Shoot or Don’t Shoot-
Summary: City police received a report of a young adult couple being threatened by a 20 year old male Hispanic with a .45 cal pistol. The couple had been hanging out in a city park when the suspect approached the female and started to harass her. He made some vulgar comments to her about performing a sex act on him and laughed. This attracted the attention of her male companion who was standing about 20 feet away.
He approached the park bench where the female victim was seated and told the (S) to leave her alone. At this point the (S) dared him to make him leave. He then threatened to shoot both of them as he drew what appeared to be a semi auto .45 cal. pistol from his waistband and pointed it at the male companion. He threatened to “blow him away.”
The (S) left the area on foot going north towards a residential area. The victims called police from a cell phone. Several police cars quickly arrived on the scene and began searching for the (S).
Approximately 3 minutes later Officer A observed a subject matching the description of the (S) walking through an alley, due north of the park. He was wearing clothing and carrying a black backpack similar to that described by the victims.
Officer A stopped behind the (S), exited his vehicle and he ordered the (S) to stop and show his hands. The (S) dropped his backpack and bolted. The officer pursued him in his police vehicle until the (S) tried to escape running through several backyards to an adjacent street. Officer A chased the (S) on foot as he radioed directions to responding police units.
The foot pursuit lasted about two hundred yards when the (S) suddenly stopped, pulled back his coat and attempted to withdraw the pistol as described above.
Officer A was already pointing his own service pistol at the (S) and told him to freeze or he would be shot! The Officer again held his fire.
The (S) fumbled the weapon and it fell into tall grass. However, the (S) continued to ignore
the orders of Officer A and bent over to snatch the weapon from the grass. He did not point the weapon at the officer, instead he held it and then raised it to his own head.
(S) turned away from the officer ran towards the street a short distance away. But, his path was cut off by a responding patrol vehicle. At that point (S) dropped his weapon and surrendered to Officer A who was about 25 feet behind him.
Moments later police determined .45 cal weapon had the serial number ground off…it was also loaded. The (S) also had a fully loaded spare clip in his coat pocket as well as three unfired .12 gauge shotgun shells. The (S)’s backpack was recovered ad it had articles of clothing in it typically associated with gang apparel, possibly indicating gang affiliation with the Sorenos, a well known street gang in the city.
An elderly Hispanic man witnessed the pursuit and spoke to the officers and asked why Officer A didn’t shoot him? Officer A said, he did not shoot because of the changes in CA law that made the officer liable unless he could absolutely prove the (S) meant to use his weapon on the officer, a far higher threshold than last year. Merely drawing a weapon may not have been enough reason to shoot. The witness was stunned.
Prior to this time the officer could have justifiably fired when the (S) attempted to draw his weapon, especially after being told to freeze by the officer. Officer A said he had no choice, but to risk his life or face trial and possible incarceration.
Officer A’s sergeant and police chief would later concurred Officer A was right. They both felt under the new law that there was weak cause to shoot the (S) and if he did shoot it would likely have ended in a prosecution of the officer. Whether or not he was convicted was another matter.
The witness strongly disagreed with this CA law because he claimed it placed him and other civilians at greater risk, as well as the officers.
He said his neighborhood was so heavily controlled by gang members that it was unsafe to be in the park or walk down the sidewalk at night. He felt the criminals in CA have more rights now than law abiding citizens. He said he would never vote for a democrat again and will urge his family members to vote republican. He’s also thinking about carrying a gun for his own safety. He expressed some strong comments about Gov. Gavin Newsome that can’t be repeated here.
Your opinions please.
I think the problem is that we don’t have enough laws yet. What we need is a law to cover every possible alternative action or response by the officers involved. In the above scenario, the officers should have been required to ascertain whether the object in the grass was a weapon, and if so, was it loaded? Did (S) have a carry permit? Since the arresting officer/s didn’t personally observe any of the preceding activities, there should be a law requiring them to ask (S) regarding his version of the facts before suggesting that he relinquish the alleged weapon in his hand. I’m assuming that since nobody was killed, (S) has been released until such time as the entire scenario has been reviewed by an unbiased civilian panel made up of the peers of (S).
Our lawgivers should be able to fashion at least twelve more policing restrictions from this incident, once they’ve completed their work with the new self-employment restrictions for the coming year.
As for the “elderly Hispanic man,” forget him. He obviously can’t remember what it was like to be young and loaded for bear.
CJ, the (S) was booked on a half dozen felonies and then released on his OR. He had been charged last year with 3 felonies that were for unknown reasons…dismissed in the interests of justice.
So much for the word “satire.” I’m putting it into my dead file with other obsolete words, such as: gay, pride, offend, gender, marriage, justice, progressive, education, racism, heroism, equality, fairness, etc., etc.
One more reason to learn Spanish if I want to be able to communicate with others in California. It’s that, or ASL.
CJ your satire is spot on, don’t stop!
It’s hopeless. My satire is their reality. What do I have to do? Wear Groucho glasses and throw cream pies?
So at what point do circumstances force LEO’s to choose between their badge and the oath they swore to the U.S. Constitution?
A good question RHT. I know which way I would choose, but I’m old school.