^ this. If anyone other than a cop did this, we’d be calling for the death penalty.
anyone else and we’d be wondering why they approached this guy instead of leaving it for the cops.
I think that when cops do things like this, the crime should be treated as more severe given the fact that they are police.
Sorry that is not the way our justice system works. Cops have the same rights as anyone else.
I didn’t say anything about revoking their rights. I think that it should be a more severe crime to murder someone while on duty as a police officer than otherwise. Even if the crime itself isn’t handled differently, it’s still more fucked up when cops do this since they’re in positions of trust and authority. It’s like how it is slightly more twisted when a parent abuses their own child than it is when just any evil adult abuses a child. They’re perverting the way things are supposed to be.
You make a good point.
They shouldn’t be cut any slack at all for this shit.
No. They should be held to a higher standard.
Why are you responding to yourself?
You quoted it like it was something you said.
No slack? what about the presumption of innocence until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt? Do you really honestly know beyond a reasonable doubt that the cop didn’t think the guy was reaching for a gun?
I don’t care if the cop thought he was reaching for a gun.
With that unreasonable statement, I see no reason to discuss this further.
If he saw this guy as being that dangerous then he shouldn’t have given him so much time to reach for a gun. Rather than harassing him, he should’ve arrested him right away. At best it’s criminal incompetence and manslaughter.
EDIT: I know most of them won’t do that, but that’s the mindset amongst many people. “Oh, he was unarmed, but it looked like he could’ve been reaching for a gun. Better safe than sorry.”
You make a good point, but consider this: what if the cop in question were a family member of yours? You might then prefer the “better safe than sorry” approach.
I probably would, but I would also prefer that my cop family member opt for a taser or stun-gun in a situation where he’s got an apparently unarmed suspect held at gunpoint.
His explanation doesn’t apply here. The suspect wasn’t doing anything when he was murdered so the fear that a taser would have been ineffective isn’t important. They could have jumped on him and had time.
Actually he was doing somthing, he was reaching behind his back and for all they knew, he had a gun.
The cop shouldn’t have let it get to that point. And given the context of that situation, there’s reason to make that conclusion, just as Jeebus explained. I don’t get why cops have to be given such extreme benefits of the doubt.