takes only a few cases, a few “mistakes” to cement that fear. It takes only a handful of questionable acquittals even without the input of political activists, to have the public on edge.

A few years ago, after a rash of burglaries in my neighborhood, I talked to a sheriff’s deputy about home security and he advised me always to shoot to kill because I will otherwise spend the rest of my life in court. He may be right, but that “dead men tell no tails” attitude belongs in pirate movies not in the America I though I lived in. I was chilled to the bone, although I tried not to react, and it scares the hell out of me.

On the other hand I knew a former Baltimore officer
whose life was destroyed in the courts because of a shooting during a convenience store holdup and I feel he was unjustly accused. It’s not a problem I have the answer to but it’s a problem that’s eating away at our country.

Reply to  Glenn R. Geist
6 years ago

Police officers are trained to shoot to stop the threat. A double tap center mass usually does that, and, in some cases, does not kill the bad guy, although if the aim is accurate it most often does, thus stopping the threat. Because of the hyperbolic news reporting, and some of the more militant organizations who seem hell bent on killing cops, and often preach that in their many mantras, the police see them as the enemy, and, sad to say, often see everyone, except those in uniform, as potential enemies. This is a cynicism born of the job, and, again, because of the inflated hyperbole surrounding the police and virtually everything they do, I see an increase in hostilities, employed as a defense mechanism. There’s a lot more to this however, but time doesn’t permit a more thorough analysis.

Admin
6 years ago

Of course you knew I’d push back on this Glenn, but I hope you also know I respect your opinion immensely. Here are the stats from the Washington Post, the only reliable database of police shootings in the United States:

So far in 2017, 721 people have been shot by police and 164 of them are black. This number is actually down from 2017. As of July 1, 2017, 67 police officers have been shot and killed. This is up 20% since 2016. These numbers represent deadly force and cop killings in a country of 350 million people, and 850K police officers.

In America, pretty much anyone can buy a gun, and carry a gun, even if they’re nuttier than the proverbial fruitcakes. This fact alone represents a significant threat to police officers. The investigation has barely begun into the LA shooting you mention so I will reserve comment.

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