ok. i've been accused of jumping the gun and embellishing some information. i just found another news source that says exactly what i said happened....so i guess whoever thought i was wrong can read this and make their own decision. BTW i didn't "embellish" anything, if anything i may have used logic in making determinations as to how this incident probably unfolded. nothing was fabricated by me, the only thing being argued was that i may have put A before B, or B before A, neither scenario of which would have changed the appropriateness of the police response.
here is the link:
http://www.somdnews.com/stories/122706/entetop143520_32137.shtml
A soldier facing a return to combat duty shot at lawmen called to his family’s home in Hollywood this week, authorities said, and he raised a gun at approaching officers before a sharpshooter killed him.
‘‘He said someone would die that night,” St. Mary’s Sheriff Timothy K. Cameron said at a press conference Tuesday about five hours after the midday death of James Emerick Dean, a 29-year-old Army reservist who had served in Afghanistan during 2004 and 2005 and was being activated to go to Iraq.
‘‘This upset him greatly,” the sheriff said, and prompted family members to call police shortly before 10 p.m. on Christmas night to check on his safety, and to warn that he had weapons at the house on Dusty Lane. Sheriff’s deputies and Maryland State Police went to the house, and made a phone call to the lone occupant.
‘‘He said he was not going to come out [and] that he intended to commit suicide,” the sheriff said.
Dean shot three police cars, including one occupied by a lawman who was not injured, during the 14-hour confrontation in which communications lapsed into repetitive comments, the sheriff said, including Dean’s proclamation that someone would die.
‘‘It appeared that they were going nowhere,” Col. Thomas E ‘‘Tim” Hutchins, secretary of the Maryland State Police, said of the negotiations. At about 10 a.m. Tuesday, a state police Special Tactical Assault Team arrived.
Police were aware of Dean’s firearms training.
‘‘We were certainly cautious,” Cameron said.
The standoff continued until shortly after noon that day, when law officers in a military-type vehicle fired tear gas canisters into the house, the law enforcement commanders said, as additional officers approached the back of the house. Dean appeared, carrying either a shotgun or rifle.
‘‘He came to the front door of the house,” Hutchins said. ‘‘He began to raise that weapon.”
The single shot striking Dean was fired by a 46-year-old police sergeant, a 17-year veteran of the agency who had served 13 years with the tactical team, the colonel said.
‘‘The officer had to take that action to protect the exposed officers,” Cameron said.
The vehicle carrying seven officers had open ports on its sides to fire the tear gas rounds, police communications director Gregory Shipley said, and its rear hatch was open.
Hutchins said all other officers on the property would have been in jeopardy if Dean had been given an opportunity to use his weapon.
‘‘It’s a tragedy that was not of our doing,” Hutchins said. ‘‘It was Mr. Dean who decided.”
‘‘Their priority was to end this peacefully with no harm to anyone, particularly Mr. Dean,” the sheriff said.
okay, so now it now appears undisputed that the following occurred, in this order:
1. normal patrol officers arrived to the call of a welfare concern/possibly suicidal person and contacted him (it appears, by phone). they arrive on Christmas evening (Monday).
2. citizen says he is not coming out and is threatening suicide, and will shoot at anyone entering the house. citizen also said someone would die although unspecific as to whom.
3. citizen fires shots at police cars. one of the bullets struck a patrol car occupied by an officer.
4. law enforcement hostage negotiators attempt communication and talking him into giving up for 14 hours
5. on Tuesday 12/26 at around 1000 hours a SWAT team arrives
6. at approximately 1200 hours they pump gas into the house and attempt a rear entry into the residence. citizen comes out the front door with a weapon and allegedly points it at an officer. sniper shoots citizen dead.
shockingly, this is mysteriously the exact order of events that i said probably and logically happened:
SWAT wasn't the first responders. patrol officers responded, got shot at, the bad guy barricaded himself, and then SWAT showed up. if you act like an idiot and shoot at the patrol officers, and barricade yourself, SWAT will probably respond.
you may ask how did i come up with this scenario logically in the now proven correct order? based upon typical police response. evidently something some people here may have little to no knowledge of since their level of expertise of law enforcement response deals primarily with what they read on the internet, watch on TV (reality based TV shows, CSI, and other fictional police dramas), things they make up in their head, and see in the news media. they don't have any real world first-hand experience on what a typical LE agency does, how they do it, and why they do what they do.
it made no sense for a SWAT team to initially respond to a call like this. even if SWAT was mobilized immediately, a SWAT team generally NEVER arrives first. patrol officers beat everyone there because they are closest. SWAT response time even in a major city like New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Dallas, Houston, etc., takes at least 20-30 minutes at best. in those same cities the patrol officers arrive generally within less than 10 minutes if it is a high priority call.
i guessed that SWAT got there after the initial shots were fired. turns out i was right. i reasonably deduced this because generally speaking, if this turns into a barricaded standoff, secondary responder patrol cars park well away from where the incident is occurring. not always so with the initial responding officers who had no idea this was going to turn into a barricaded standoff. it was very evident that the cars that got shot up were those of initial responders, not SWAT. SWAT most likely showed up at a designated command post and were briefed before going out to the actual area to set up. it also says they used an armored vehicle. chances are most of the SWAT guys responded to the command post in various cars, assembled, briefed, and got into the armored car. they probably didn't go to the PD, brief there, get into the armored car, and all drive out there.
so i guess for all of the guys who accused me of making things up or embellishing can see that through logic we could have reasonably deducted the logical course of events.
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