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Post by Marshall on Nov 27, 2015 18:51:52 GMT -5
There were protests on Michigan Ave, the Magnificent Mile, shopping district today. It was to protest the police shooting over a year ago of Laquan McDonald. The whole shooting incident is a sordid affair. A judge finally made the City release dash-cam video of the shooting. Only then (13 months after the shooting) did they charge the officer with a crime. And all sorts of evidence of big-time coverup has now come to light.
The purpose of the peaceful demonstration was summed up by a local activist priest, Michael Pfleger; "This city only understands money. We're interrupting the money to show our anger." Hundreds of people stopped traffic on Michigan Avenue. And protestors stood arm-in-arm blocking shoppers from getting into Michigan Ave stores.
. . . , I only wish I'd have known about it in advance. Or I'd have been down there.
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Post by epaul on Nov 27, 2015 20:30:40 GMT -5
The shooting and the cover up I had heard about. I haven't heard anything about what led up the shooting.
So I googled over to the Chicago Tribune.
The guy was on PCP and breaking into cars. Two cops arrived. But, instead of apprehending the guy on the spot, they followed him for half a mile in their squad car. More squad cars arrived. The cops stayed in their cars and used them to try herd the guy away from passersby on a busy street. Then ten minutes after the original cops had radioed for additional squads, the third or fourth or fifth squad car arrived and a cop jumps out of it and empties his gun into the guy.
How did it get to that point? How come two cops can't apprehend a stoned druggie breaking into cars by a Burger King? Instead they follow him for half a mile while calling for more cops. More cops arrive, and still the guy is wandering, not running, down a busy street in the middle of Chicago. So four to six cops (whatever) aren't enough to arrest one drugged up thief? The guy just keeps walking along until cop number (?) shows up and shoots him?
So the first two cops say, "Stop in the name of the law." And the robber says, or mumbles, "No, I don't want to" and walks away down the street. And one, then two, then (?) squad cars with cops in them just haplessly follow the guy down a busy street?
Ok, so how are cops supposed to stop bad guys who decide to ignore them? Shooting is apparently not an approved method. Are they supposed to wrestle with the bad guy? Bad guy has a knife. Do they still wrestle? Do they taz the guy? That has almost as many issues as shooting. Do cops need to be trained to use a lariat? Or should they have nets? Or do they just let the bad guys walk away if they don't stop when they are politely asked to?
Non-lethal apprehension is huge problem. Chicago can't afford to hire 6-8 cops to try stop one drugged-up bad guy. And it really can't afford to have one of the cops shoot him. 5 million, and that is just the start of what this is going to cost Chicago. One worthless bum and an idiot cop is going to cost Chicago 10 million and probably more lives. Chicago can't afford cops. They are just a huge cost and for what?
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Post by theevan on Nov 27, 2015 21:26:43 GMT -5
One of Nancy's Chicago cousins joined the protests and shared some pics on Facebook. Looked like she was having a grand old time, smiles all around.
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Post by Village Idiot on Nov 27, 2015 22:05:03 GMT -5
Ok, so how are cops supposed to stop bad guys who decide to ignore them? Shooting is apparently not an approved method. Are they supposed to wrestle with the bad guy? Bad guy has a knife. Do they still wrestle? Do they taz the guy? That has almost as many issues as shooting. Do cops need to be trained to use a lariat? Or should they have nets? Or do they just let the bad guys walk away if they don't stop when they are politely asked to? I'm thinking bolas. Sure, it'd take some extra police training, but used properly, if a cop whipped it around his head fast enough and aimed properly, it would bind up the fleer's legs rendering him uninjured but immobile. Any thoughts on that, Epaul? |
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Post by millring on Nov 27, 2015 22:16:33 GMT -5
Los gauchos in la pampas.
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Post by james on Nov 27, 2015 22:31:14 GMT -5
The key thing in apprehending a criminal is not to murder them. Even if it takes a while to figure out a non-murderous plan. That generally works.
Knife carrying people do not get shot 16 times here. They get arrested, as a rule, without being murdered. |
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Dub
Administrator
I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
Posts: 19,847 
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Post by Dub on Nov 27, 2015 22:50:05 GMT -5
…Knife carrying people do not get shot 16 times here. They get arrested, as a rule, without being murdered. How very civilized. Have your countrymen given any thought to re-colonizing this clearly untamed territory? Many of the current inhabitants might welcome you this time. |
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Post by epaul on Nov 28, 2015 0:37:48 GMT -5
This knife carrying person got shot 16 times because four to six cops (how many,Chicago people?) apparently did not know how to apprehend him when he refused a verbal command.
So, how do a couple London cops arrest someone who does not wish to be arrested? Do they wrestle him to the ground? What if the suspect is 6'8" and heavily muscled? What if the bad guy has a knife? Do English cops wrestle with bad guys who have a knife? Or, do they taz them? I don't know how English tazers work, but tazers have been a lot of trouble over here. Some bad guys can resist them, others can die from them. Do London cops use billy clubs and bop bad guys on the head and knock them silly? Our cops aren't supposed to hit bad guys on the head. It could hurt them. Or do you let bad guys walk freely away if they wish to as crime really isn't serious enough an issue to risk hurting a criminal over it? Or, maybe you gather twenty or thirty cops with pillows and just form a big circle around a criminal keeping him safely ensconced until he get bored and asks to be taken in so he can get something to eat?
Should this thief have been shot to death? No. That aspect is being discussed thoroughly, even in England. Should the Chicago police have tried cover up the details of the shooting in order to protect one of their own? No. And that is being discussed thoroughly, even in England. Everything about this event is being discussed, except the one issue that directly led up to it; apparently those two original cops didn't have a safe, legal, effective, non-lethal means of apprehending an unwilling bad guy who refused to submit to their authority. The guy just walked away, walked over half a mile with how many cops trailing helplessly behind him?
If the first two cops would have had the means and training to apprehend the guy safely and securely at the scene of his crimes and place him under arrest, this affair would have been the simple matter it should have been. But, this means and training won't be easy to implement. It may be very difficult. The times are a changing. And the new means for these new times may not even exist or, if it does, be feasible to implement. And without a useful means, training is just another useless workshop with stale donuts.
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Post by aquaduct on Nov 28, 2015 0:50:49 GMT -5
London cops obviously ask politely and promise scones and tea.
Easy peasy.
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Post by RickW on Nov 28, 2015 1:11:06 GMT -5
I would not see why anyone, Policeman or not, would be required to tackle someone with a knife. If he won't put the knife down, I would suggest a tazer or shooting him somewhere that was potentially non lethal, like the leg. However, emptying a gun into him seems ridiculous.
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Post by epaul on Nov 28, 2015 2:28:30 GMT -5
Emptying the gun into the guy was ridiculous. More than ridiculous, it may be prove to be murder (I don't know how they can expect to get a murder one charge to stick, but manslaughter or something similar seems a likely outcome.
And the attempted cover-up by the Chicago cops and even city hall is very worrisome and likely criminal, I don't know where it will lead, but it will be destructive and harmful to the city.
But, that will all be covered and re-covered, discussed and re-discussed, and Chicago, its cops, and its city council will be castigated and re-castigated. And if what happened happened as it is starting to appear it happened, whoo boy ...(if they erased that Burger King video, holy shit)
What struck me when I read the timeline of events was how in the hell it did it reach the point where the crazy cop showed up and emptied his revolver into that guy. The guy who was shot was smashing car windows a half mile away from where he was shot. Two cops showed up at the scene and tried arrest the guy. He ignored the cops and just started walking away. And the two cops just followed him. Followed him for half a mile in their squad car. Calling for backup. Two cops can't arrest a stoned out thief? A thief who doesn't even run away, he just walked away, walked down the street ignoring them.
Backups arrive. Now there are at least four cops on the scene. Do they arrest the guy? No, they just follow him in their cars like dolts hoping he will, what? just stop and hop in one of the squads? One of the squads drives in front of the guy, he slashes at the tire with his knife and keeps on walking.
The cop that did the shooting was in the third or fourth squad car to show up (Chicago guys,how many?). This squad comes racing up to the scene ---a bunch of cop cars following a strolling, stoned out, thief--- and a cop jumps out of this squad and opens up on the guy as he is strolling along leading a bunch of hapless fellow cops.
Why weren't the first two cops able to apprehend a stoned out jerk who was smash and grabbing a string of cars? Smash and grabber just ignores them goes walking down the street.
Why weren't the next bunch of cops to arrive on the scene able to arrest the strolling thief dude? Did any of them even get out of their squads?
The robber guy should have been in cuffs long before nutso cop even shows up and goes gun crazy.
The robber guy should not have been filled with lead. But, before that, it should not take three or four squad cars with six to eight cops to handle one stoned out smash and grab thief, even if he did have a knife. At that rate, Chicago would have to hire a couple million cops just to ensure they have enough on hand so that a dozen or so can follow one thief around town until someone finally flips out and shoots him.
There is a problem with the non-lethal apprehension options available for this country's police forces, the problem is that there doesn't seem to be any good non-lethal options that the average cop can safely and effectively employ. The sleeper hold requires several cops and small suspects, and even then it gets botched too often. Tazing works sometimes and backfires other times, it requires close contact with the bad guy and too often is not safe for either the tazer or the tazee.
I don't know what will work. It just seems to me that in the justified outrage over the pumping of sixteen rounds into a run of the mill car thief and the subsequent cover up by the cops and City Hall something very simple and basic is getting neglected, how in the hell did it ever reach that point?
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Post by jdd2 on Nov 28, 2015 4:48:36 GMT -5
Obviously, the tazers didn't work. So the cop shot him a bazillion times.
Just to make sure.
on edit: I guess none of the cops had a taser, or, if so, didn't have a thought to use it.
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Post by millring on Nov 28, 2015 5:55:28 GMT -5
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Post by aquaduct on Nov 28, 2015 9:17:29 GMT -5
Yeah, the PCP stuff tends to do a lot to counter the stupidly simplistic discussions of this. But I guess it's kind of like the middle east, as long as the destruction is contained, who cares? |
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Post by drlj on Nov 28, 2015 9:53:18 GMT -5
The kid shot was no saint but that is really not the issue. The cop, when you see the video, has no defense. Taser anyone? I could almost understand one shot fired, too, but 16, most of them when the kid was down?
Just as big a crime is the way the whole thing was covered up. Emmanuel would not have won the run-off election, I would bet, had that video come out before the election. The cash settlement to the family was pushed through pretty fast with no one seeing the video, either. As soon as it came out, the cop was tossed under the bus by Rahm and he will toss others there if he has to do so.
So now, the wise men punish those who were truly responsible--the retail merchants on Michigan! Oh, wait a minute. That doesn't make a lot of sense? Well, it will bring out the most cameras so Pfleger and Jackson will get the media coverage they deserve. Turn on a camera and those two guys will fight for the front row. Macy's which does not have much of a record of shooting teenagers, black or white, should pay the price for this!
Demonstrating against the police, the mayor, the city council and the rest of the folks who covered the whole thing up for as long as they could, would probably not get as many news cameras out there and Pfleger would not be able to see his face on as many TV stations. Rahm could not put on his "hurting like the rest of you" face as easily I suppose.
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Post by coachdoc on Nov 28, 2015 9:54:36 GMT -5
I have personally seen a PCP crazed smallish guy pound two cops into a pulp in our ED in Philly a couple of decades back. Took 7-8 more guys to subdue him.
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Post by Marshall on Nov 28, 2015 10:00:06 GMT -5
Yup. The Dash cam video is disgusting. The kid is loping along the street. No one near him. Not even a cop. Then a car pulls up and withing 6 seconds of opening his door, the one cop pulls his gun and starts shooting. It's graphic. And they fought to keep the video under wraps. They even went into the Burger King and asked to see their security camera record. And low and behold, there's several minutes missing from the tape now; just when the incident happened. The cop was put on desk duty. The city paid the kids family $5 Mil to keep it quiet. Only when a judge made the city release the video did they charge the cop with a crime. He's had 20 other complaints against him over the years. |
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Post by Marshall on Nov 28, 2015 10:02:22 GMT -5
One of Nancy's Chicago cousins joined the protests and shared some pics on Facebook. Looked like she was having a grand old time, smiles all around. I'm quite proud of the protest. It was worth-while, in my book. And it was peaceful and it sent a strong message. I'm not a Jessie Jackson fan. But he was part of this and it was the right thing to do. |
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Post by drlj on Nov 28, 2015 10:40:32 GMT -5
The right thing to do would be take the protest to the police and city hall. Nobody at the Apple Store shot anyone or covered anything up. I am all for the protest but stopping someone from buying a toaster isn't going to stop anyone from being shot. Jackson and Pfleger should have been raising their shrill little voices demanding answers a year ago. It is typical Chicago politics to put the attention where it really does not belong.
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Post by Cosmic Wonder on Nov 28, 2015 10:52:01 GMT -5
Tragic outcome. Which seems to be repeated all over the place. Racism is endemic in our culture, and I don't know of anyway to fix it. I'm glad I'm a white guy. Huge problem for the powers that be in Chicago and every where else too. The old ways of dealing with a thief on PCP with a knife are no longer acceptable. Meanwhile a white guy with automatic weapons kills a cop and two civilians in Colorado Springs but is taken into custody unharmed. Im a bit surprised we don't have a full blown insurrection going on.
Mike
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