“The Officer Who Killed My Son Got 3 Days Paid Leave. ...

[xchrom]

http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/officer-who-killed-my-son-got-3-days-paid-leave-then-he-tried-take-part-killer-cop

“The Officer Who Killed My Son Got 3 Days Paid Leave. Then He Tried to Take Part in a "Killer Cop Competition"



Around 3am one night in May 2011, 22-year-old Alan Gomez was outside his brother Eric’s house in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Nervous because she believed Gomez was acting erratically, Eric's girlfriend called the police. After about an hour, Albuquerque police officer Sean Wallace arrived.

Wallace saw Alan Gomez leave the house and then turn to go back inside. According to a subsequent Department of Justice report, Gomez was unarmed and did not pose an immediate threat to the officers or anyone inside the house. Sean Wallace, however, fired a shot, striking Gomez in the back. Gomez died on the scene, while Wallace was never punished.

“He was never indicted, never suspended, nothing,” Mike Gomez, Alan’s father, said. “It was like it never happened.” The officer was given three days of paid leave and $500 from the police union to decompress after “stressful events."

Wallace is a K-9 officer, part of a team that works closely with paramilitary SWAT units. He doesn’t have a reputable record. In 2004, he shot and killed an unarmed man while with the New Mexico State Police. The victim’s family received $235,000 from a wrongful death lawsuit. By 2007, Wallace made a "lateral transfer" to the APD—meaning he wasn’t required to undergo background checks or psychological evaluations. (Last March, the APD officer who shot and killed James Boyd, a homeless man suffering from mental illness, was also a lateral transfer.) In 2010, Wallace wounded another unarmed man.

[Warpy]

1. The police chief says he has to keep bad cops because of the union

I call BULLSHIT.

Violent cops can be fired even more easily than the ones on the take.

[yeoman6987]

2. A lot of these shooting are because family and friends called

It has taught me to NEVER call police unless it is a dyer emergency. Heck with these so called "friendly neighborhood police".

[notadmblnd]

13. It would have to be beyond a dire emergency for me to call the police.

I want nothing to do with law enforcement. I'll just take my chances with the crooks.

[randys1]

26. This is the lesson even poor white folk best learn pretty soon.

Like my favorite music critic of Rolling Stone fame once said, Dave Marsh: "The police exist to protect the one percent from the rest of us"

And I WONDER why so many of us just assume this story is true, now before cop defenders answer that, best they think about it.

BTW, the only way to know what happened is to ask witnesses, there is NEVER a situation where I take the cops word over a witness or hardly ever.

[Warpy]

27. Cops are overly anxious here

because a few years ago, a couple of the good cops went to check on a well known crazy person, as they did several times a month. The guy had gotten hold of a gun and blew them away. He then proceeded to a bike shop and shot 3 random people dead there.

The cops who remember that tend to be more trigger happy when dealing with mentally ill folks. Knowing where it comes from is not condoning it. They need more training in how to talk crazy people down and de escalate a tense situation. They need recognition and salary perks for the number of people they don't kill, the ones who go on psych hold and get stable on medication and go back to families who love them.

That's what should be praised and rewarded.

[RoccoR5955]

11. What a load of BS

They use that excuse all the time.

[Lee-Lee]

3. This story and post are a load of crap

And typical of the mindless cop bashing so common here where some will believe anything they see posted without looking for facts.

The real truth: http://www.nmdas.com/districts/second/linked/alan%20gomez%20shooting%20review.pdf

The police were not called because he was "acting erratically". They were called because cause he was holding people hostage in the home armed with a gun and knife, an illegal gun at that, refusing to let them leave. Also known as kidnapping. And he had fired shots from the porch.

He knew the cops were there and refused to follow any commands or release the hostages.

He had put the gun down at the time and picked up a large spoon- and after dark, in a split second chance the officers knowing he had been armed, had previously fired shots, had just talked to a hostage on the phone who said he was still armed, and saw an object in his hand. They had to act when they had him visible and they were in position.

He didn't get shot for "acting erratic", he got shot for kidnapping and actively holding hostages.

But the typical dishonest cop-hating folks at places like Alternet don't bother with facts, not do people who blindly repost the cap here and the other who blindly fall for it.

[hobbit709]

4. do you defend "He had his hands up" too?

[Lee-Lee]

6. Huh?

What?

Are you trying to distract from the obvious lies and distortion in this by dragging an unrelated case in, or did I miss a relevant fact to this case?

[edgineered]

8. At the Miami Zoo

it was comical watching the kids run back and forth in front of the primate cages, their arms flailing while making strange noises. Of course the monkeys just sat in their trees and watched; I wondered why I was at a zoo watching people. Just pointing out how watching the defenders here reminded me of that.

[Oktober]

5. Ha...

It's like the authors of the OP are counting on their audience doing zero follow on thought or research.

[Lee-Lee]

7. Well, it would be typical

Most of the worst police bashers here take anything bad about the police as absolute fact, and anything positive is dismissed as propaganda.

It take a real twisted mind to pen an article that turns the police safely rescuing hostages from an armed man in a standoff to evil cops shooting an unarmed man just for "erratic behavior".

[BklnDem75]

10. District Attorneys aren't exactly reliable when it comes to officer involved anything...

This was the third time Sean Wallace killed someone in the line of duty and the city settled the suit for $900k. Gomez was unarmed when he was killed.

[Oktober]

12. After having been armed only moments before while holding hostages...

[BklnDem75]

14. According to an officer who killed 3 people in his career...

No reason he'd protect his ass or anything like that.

[Oktober]

16. Are you suggesting that the couple who was held hostage...

... And called 911 to report it and get help were actually part of the conspiracy?

[hobbit709]

18. And the cop lovers are so blinded by the love that NO cop can do anything wrong.

[Lee-Lee]

19. Can you point that out on this forum

I've had no problem being critical of cops when it's actually deserved.

Who posts here as you describe?

[hobbit709]

20. Why bother, you won't believe that a lot of cops are out and out pigs.

[Lee-Lee]

22. Some are

Not a lot when you look at overall percentages, and I know and have worked with a lot more than most here so I have a better frame of reference to judge from.

[BklnDem75]

23. Nice twist...

He was armed with a spoon previously, and unarmed when the cop gunned him down.

[Oktober]

24. Read the report...

The 911 call is on record from the hostage. She complained of being held against her will and stated that he had a gun.

Which was later found....

Your bias is hindering your ability the reason.

[BklnDem75]

25. With the exception of th e shooting officer, who gave inconsistent statements...

When the officer shot Gomez, the circumstances would not have suggested to a reasonable officer that there was an immediate threat. The officers had not confirmed that Gomez was armed. With the exception of the shooting officer, who gave inconsistent statements, officers did not observe Gomez hold, raise, or aim a gun. No one’s life was in immediate danger and an APD negotiator was on his
way to the scene. There were insufficient facts to lead officers to believe that Gomez “pose[d] a significant risk of death or serious physical injury to the officer or others.” Garner, 471 U.S. at 3. Even if officers were concerned that Gomez might have been going back to harm the individuals inside the house, that risk of future harm was not enough to justify the near certainty of Gomez’s death from the firearm discharge. See Cordova, 569 F.3d at 1190. Gomez’s family sued APD and in December 2013, the parties reached an out-of-court settlement in the amount of $900,000. This was the shooting officer’s third shooting in the line of duty. He shot and killed a man in 2004 while serving with the New Mexico State Police and wounded another man in 2010. None of the three shooting subjects was armed. The officer joined APD in 2007 as a lateral hire.

http://www.justice.gov/crt/about/spl/documents/apd_findings_4-10-14.pdf

I'll believe the federal investigation over an officer who tries to justify shooting an unarmed man in the back. Maybe you should stop believing people who has a reason to lie.

[951-Riverside]

21. +1 (If its true)

Look I think police departments around the country are filled with ultra violent predators who get off on hurting people and seeing someone get hurt but if this guy was armed, firing shots and holding someone hostage and had no intention of giving himself up then they did the right thing by taking him out.

I look at it this way, their action in this case (if all of the facts are true) is equivalent of instantly cuffing, charging and jailing Mike Brown's murderer.

With that said I absolutely abhor boot lickers, badge bunnies, cop-cultists and other deranged psychopaths and sycophants who blindly support police officers without question and view them as being God like creatures who can do no wrong. These people are a disgrace and mentally ill.

[ncjustice80]

9. This is why cops shouldn t be allowed to hace unions.

I am very pro union in general, every worker has rights and unions are necesarry to protect thoae rights from greedy corporatists and profiteers. However, cops are not workers, but rather attack dogs hired by the 1% to oppress the poor and the brown. They get many fringe benefits- not only wjats in their (often lucrative) contractz but the fact they cah break all sorts of traffic amd criminal laws and have zero accountability. They do NOT deserve union protection like us.

[babydollhead]

15. lateral transfer, the same way as pedophile priests. n/t