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Defend This
The boys in blue are taking a beating lately, much of it wholly unwarranted. However, on December 30th a New Jersey police officer did his part to lower the public’s trust of law enforcement. I’ll link the story because the language in the video is far outside Ricochet’s code of conduct.
The basic story goes like this: two cops pull over a car for failure to come to a complete stop at a stop sign. During the stop the officer on the passenger side of the car views a gun in the glove compartment of the vehicle. As one might expect things escalated quickly. While the driver of the vehicle complied readily by placing his hands outside the window of the vehicle the passenger did not. (The gun had been removed at this point.)
The officer is heard repeatedly ordering the soon to be deceased passenger not to move and to show his hands. At one point the officer warns “if you reach for something you’re going to be [expletive] dead.” The passenger seems to inform the officer that he is going to exit the vehicle (the audio is weak here) to which the officer says “no you’re not” several times while attempting to both train his weapon on the man and hold the door closed. The man opens the door and exits the vehicle anyway. Even though his hands were held at about shoulder level and he was clearly unarmed the officer fired seven times (by my count, and one after the man has fallen to the ground) and his partner fired once into the man’s back.
One cannot say the man resisted arrest such as in the Eric Garner case. The officers never informed the man he was being arrested. The man was accused of no crime at all. As he was the passenger the rolling stop at the stop sign cannot be charged against him. My understanding is that unless otherwise determined, the weapon was technically in the possession of the driver of the vehicle rather than the passenger. The only thing the man seems to have done wrong is not obey a police officer during an encounter in which the man was not a accused of any crime. For this he was shot repeatedly and killed.
Logic says that when a gun is pointed at you that it is at least nominally in your best interest to obey orders of the one pointing the gun. Liberty, however, says the state does not have the power to point a gun in your face without justification, and the state especially does not have the authority to kill you for standing up rather than sitting in a vehicle.
Published in General
Every shooting incident has it’s own set of facts. To suggest that they are somehow related beyond the obvious fact that a shooting incident involves a firearm leads to false assumptions and the belief that there is some sort of magic formula that can be applied in understanding every shooting situation. A magic formula that can dictate when a police officer can shoot or should shoot in every situation.
The passenger had a history that was familiar to one of the officers. He had shot at three state troopers. The officer had arrested him a year earlier for two crimes that were listed in the link as well as crimes that were not specified in the link. The officers find one gun in the vehicle. Before the gun was found according to the news story the passenger had not complied with instructions. After the gun was found the passenger was not complying with instructions. The question becomes did the officer that knew the subject have a reasonable belief that the subject was dangerous. Did the officer have a reasonable belief that there might be a chance that there might be another gun in the vehicle or carried by one of the subjects. Does the officer have a reasonable belief that the failure to obey commands even though the subject is being held at gunpoint present a threat to both officers.
Tactically you take passengers out of the car one at a time. You do not want to engage in a gun battle with the passenger, shooting towards the car while your partner is in your line of fire on the other side of the car. Obey the commands and live, disobey the commands and risk serious injury or death.
This. Well said, Frank.
Indeed. See my previous comment.
The police do not have the right to execute because you do not follow instructions. We have a justice “system” for precisely this reason: we do not endow anyone with the right to be judge, jury, and executioner. Especially not the police.
All of us, police included, do have a right to defend ourselves. This case doesn’t really rise to the level of defense. “Preemptive defense” would land a civilian in prison, and should do the same for a policeman.
A lot about this struck me as bad police work. I can see how the officer is trying to take charge of the man and the situation. He gave the guy many (perhaps too many) opportunities to comply. I can’t see where keeping him in the car where he had more ways to hide his hands, and not to mention how much less target area he provides like that, was the better choice. I would have wanted him out of the car in full view.
All that said, I really don’t like the way this went down, and I question its legality. I don’t know all the technical requirements on this (maybe one of the J.D.s around here can fill us in), but it is my understanding that when placed under arrest the officer must make that a known fact. (My lawyer made a big deal out of the fact that my arresting officer said only “I have enough to take you into custody” and not the specific words that I was under arrest, detained, or taken into custody.) It changes the power relationship between the officer and the person. The arrested is no longer a free citizen. He is now absolutely required to obey lawful orders of the officer such as stand, sit, hands up, etc. I think this is part of why the question “am I being detained?” gets so many people past the harassing clowns at border check points.
Until one is detained/arrested he is at liberty to behave lawfully. So far as I know, there is no statute that requires a free citizen to obey a law enforcement officer unless disobedience hinders his duties. Until there is probable cause to detain/arrest a person (the presence of the handgun perhaps is probable cause enough here, but I don’t know NJ law) an officer giving orders like that is not lawful. He is overreaching with the power of the state. The officer here never made known if the man was under arrest or detained, he just started shouting orders. And he did shoot the man multiple times when the man’s hands were raised and clearly empty.
Of course, I’m no lawyer. I had one conlaw class for my degree, so my words here are opinion and/or uninformed horse hockey.
I second this proposal. I would enjoy the Freedom.
Being responsible for My actions and not punished for what I “might” do or “could have done” to someone or property; what a concept.
I would also enjoy this Liberty for the money I would still have.
But We can only have this deal if We also have the same gun laws and restrictions We did before there was a police
stateforce.My understanding (and this could be completely bogus) is that during the NYC slowdown crime didn’t go up but city revenue sure went down.
This, and the earlier Darwin joke, are not the point. You can say he was stupid, but that doesn’t make the cop right.
This is what I know: no matter what you do, and no matter how well you do it, there will always be someone in your face telling you that you did it wrong. The cops may have done it wrong here. I don’t know. I just feel that every time a cop shoots someone there’s a whole ton of armchair quarterbacking.
I think I’m coming down on DocJay’s side here.
Good point. We should do the best we can at that.
Every time a cop shoots someone, he does it under the authority of the free society. Since we, as citizens, grant that authority, that means it is our responsibility as citizens to evaluate the circumstances and decide if it was justified or not, since it was done in our name. If we don’t find it justified, we need to step up and question what is being done in our name.
You seem to be saying that since they work for us, and we ask them to perform their duty, we should not question the circumstances, just give them unlimited authority to shoot to kill any time they perceive a threat- and don’t question it- that is armchair QB?
How long before it is you or yours being shot for some perception of threat, be it real or imagined?
He may not even have been stupid. In many recordings of arrests and police raids I’ve seen, it seems like the police are deliberately trying to confuse the civilian. You hear simultaneous yelling from many officers to the point of becoming unintelligible.
On the one hand, it may have the effect of distracting/confusing a very bad guy who, absent the distraction, would have been able to think through a counterattack on the officers.
On the other hand, it may confuse an innocent or not-so-bad guy into moving or not moving in such away that the officers perceive a threat.
I always think of it as amounting to a form of slavery. What is slavery – being forced to work and then not being able to enjoy the fruits of your labor. (Adam Smith/John Locke)
Police officers, as a population, are as apt to have people within their ranks with belligerent attitudes as is the non-police population.
I spent a lot of time volunteering in a middle school. Of the teachers, staff members, and administrators, 90 percent were fantastic with the kids. But 10 percent of the adults were clearly really high on their authority and possibly caffeine. Some mood-swinging alcoholics too. There were times when I was ashamed to call myself an adult around the kids. Often times some of these, frankly, abusive teachers would glance at me, at my furrowed brow, and back off with the kids.
Just as I think there should be more community presence in schools, especially middle and high schools, I think there needs to be more calming community presence around police work. Police are too isolated in the normal course of their daily work. True, they are surrounded by people, but those people are not a calming support network.
I’m hoping that across the country there are administrators looking at these videos of daily life in the field for police officers and acting to prevent such incidences.
These periods of tension between police and the public have come and gone many times over my lifetime. They don’t end well. A hero to me is Boston Police Chief Evans who took the notion of community policing seriously. Things have deteriorated in Boston since he left. All I can say is one person can make a huge difference.
I just watched the stop and the killing a few times. That’s gruesome. Think about that, just how fast you can die.
My first impression is these cops are incompetent. I think Doug Watt above already mentioned they should have taken care of one suspect at a time. Even with the dashboard camera we can’t see what the officers could (body cams would help) so I’m not going to try to argue details, but the whole scene after the gun is spotted is Keystone Kafka.
I’d like to know more about Reid’s state of mind. Was he drugged? Was he mentally competent?
I’ll tell you who looks like the hophead, tho’ – Officer Braheme Days. That guy is out of control, beyond mere girly panic. If he wasn’t tested for substance abuse immediately then his superiors are incompetent too.
Days shot Reid with his hands up and palms forward. This video gives no evidence of any threat from Reid that couldn’t be handled by any competent cop. Two steps back by Days and everyone might still be alive.
Yes, Reid was a known felon. Yes, Reid disobeyed the incoherent raving order of the Holy Cop. Yes, the situation was tense – the Mighty Cop had already peed his pink panties at the first sight of a gun in the glove box. Guess what, Americans – the cops don’t get to shoot you for any of that. No cop, no where in America, gets to kill you because you don’t do what he says, no matter the state of what passes for his addled mind.
Maybe there’s things going on I can’t see, like Jerame Reid’s left hand. Still, I’m sickened by what I saw and it gets worse every time I watch it. The best definition of a police state I know is that the police are above the law.
So, just having, or even holding, a gun doesn’t really justify deadly force….
Holding a gun when a lawman says “Drop it” is volunteering to die, and needless to say pointing the gun anywhere near a lawman means you die. Preferably on the spot. The police are not supposed to give criminals a break, armed or not. I expect to explain this to Al Sharpton, not to other conservatives.
I got enough flack from this opinion of mine that I forwarded this video to a SWAT officer friend of mine. His response was that he’d have been better than those cops but it was by no means some cut and dry situation. He said that while he understands about police abuse only too well, he’d rather err on the side of seeing his wife and babies than getting killed by some piece of garbage cop hating criminal.
Nice to see all this energy here and I can see all of your points well. They altered my views some.
In this moment the man who was shot was not a criminal. He was a citizen with a criminal history. Not killing him was not giving him a break.
While you’re explaining to Al, spare a minute to tell me where this bit about Reid holding a gun came from. Did you make that up, is it a hypothetical meant to illustrate some point you forgot to make, or what?
Reid was not holding a gun when Days killed him. Reid was shot to death with his hands up and visible, unarmed. C’mon, Gary – making stuff up is the trademark of the left. You did watch the vid, right?
You know what really bothers me, Barfly? It’s when people belittle an extremely overstressed cop in a situation where felons are potentially armed with
Yes, the situation was tense – the Mighty Cop had already peed his pink panties at the first sight of a gun in the glove box.
That’s a conservative’s response? Tell you what. Let’s bring Jack Dunphy in here to explain the facts of life.
There are plenty of police abuses worth fighting. We’ve discussed plenty of them right here. If that’s the way you’re going to talk about the cops, you’re not worth arguing with.
Gary, shifting ground when confronted is another lefty technique. So, you do agree that Reid was not holding a gun? It’s ok to back off when you’ve made a misstatement.
And yes, that’s this conservative’s response. Never been a cop, but I’ve done vehicle stops and checkpoints. I would not want to do that work with anyone who’d behave like Days.
Now, where did you get that bit about Reid holding a gun?
I wonder if there is other dash cam video of Days. I would like to hope that it was just the worst day ever, but I doubt it.
Barfly, I’m not shifting ground. The video is hard to understand in parts–I have to admit that–but you write from the quiet, easy assurance that we saw what happened and have perfect 20/20 hindsight on what Days saw from his perspective. You were kind enough to colorfully point out the fact that there was a gun in reach at the scene, others have said he had knowledge that this upright, worthy “citizen” had used felonious violence before.
In a court of law we judge their situations, cop and criminal, equally, or try to. In the court of life, they aren’t equal teams in some amusing video game. The cop is on our side. Yeah, maybe he could have handled this one better; I know for a fact the passenger could have. We can discuss this one like we did Ferguson and Staten Island. If this is some twisted upside down defense of the Second Amendment, it’s not coming across. But your contemptuous language about the police response is unjustified, Barfly.
Gary, you said, indirectly, that Reid was holding a gun and Days shot him because he didn’t drop it when ordered.
What you said was false and misleading. We cannot have a discussion in the presence of rhetoric based on fantasy. Let’s get that out of the way, then we can discuss whether I’m somehow a poor conservative for deploying scorn and ridicule.
For deploying scorn and ridicule against American cops? Sure, I’m ready for that discussion. To be fair to you, Barfly, you’re not the only conservative who ought to be part of it.
That’s the defense?
So, an innocent Citizen, when confronted by police, should blow ’em away first if They would rather err on the side of seeing Their wife and babies than getting killed?
The attitude is generally expressed as “I’m going home tonight.” You have to be sympathetic to the sentiment, but sometimes it blurs into “shoot anytime you’re scared, angry and your shouts of command aren’t obeyed.”
We have to draw the line well before that point. Not everyone is fit to be a cop.
Oh, I got it.
I was using the same “excuse” for the innocent Citizen. That when confronted by the keystone kops Citizens should just start shooting so They may “go home tonight.”
And I don’t have “to be sympathetic to the sentiment,” They volunteered. They can find a safer line of work (but then where else would You get “administrative leave” [vacation] pay for killing Citizens?).
Former peace officer. I’ve watched the video several times. I can’t make out nearly enough detail to really know what happened. We have scant information about the gun in the glove box, or what became of it. Somebody said it was no longer there at the time of the shooting. So where was it? We’re told that the passenger was known to the police officer, but we have no idea why – and that is a critical piece of information, especially in the presence of a firearm. The glove box is easily within the passenger’s range of control. It does appear that the passenger is coming out with his hands up, but it’s against the officer’s orders, and we don’t know the status of the gun at that moment. Hands raised can come down mighty fast.
I was trained to keep people in the vehicle on a car stop. Which would you prefer- everybody in one spot, where you can keep an eye on them, or a bunch of people out and moving around? My training would have caused me to react differently, but my reaction may have proven, in the long run, to be more dangerous. There are far too many records of people emerging from a car, after a routine traffic stop, and opening fire on the officer(s) as they did so.
The fact that the stop was for running a stop sign is virtually insignificant. I used to see a law enforcement – oriented magazine years ago that had a monthly column called “Routine Stops.” The whole point of the stories that followed was to remind us that there’s no such thing as a routine stop.
Somebody back there mentioned the Coast Guard, then said a cop says, “I’m going home tonight.” No, that’s not what any cop I’ve ever known said. They (we) said, “this may be the night I don’t come home.”
I’m not saying it was a “good shoot,” or a “bad shoot.” Based on the information I have, there are big questions that need to be answered. Until then, I don’t know.
Quietpi, thanks. Keeping everybody in the car makes perfect sense to me. Days tells “Rog” to get his subject out of the car at 1:28. What was up with that?
That was me with the Coast Guard comparison. I first heard that going-home phrase from cops when I was a kid in Boy Scouts, occasionally since. I never heard it from one I respected, of course.
As for the gun, it’s natural for Days to worry about another one, of course, but I don’t get why everybody keeps saying the gun is in play. The article refers to the officer removing the gun in the second paragraph. Watch the video at 1:30; it’s pretty clear. Days takes custody of the gun.
Righteous shooting.