MN: Police urge calm in wake of shooting of teen

[Mad Man]

Seems like a justifiable shooting by the police to me.

But then again, I wasn't there, I don't have all the facts, I only know what was reported by the liberal media, I'm not a cop so what do I know, blah blah blah.

[BLOCKQUOTE]
September 21st, 2004 03:13 AM

This isn't about violating civil rights. This is about smearing the name of a man dead in his grave.

You see, dead people don't have civil rights anymore. What they should have is the right not to be spoken ill of in their death by a pack of strangers.

You knew the deceased? Speak up.

You didn't know the deceased? Show some respect for a man who can't defend himself.

At the very least, have some common decency to show some respect for the mother who had to bury her child by keeping your speculations about the thuggish character of her dead son to yourselves until the facts are in front of you.
[/BLOCKQUOTE]

 

[Mad Man]

[DELETED: double post]

 

[jdege]

just being there at night is not prima facie evidence of wrongdoing.

True enough.

Being a 15-year-old on the street at 12:30 in the morning is grounds for being stopped and questioned - even for a white kid in the suburbs. It's something that happened to me more than once.

But the only real wrongdoing in the story as I've heard it was on the part of the kid who was shooting the other kids with the pellet gun.

The other kids were just being stupid when they decided to run from the police.

OTOH, I don't much care for Minneapolis police - those I've met had an attitude that rubbed me in the wrong way. And I'm a middle-aged white guy from the suburbs. (Oddly enough, I've never had that from St. Paul police.)

If I was young and stupid and had had bad experiences with cops, would I have run?

 

[gunsmith]

double tap & head shot?

Good shooting officer!

Parents and schools need to teach basic gun safety,this is what happens when you don't

 

[Zebulon]

I've taught all my children several things related to this subject. Some of them are...Never run from the Police. Never put yourself in a place where you have no business being. When you're wrong, you're wrong....and NEVER think that you're smart enough to figure out the consequences of your own, or others, wrong actions. Life is too unpredictable and messy to forcast the future. If one of my children ever took a bullet for the consequences of any of the above actions...I would grieve the loss of a loved one, my heart would be broken....and I would look into a casket angered at the foolishness of one who was dear to my heart. You ALWAYS reap what you sow....some immediately, some later, but always. Blameshifting is epidemic in this culture. My heart goes out to the Officer who now has to eat additional crap and stress for simply doing the right thing. Zebulon

 

[Tharg]

what zeb said -

I was taught to not point guns at anything really - even cap guns...

can't imagine being 15 again and running from the cops...

which of course means i REALLY can't imagine stopping and pointing something that looks like a gun at them.

but hey.... just me - my dad would have kicked my but... even if i was dead... he'd have found a way... thats how good Dad was about right and wrong....

J/Tharg!

EDIT: btw.. wild - you really caught me off guard too... didn't sect those words from ya and kept reading down waiting for the 'splain... <rofl> heheh.

 

[jefnvk]

Original post says pellet pistol, not airsoft. But I do agree.

You point something that is made to resemble a gun (legally, that is a handgun in MI anyways, I dunno about MN) at a police officer, expect to get shot.

 

[Daniel T]

Hey how come there are no other cries of police brutality? Is it becasue it was a black kid rather than a white gun owner?

WildpotstirrerAlaska

You know, there is a fine line between potstirrer and troll.

 

[Chipperman]

Why stir the pot if nobody has added any excess spice?

This thread was going along fine without any negative comments about the Police until you made that comment.

 

[P0832177]

While a possible tragic loss of life. Our thoughts should be with the officer. We need to take care of the living. Having close personal knowledge of post traumatic stress related to the taking of a life it is not something that officer he will ever forget.

 

[nomadboi]

Sounds like a good double-tap to me. Regrettable, but not the officer's mistake, as far as we can tell from the information presented here.

But ArmoredMan, you realize your own hypocracy here, right?

Talk about sounding like a Democrat - sweeping statements with no basis in truth, and insulting huge numbers of people for no reason, for the actions of a few.

Um... I think you just insulted about half the population of the US right there yourself, including some who speak the truth and believe in the RKBA. Let's remember this is the high road here, and not just find our own local minorities to gang up on.

 

[carpettbaggerr]

but just being there at night is not prima facie evidence of wrongdoing.

Yes, it is. Having once been a teenager, I can assure you a group of young men out at 12:30 am aren't doing charitable work.

"Officers are not taught to kill a person. Officers are not taught to shoot a person so they die. Officers are taught and trained to stop the threat."

I love the semantics. Of course the officer is shooting to kill. Does anyone believe a bullet to the forehead is not an attempt to kill the perpetrator? Lethal force is entirely justified, and the cop killed someone he believed was trying to kill him. Stop with the weasel-words already.

 

[Matt G]

Last time I saw a "toy" gun taken off a kid, I literally thought it was a real gun for several minutes while looking at it in good strong light:

 

[ducktapehero]

I hate airsoft, those guns look real enough to get you in serious trouble.

I owned several toy guns and BB guns that looked VERY similar to real guns. I was also taught not to point them at anyone unless I was in the woods and I was playing with my friends. I would think that at 15, even someone with no gun training by their parents would be smart enough to refrain from pointing a realistic gun at a cop. If he didn't know, for some reason, then it's the failure of his parents. Either way it's sad.

Rant mode on!!

That said. I don't think the cop did anything wrong. What I wanna know is if it was a white kid then society would just say,"dumbass kid, should've known better." But since it was a black kid it's now the cop's fault for doing his job. I think that many black "leaders" are taking "the man is just putting us down" a little too far and are just looking for trouble.

I personally believe that People like Jesse Jackson have done more harm to race relations than the klan. People know the klan are a bunch of idiots, I just wish that a lot of blacks could see the same about many of their self appointed leaders. It's just an ugly situation any way you look at it.

Rant mode off.