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When the Police Run Away, Who Will Fight Crime?
In my recent contribution at PJ Media, I lamented the fact that “over the last few years the belief has arisen that a fleeing or resisting suspect – even an armed one – has the absolute right to be subdued without being harmed.” It’s bad enough when this opinion is held by an uninformed public or members of the media, but police officers are dumbfounded when they find such ignorance expressed by people occupying positions that should, at least in theory, demand a greater mastery of the issues.
I have written previously on the low opinion I hold for the Los Angeles police commission, the five-member body that oversees the LAPD. The members are appointed by the mayor to five-year terms, and though the commission is charged with setting policy for the department and evaluating officers’ conduct in serious use-of-force incidents, there is no expectation that any commissioner have even minimal experience or training that might inform his decisions. In reality, the commissioners are selected so as to conform with some unwritten “diversity” checklist, with the result that there is always at least one black member, one Hispanic, one female, one gay, and what have you. The politics of Los Angeles being what they are, the current members are all left-leaning, some of them more so than others.
A recent decision from the commission brings into stark clarity this lack of real-world experience. Last September, two uniformed LAPD officers were dispatched to a report of a woman creating a disturbance while armed with a knife. The officers drove to the location of the call, parked some 70 feet away from the woman, and got out of their car to investigate. The events that followed were captured on a security camera, the video from which is available at this Los Angeles Times story. The video shows the woman advancing quickly on the officers, both of whom draw their pistols. There is no sound accompanying the video, but videos from the officers’ body-worn cameras (which were not made public) showed that the woman was ordered to drop the knife no less than six times.
When the woman continued to advance while holding the knife, both officers fired. She was between four and five feet away from one officer and about ten feet from the other when she was struck by the gunfire and fell to the ground. She was taken to a hospital but died from her wounds.
To anyone with even a modest amount of police experience, this was clearly a justified shooting. The officers parked and exited their car a safe distance away from the suspect, who made the decision to advance on them quickly while holding a knife in an aggressive manner. When the woman ignored repeated commands to drop the knife, less-lethal means of subduing her, such as a Taser or pepper spray, were not practical alternatives to deadly force. Yes, it is unfortunate that the woman died, but it would have been no less unfortunate if she had stabbed one or both of the officers because they were reluctant to defend themselves as the law allows and common sense demands.
In a decision that has left LAPD officers agog, the commission ruled that the officer who was closest to the woman “out of policy” when he shot her. Their rationale for this finding (if one can label it as such) is that the officer placed himself in a “vulnerable position.” The commission further reasoned that “Given the nature of the Subject’s advance, it should have been apparent to Officer C that his positioning was quickly becoming disadvantageous and that redeployment was warranted.”
In other words, the commissioners would have preferred that the officer run away. The commission’s full report on the incident can be found here, but don’t read it in the expectation of finding any trace of wisdom within.
Over at The Corner on NRO yesterday, my friend Heather Mac Donald reported on newly released FBI crime data that further proves the “Ferguson Effect” to be real. Violent crime is up 12 percent in Los Angeles so far this year and 37 percent over two years. If you were an LAPD officer, how willing would you be, aware that your actions will be judged by these people, to place yourself in harm’s way?
When LAPD officers decide it’s more prudent to take crime reports after the fact than to do what is required to prevent disorder, when crime continues to rise in Los Angeles, will the police commission see a connection to their findings in this case? Of course they won’t.
Published in General
I’d like to know how she would shred it though.
From a protest this month a block from my office.
Jack, What do you think is the proper role for civilian oversight of the police and how would you structure such a system? The popular notion is that cops will automatically cover for other cops and cannot be the sole judge of police actions.
Someone needs to point out to these geniuses that the police aren’t there to protect the public from the criminals, but ultimately to protect accused criminals from the public. Abolish the police and the mob will dispense justice, with little concern about things like rules of evidence or proportional force.
I recommend reading her latest book, but you can start with her recent piece on the City Journal website
James,
Check out the list of demands from the Charlotte protesters.
Excellent piece. Thanks for referencing it.
That information, supported by statistics, can’t be repeated often enough. While we know the facts, the MSM refuses to help educate the general public. The focus is always on the latest uprising thereby feeding the administration’s (and Her Royal Thighness’s) claims of racism, etc. She seems hellbent on continuing to tear our country apart at the seams.
I think the best policy is for police to declare experimental Peoples Safety Zones in which
(a) No one will be stopped, confronted or verbally addressed by police for any reason other than repeated discharge of a firearm in the direction of other persons, active stabbing, clubbing or beating of other person(s) or operating a vehicle that exceeds speed limits by at least 30 MPH as measured by calibrated radar devices or which vehicle is known to be stolen or which vehicle is in the act of colliding with pedestrians.
(b) Even in the event of someone qualifying for police intervention under provision (a), police may not attempt to communicate with any fleeing person until such person stops or otherwise chooses to engage police and police must remain at least 50 feet away from fleeing persons as long as flight persists or the person leaves the PSZ.
And make the neighborhood of every commission member a PSZ with signs on every corner to that effect.
I’m not opposed to civilian oversight, but it seems obvious that those civilians should have some expertise in the matters before them. The problem is that for many police issues, only the police themselves have the necessary training and experience to offer an informed judgment.
That answer sort of fits any area of expertise. Only doctors have the expertise to judge doctors, only lawyers have the expertise to just lawyers, etc. Then you tend to get organizations that fly cover for more than judge that profession.