"Fleeing from police and not following an officer’s command should not be sufficient for..."

[uppityperson]

"Fleeing from police and not following an officer’s command should not be sufficient for a person to get shot."

Pasco, WA

What gets me is not that they needed to stop him, but they shot him when he was stopped, facing them, hands up, no threat. He ran, stopped, faced them with hands up, and they shot him. Why the hell couldn't they have, I don't know, grabbed him?

http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2025678977_pascoshootingxml.html

More than a dozen people apparently witnessed Tuesday’s rush-hour confrontation between 35-year-old Antonio Zambrano-Montes, who had gotten out of jail on Monday, and three officers. The officers had tried to arrest him after witnesses reported he was throwing rocks at cars outside the Fiesta Foods supermarket in downtown Pasco.

At least one witness posted a graphic cellphone video on YouTube showing Zambrano-Montes being pursued across a street by the officers and then collapsing to the sidewalk under a hail of police gunfire. Witnesses said Zambrano-Montes was carrying a rock and was walking away when the officers fired as many as 13 rounds.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Washington called the shooting “very disturbing,” and at least one eyewitness questioned the use of deadly force on a crowded street.

“I could not believe they were shooting guns. There were cars and people everywhere,” said Pasco resident Benjamin Patrick....

http://www.tri-cityherald.com/2015/02/11/3405116/man-shot-by-pasco-police-identified.html

(clip)Zambrano-Montes was throwing rocks at cars about 5 p.m. Tuesday near Fiesta Foods when police were called. He hit two officers with rocks and refused to listen to commands, Police Chief Bob Metzger said.

Police gave him orders to surrender and unsuccessfully tried using a Taser. The officers chased him across the intersection of 10th Avenue and Lewis Street and eventually shot him in front of a business on Lewis Street.

The shooting was captured on video by bystanders and caused outrage and protests in the city Wednesday. Several graphic videos have been posted to YouTube and viewed thousands of times.

The Zambrano family told the Herald police were out of line when they shot him and should have used less-lethal force to get him under control....

Beware, video shows him getting shot, across the street from the filming person.

[still_one]

1. No it shouldn't, but if I am stopped by a police officer I will not run

and I will keep my hands visible, because the reality of the situation is you can be killed, and that won't do you any good

You can always deal with a wrong doing later through legal means. In order to do that you need to survive the incident

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

3. Sounds like the guy was not quite right in the head

Some of the homeless have mental issues. And this guy was throwing rocks for no apparent reason. I agree with you that no one should run from the police for their own safety. But it's like saying no one should run away from a rabid dog or do anything to provoke it. The police are acting like animals who can't control themselves. You don't shoot a fleeing unarmed man.

[ladjf]

4. Without a doubt. The victim was a mental case.

Any good social worker could have neutralized this situation with no weapons and no injury to anyone.

[Iggo]

5. ...because they might murder you.

[still_one]

11. that is right

[randys1]

28. Indeed, police have the right to murder you especially if you are not white

[still_one]

34. Where did anyone say that in this thread?

[uppityperson]

6. And once he stopped, turned with his hands held up,then they shot him 13 times.

I have been harassed by a cop for the crime of not knowing the name of a street. I was stopped for pulling out too close in front of someone but what really pissed him off into a red faced 10+min harassment was when I didn't know the name of the street he said 9it was several blocks and turns back in an area of random ex-pres named streets).

All I wanted to do was survive and spent that 10+min repeatedly apologizing.

Once this man was not a threat, they didn't need to shoot him repeatedly.

[still_one]

35. absolutely right, but it won't help him, he is dead. Even if a criminal or civil suit is brought

against the cop, the guy is still dead

[uppityperson]

36. I fear because I am very hard of hearing, how can I comply if I can not hear them?

Rather like John Williams in Seattle, hard of hearing, turned to see what was yelling and bam was shot because the cop ran up too close and said Mr Williams turned with a frown on his face. Sometimes instant compliance takes a moment, like Tamir Rice who was yelled at as the cop car drove up fast and didn't get time to comply.

To be clear, I am not arguing that you should not comply, but that sometime you don't get a chance and even if you don't, no reason to shoot or suffocate you.

[still_one]

37. I know you are not. Something really has to be done about trigger happy police

[strategery blunder]

33. You can't deal with a wrongdoing later through legal means if you're dead

And therein lies the problem. The threshold for lethal force, over, and over and over again, is far too low, to the point that now I fear cops will summarily execute me should I encounter them.

Not because I'm a criminal or wrongdoer, mind. I don't have a record and I've literally never even been pulled over. But I have ADD, and if someone tells me to do something, it can take my brain a couple of seconds to figure out what I'm being commanded to do, especially if I do not hear it perfectly clearly.

The vast, vast majority of the time, that is not a problem at all. That characteristic makes it easy to think before opening my mouth, and I can outwardly appear quite...deliberative. But throw in a cop with a gun, and on steroids, who expects IMMEDIATE compliance?

I fear being deemed "noncompliant" in a police encounter before I even fully discern what the police expect me to do. If the cop's first resort is his gun, I'm dead about a half second before I ask him if he could please repeat what he just said.

I recognize that for any given time I deal with the police, the chances of the cops resorting to use of force before I can respond to compliance demands are very low, probably a fraction of one percent. After all, there are thousands if not millions of traffic stops every day, and if they all ended like this, there would be a revolution on. But every time a shooting happens, I am reminded that the chance of a cop killing me for "noncompliantly" sitting in my drivers' seat with a "what-did-he-say" look on my face is not quite zero. And the consequences of being unlucky enough to have one of the trigger-happy cops pulling me over instead of a reasonable peace officer doing the same are dire enough that I fear law enforcement nearly as much as a criminal would.

I recognize that if I was brutalized but left alive for a scenario like that, I would have the legal recourse available to at least recover a large settlement out of it. When I was growing up, the crooked cops were just beating people to extort confessions and such; police shootings were far more rare than now. However now it seems that "summary execution" is becoming the new "police brutality."

[ladjf]

2. This crazy cruelty has got to stop. The police have made

a sporting event out of shooting people unnecessarily.

[WDIM]

7. we allow officers to use way to much force to subdue citizens.

A police officer is a public servant. They take the job to serve and protect the public. The safety of the citizens should be their upmost priority. Even if they are suspected of a crime or holding a weapon they are still a citizen and their safety should be the first thing on a police officers mind.

We have elderly man with a knife shot by cops. We have people with their hands up shot by cops. We have people brutilized and beaten by cops. This is not how its meant to be. Police officer who abuse their power and use violence as a means to an end are part of the problem and not the solution.

We need peace training for our officers we need to train them in better communication. A police officer should never be on edge yelling obsceneties at a suspect they should approach everybody with respect and act like professionals. If they need more hand to hand combat training then lets train them. The very last thing they should ever do is fire a shot. Shooting a suspect should be the last option and only used when being fired upon.

What we have today is a break down on training. Officers approaching their jobs like its us against them. They work for us they are public employees and they should be acting like it. Power corrupts but we can no longer allow the power of the badge to corrupt the people who should be protecting us.

[guillaumeb]

8. follow the English example

take away their guns, tanks, body armor, Tasers, mace, sound cannons, armored vehicles, and the rest of the military gear and force them to use their brains.

Contrary to all the hype about the dangers of police work, and it can be dangerous, it is ranked number 16 on the list of most dangerous jobs in America. Check the link below.

http://www.ranker.com/list/the-most-dangerous-jobs-in-america/american-jobs

Are the police an occupying force in America, making sure that workers, especially non-white workers, know their place?

Should they be public safety workers who protect everyone?

[uppityperson]

9. I watched a couple gendarmes in Paris deal with a situation, they took time, lots of time, to

separate the 2 fighting men, while getting hit themselves accidentally. They dragged the 2 men apart, each gendarme talked to a man, then they got them back together to talk and the fighting resumed. Dragged apart, walked and talked, back together. They did this several times until the 2 men were able to talk out their dispute, shake hands and go on their way. A young man I was sitting by told me this is what they try to do, take time to work out what the problem is, to resolve the problem rather than grab, throw, cuff, tase, shoot, etc.

It took time. No one got shot.

Yes, police work can be dangerous but so can other jobs. Yes, police work with people, so do other jobs. They seem to have forgotten they are our servants. They too often do not want to take the time needed to resolve a situation without manhandling someone or hurting them because the person did not jump when they said jump.

Yes, this guy was throwing rocks and needed to be stopped. But shooting him 13 times when he was not a threat?

[Spider Jerusalem]

21. British police have guns and body armour and Apache helicopters and Tasers and so on.

The average constable walking a beat has a baton, possibly pepper spray and a Taser, and handcuffs. There are specialist firearms officers who are deployed in specific situations. The biggest difference is in training, where deployment of force is seen as the last resort and not the first option.

[dilby]

10. True but hitting the cops with rocks and putting your hands into

a forward motion instead of up when he turned around did not help his situation

[rhett o rick]

12. Oh please, please don't try to justify this abhorrent, cowardly behavior. nm

[HappyMe]

13. C'mon.

There's no justification for this.

[dilby]

14. I disagree.

Looking at the video, when he turns and moves his hands it looks like he has a weapon to me. He obviously did not have a weapon but the gesture he made did not help his situation, just like hitting the cops with rocks in the first place did not help him.

[HappyMe]

15. What you think about the presence of a weapon

doesn't matter. Besides, if he had a weapon why the hell would he bother with rocks?

Yeah, a person has to watch those "gestures", they're scary I tell ya. If these cops are afraid of a mentally ill homeless guy with rocks, they really aren't of much use to anyone.

[dilby]

16. The gestures he made were those of someone who reached for a weapon

and then pointed it towards the cops. Sorry you do that, you lose every time, doesn't matter if there was a weapon or not. The gesture is enough to end your life, you don't like that fine I understand but it's how cops are trained and will continue to be trained for their own safety. If the guy would have put his hands in the air and was gunned down, you would have a case.

[HappyMe]

17. You can believe that if you like.

[dilby]

18. What am I supposed to believe?

That having mental issues gets you a pass from possibly being dangerous? Adam Lanza and James Holmes both had mental issues, didn't save all those people from being gunned down.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

19. I see nothing like what you describe.

Sorry. In fact, when he stopped it looks like he had his hands in the air before he continued. I see no furtive gesture appearing to be going for a gun.

[dilby]

20. It's right there between the 23 and 24 second mark.

Clear as day, at 24 to 25 he gets shot by gunfire, he moved his hands into a forward motion and then the cops shot him. Really just watch from 22-24 to see what he did wrong.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

22. Wow, you are seriously trippin'

The police are far closer to the action than we can see. From where we can see, he had his hands up and then out from his body. No weapon appears in his hands. At no point does he go for a concealed weapon, for example behind him or in his pants. Moving empty hands in a forward position is not a threat and the police are trained to shoot him only if he goes for a weapon on his body which he did not.

Clear as day, yes, that he didn't have a weapon.

[guillaumeb]

23. It is not a matter of their own safety.

It is a matter of an occupying force IMMEDIATELY moving to lethal force. We have thousands of would-be Dirty Harrys out there. Some have uniforms, most do not. But the ones with uniforms are supposed to be trained in how to use non-lethal methods of defusing a situation.

The gestures he made were obviously interpreted by the police as being deadly, but how many of these misinterpretations will it take to realize that we have to take the guns out of every ones hands?

Michael Brown had his hands in the air. What happened there? Death by police. Is this really any different than the drone death that the President orders on a regular basis?

[uppityperson]

25. "The gestures he made were obviously interpreted by the police as being deadly" I disagree

They had been dealing with him for a bit, knew he had no weapon.

[rhett o rick]

24. That is so much crap. The cops see every move as a move to a weapon. Any excuse to kill.

They are cowards with guns. I bet there were high fives all around at the cop bar that night.

[uppityperson]

27. I see putting his hands out in a "wait" gesture. He was familiar to the police and there was

no reason to think he had a weapon beyond rocks.

[randys1]

29. SIGH only in America...raising your hands in air = death penalty....

[uppityperson]

26. Washington city sees 4 police killings in recent months

Link to LBN thread with this article
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10141013262

http://www.chron.com/news/us/article/Protesters-plan-more-rallies-over-Washington-6077678.php

[randys1]

31. Police have the excuse that we are all armed to the teeth so they are going to shoot

us at the slightest provocation.

If you are not white, you will be instantly shot and if you are white, you will have one chance to comply or get shot.

[Judi Lynn]

30. Unbearable! How many cowards does it take, at close range to shoot an unarmed person?

Unforgiveable.

These people don't have any place on any police force.

Hideous.

[bob4460]

32. That is a execution plan and simple

This shit HAS to stop!!!