Killer cops

[The Magistrate]

18. In Both Instances, Sir, the Officer Made A Snap Judgement

In the first, he reacted to the speed with which the person turned, without noting the person's hands were empty. He reacted to what he feared, rather than what was there to be seen.

In the second, the officer rolled up to an ongoing fight, and seems to have decided the person with the upper hand at the moment was the problem. I do not know that, and neither did he. The person he shot was the person who called the police for help against a group she felt threatened by.

Two further points.

You ask whether an officer should wait to see if there is a gun in someone's hand before firing. Yes. The chance of being killed or injured is one of the things police work entails. People who will not or cannot face that should find other employment.

Taking a holistic point of view, the rights and wrongs of particular instances are of little importance, weighed against the sheer volume of such incidents. Police here shoot citizens at twenty times the rate police in Germany do. That is a problem, and it needs to be fixed. Now.