Off-duty cop shoots teenager in head when startled by light. Sheriffs treat cop as victim.No arrest.

[DetlefK]

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/4/23/1939827/--Shouldn-t-have-been-out-Louisiana-sheriff-blames-unarmed-teen-when-cop-shoots-him-over-cell

A Louisiana sheriff blamed a 14-year-old, unarmed teen for an encounter that left the teen critically injured when an off-duty cop shot him in the head, fearing the teen’s phone light was a gun, according to local news station 4WWL-TV. Jefferson Parish Sheriff Joe Lopinto told reporters the teen was outside of the home of officer William Daniel Short with four other teens around 3 AM on Friday. They had snuck out of their homes to go joyriding in a parent's car and decided to park a few houses down from their own to avoid getting caught, Lopinto told 4WWL. While two of the teens immediately left, three of them stayed inside the car, causing the car’s alarm to sound when they did decide to leave, Lopinto said. Short came outside his home, confronted the teens, and when they tried to get away, fired one shot, claiming he thought a cell phone light was the flash of a gun, the sheriff’s office told 4WWL. The flash was actually just alerting the teen to a call he received around the time of the incident, 4WWL reported.

...

It’s never a good call when you get a call that your child has been shot,” Lopinto said. “And that being said, all that can be prevented if we can keep our children home especially at that time of night.”

...

Lopinto didn’t stop his defense of the officer at the time of the incident either. "He was not in uniform. He was woken up with no shirt on and shorts on and exited his house as a regular homeowner,” Lopinto said. “We are treating him as obviously a victim and a suspect at this time."

According to the Sheriff's department, no crime was commited against the officer. So why is he being treated by the Sheriff's department as the victim of this situation? Victim of what?

[mr_lebowski]

1. "Bad things happen at that time of the morning." Well there it is then ... that explains everything

Nothing to see here. Never mind that perceiving a phone flashing as a gunshot when it was not immediately followed by the normal audible report of a gunshot is pretty much a FCUKING RIDICULOUS excuse ...

Kinda curious as to the ethnicity of the parties involved in this shooting.

[writes3000]

3. The shooter and the deceased kid are both white.

https://www.nola.com/news/crime_police/article_d6161a5e-84cf-11ea-9844-73619c111d6a.html

I hate “shoot first” stories like this.

[mr_lebowski]

5. Thanks for the info ... and I hate it too. It's even worse that it's a cop because

cops are EXACTLY the ones who should be trained to not make a mistake like this.

for the teen and his/her family. May they make a full recovery.

[unblock]

2. the police is the only profession where the those with expert training are held to a lower standard

somehow, random kids with no training in police-encounter situations are supposed to know to instantly turn off their cell phone to avoid having their cell phone light flash, lest they get shot by police?

meanwhile, a trained police officer is completely allowed to mistake any random flash of light, presumably accompanied by *no gunshot sound*, for an actual gunshot, and "return" fire?

[mr_lebowski]

6. THIS! (nt)

[Karadeniz]

4. Perverse.

[Newest Reality]

7. I see no reason...

I see no reason that the off-duty officer was in danger in his home.

You mean, it didn't occur to him, when he suspected something going afoul to CALL THE POLICE?

Yeah, I know, that could have had a bad outcome as well, but we are talking about a suspect and NOT a victim of anything. He chose to enter the situation, was armed and had no reason or right to try to detain them in that situation since nobody was in danger until he acted.