Thats's a real problem. The situations are not in anyway comparable,...
In the sense of being executions they pretty much are.
When the suspect was killed the police only knew that he had attacked people with knives. They didn't know if anyone had been killed, or that the suspect had served time in prison for terrorist related activities.
Let's be honest neither of us know what they knew.
Assuming you're referring to what you just quoted me saying then it's kind of obvious, but we can go over it anyway.
Since the police did not know the identify of the attacker at that time, they could not possibly know that the suspect had served time in prison for terrorist activities.
And since one victim died about fifteen minutes after the suspect was killed, and the other victim only a few minutes before the suspect was killed, it seems very unlikely that the police on the bridge with the guns could have known that the suspect had killed anyone.
But, we do know that they are armed police, that they have been called to an emergency terrorist incident and it's not the first time.
It wasn't declared a terrorist incident until after it was all over.
And I'm questioning that policy. All policies, no matter how well thought through, evolve and change over time in reaction to how well they work in reality and to changing circumstances and improved insights.
Yup, but the policies in place at the time are the ones used.
No argument there.
And so far I'm not hearing anything better.
Yes you are, right now, from me. Don't use deadly force against defenseless people lying on the ground.
I never got into the legality of the killing of the suspect. I'm simply saying that the currently available information leads me to think it was possibly wrong and unnecessary.
You have no feasible way of assessing that.
This seems like a strange thing to say. Why would anyone be unable to form an opinion based on currently available information?
It was a terrorist incident in progress,...
Again, not judged to be a terrorist incident at that time.
...they acted to policy and training.
That's my point. Policy and training is wrong. There should be an arrested suspect, not a dead one.
If they didn't they're in trouble, that's the way it works.
Well, yes, of course. I naturally agree that police should follow current policy and procedures according to their training. Time to change the policy and procedures.
To be clear, my stance is pretty simple: Where there is a clear and present danger, shoot to kill. A man with a suicide vest is a clear and present danger, period.
In the sense of being executions they pretty much are.
Sorry, you can't declare them both as executions in order to claim that they are therefore executions. I'm sure that you understand the difference between the two situations.
Since the police did not know the identify of the attacker at that time, they could not possibly know that the suspect had served time in prison for terrorist activities.
And since one victim died about fifteen minutes after the suspect was killed, and the other victim only a few minutes before the suspect was killed, it seems very unlikely that the police on the bridge with the guns could have known that the suspect had killed anyone.
That's just silly. The armed police would have known that they were being called to a terrorist incident. And remember, we'd just had a couple and they would have been trained how to react.
It wasn't declared a terrorist incident until after it was all over.
You can't possibly think that the public announcement that it's a terrorist incident after the fact has anything to do with what will have been communicated to the armed units when called in as a result of the emergency calls? Surely you're not that naive?
Policy and training is wrong. There should be an arrested suspect, not a dead one.
Says you, half a world away from the comfort of your armchair. You're in a group of one at the moment.
Time to change the policy and procedures.
I think you should stick to your campaign to stop ignorant, prejudiced and untrained police shooting black people for no reason and don't harm your position by arguing badly about lawful and necessary shooting of armed terrorists.
Je suis Charlie. Je suis Ahmed. Je suis Juif. Je suis Parisien. I am Mancunian. I am Brum. I am London.I am Finland. Soy Barcelona
"Life, don't talk to me about life" - Marvin the Paranoid Android
"Science adjusts it's views based on what's observed. Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved." - Tim Minchin, in his beat poem, Storm.
Because it is so early in the news cycle I believe the details provided so far are likely inaccurate and incomplete and will be amended and augmented, but the information available now says that two men wanted for questioning about a homicide were spotted by police officers at a cemetery in Jersey City. The men saw the officers and opened fire on them, injuring one of them, a Detective Michael Kelly. The suspects then fled about a mile to a local grocery in a residential neighborhood, pursued by police.
Police called for backup, which came in droves and included SWAT teams, armored vehicles, canine units, the bomb squad, aviation units and tactical squads, then engaged in an hours long gun battle with the suspects with hundreds of rounds fired. Nearby schools went into lockdown while civilians either huddled in safe places or fled the area.
When it was all over one police officer was dead (a Detective Seals), three were injured (the aforementioned Kelly, and also Ray Sanchez and Mariella Fernandez), three civilians inside the grocery were dead, and the two gunmen were dead. Police believe the civilians were killed by the suspects, but the article did not say why they think so.
I believe it was a serious mistake to engage in a gun battle in a residential neighborhood, or almost anywhere there are people for that matter, unless lives are at stake (in other words, immediate intervention required or people will die). While it's not impossible a negotiator was brought in, none is mentioned in any of the three articles I have read. I don't see how the police could be confident the civilians were killed by the suspects and think it much more likely they were killed by police bullets. Hundreds of rounds were fired into the grocery.
Police believe the stolen U-Haul used by the suspects "may contain an incendiary device," and it's being inspected by the bomb squad. The presence of a suspected "incendiary device" also argues against gunfire.
Did the grocery have a landline that police called, or did police find out who was working inside the grocery at the time and call their cell phone, or, since police knew the identities of the suspects did they know their cell phone numbers or request them from cell phone companies or contact friends who may have known their cell phone numbers? Was any attempt at all made to contact the suspects?
To me this sounds like yet another massive screwup on the part of police who are just as gun happy as the criminals they pursue.
The police officer killed was actually the one shot at the cemetary, Detective Joseph Seals. No one named Kelly was shot. Michael Kelly is the name of the Police Chief of Jersey City.
The grocery was a kosher market that police suspect was targeted after reviewing security footage from the store, but have not yet described what the video shows. This information is from Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulup.
The gunmen's movement was "rapid and continuous for four hours within that area," said Police Chief Kelly.
The final tally is now two police officers wounded, one police officer dead, three civilian dead, and two suspects dead.
As all articles say, it is a sad day in Jersey city, but to my mind they should be mourning only one death, not six.
Each case has to be judged on its own merits and circumstances without the luxury of hindsight. I recently watched a video of a deputy who was completely out of control...What I would not agree with is that it is representative of why all police should be stripped of their weapons.
My objection is based upon the imperfection of human beings in that they can be careless, angry, mentally ill, depressed, poorly trained, temperamentally unsuited, etc., so it seems completely representative of why I think most police should not be armed, and especially while we have our current policies about the appropriate use of deadly force.
An execution is a person who is constrained, does not pose any kind of threat at the moment, and is deliberately being killed for a punitive reason.
That's pretty close to the way the police killed the suspect. If the initial shots were fired at the time most people are claiming (immediately after the last passersby is pulled off) he was constrained and he posed no threat since he had been disarmed. Maybe it was punitive for attacking people with knives, maybe not.
But you might want to look up execution in a good dictionary. For example, when Joey the hitman snuck up behind someone on a New York City street at night and shot him in the back of the head for his first hit, that was an execution.
You have to remember they ran up to the civilians and the subject and didn't kill anyone... until the moment they saw the hoax bomb.
I've asked a number of times now for when in the videos people can tell that police are noticing what most are calling a suicide vest rather than a hoax bomb, but no one has been able to do so.
In any case, that the suspect was perceived as wearing such a device is unlikely since, as Tangle has helpfully informed us, guidelines call for shooting someone wearing a suicide vest in the brainstem, but in this case police shot the suspect in the chest and abdomen. Would they do so if they thought he was wearing an explosive device? I don't think so.
They observed a threat.
That hasn't been established. Did they actually observe the threat of a suicide vest or hoax bomb? Where's the evidence for this? I'm not claiming it's untrue but that there are many possibilities, and that people seem inappropriately locked in to one of the more heroic narratives but for which there is no publicly available evidence.
Police arrest dangerous murderous people all the time. It's why many murderers are in prisons instead in cemeteries. Why not this one?
Because it's policy and training to use lethal force in a terrorist situation where it is known that the perpetrator is trying to do as much damage as possible with no regard to his own life.
Most of that is post facto information.
That's the way the evidence falls - after studying many suicide bomber incidents in Israel and on home territory shooting them dead was found to cause the least loss of life.
It hasn't been established that the police thought he was wearing a suicide vest at the time he was killed, and that he was shot in the chest and abdomen argues against it.
I have no idea where the terrorist was shot but there will be an inquest and an internal review, and maybe we'll find out.
Might be a good idea to wait until then before reaching conclusions.
But I doubt it because nobody here cares. You won't find many, if any, here trying to second-guess the police shooting that terrorist.
Oh, I've already said that. The narrative's already been established and it's a good one. Only the most stark of evidence could dismantle it.
If he was shot in the chest, the learning point would be about why not the head, not why not the leg or arm or whatever.
Well, we can agree that this represents a learning point, and about accepting the possibility of non-lethal targets. For those police who have guns I'm in favor of including policies, procedures and training for their non-lethal use.
For those police who have guns I'm in favor of including policies, procedures and training for their non-lethal use
there is no non-lethal use for guns in a police situation, if the situation has escalated to where you need to use a gun it should be to kill.
edit a couple hours after the fact: also if you widen the criteria for acceptable use of a firearm you're going to get more use of a firearm with more deaths.
Edited by DrJones*, : No reason given.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds soon I discovered that this rock thing was true Jerry Lee Lewis was the devil Jesus was an architect previous to his career as a prophet All of a sudden i found myself in love with the world And so there was only one thing I could do Was ding a ding dang my dang along ling long - Jesus Built my Hotrod Ministry Live every week like it's Shark Week! - Tracey Jordan Just a monkey in a long line of kings. - Matthew Good If "elitist" just means "not the dumbest motherfucker in the room", I'll be an elitist! - Get Your War On *not an actual doctor
Armed police were called to a multiple stabbing and suspected terrorist attack. It is not post facto.
It hasn't been established that the police thought he was wearing a suicide vest at the time he was killed, and that he was shot in the chest and abdomen argues against it.
So lets 'hold fire' before calling the police executioners should we?
Might be a good idea to wait until then before reaching conclusions.
Quite.
Je suis Charlie. Je suis Ahmed. Je suis Juif. Je suis Parisien. I am Mancunian. I am Brum. I am London.I am Finland. Soy Barcelona
"Life, don't talk to me about life" - Marvin the Paranoid Android
"Science adjusts it's views based on what's observed. Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved." - Tim Minchin, in his beat poem, Storm.
quote:Tangle cut-n-pasted without attribution, and I sought out the source of his cut-n-paste and posted a link to the full Wikipedia article. Of what use would quoting from Tangle's cut-n-paste be?
To give an accurate impression of what Tangle posted of course. The fact that you quoted material that supported your claims but not more relevant material that contradicted you is quite telling.
Do tell.
quote:...It's been insisted many multiple times that he must have been shot in the head,...
As I stated that appeared to be where the most likely shooter was aiming, and as Tangle posted, that is the correct action when a suicide vest is present.
You may have seen things in the video that weren't really there because of your certainty that the police knew he was wearing a suicide vest and would therefore have shot him in the head.
On the other hand you presented no evidence at all for him being shot in the body, until this post.
It's just one article, insufficient to be definitive.
quote:I have also questioned at what point the police had visual evidence that the suspect was wearing a suicide vest, and there's been no answer to that either.
The video has evidence - which I pointed out - that shows that they were unlikely to have noticed it until they had pulled at least some of the people off of the attacker.
Yes, I've made the same point myself several times, that the police couldn't see any suicide vest with passersby atop him.
The audio has a civilian asking if the attacker was going to set off a bomb, which may refer to the belt.
Where in the video does that audio occur. Here's a copy again:
From the image showing the belt, it seems to me that the officers on the spot should have noticed the belt by the time they pulled the last person off.
That's a possibility, but not something that's been established. The suspect was wearing a coat, and we can't tell at what point the coat becomes positioned in such a way as to make the belt visible.
quote:I don't know why searches didn't turn this up earlier, but I have now come across an article that states where the suspect was shot, and it wasn't in the head. This is from https://www.mirror.co.uk/...ge-terrorist-bled-death-21026112:
That would be disturbing if it turned out to be true.
Why is that?
Given the nature of the attack and the location I am certain that terrorism was on their minds. This is not the first terrorist knife attack at London Bridge.
Yes, I agree that the possibility it was a terrorist attack was likely on their minds.
In the sense of being executions they pretty much are.
Sorry, you can't declare them both as executions in order to claim that they are therefore executions.
That wasn't my argument.
Since the police did not know the identify of the attacker at that time, they could not possibly know that the suspect had served time in prison for terrorist activities.
And since one victim died about fifteen minutes after the suspect was killed, and the other victim only a few minutes before the suspect was killed, it seems very unlikely that the police on the bridge with the guns could have known that the suspect had killed anyone.
That's just silly.
What I said is factual.
The armed police would have known that they were being called to a terrorist incident.
I could agree that the armed police officers might easily have considered the possibility that they were responding to a terrorist incident, but it wasn't classified as such until after the fact.
It wasn't declared a terrorist incident until after it was all over.
You can't possibly think that the public announcement that it's a terrorist incident after the fact has anything to do with what will have been communicated to the armed units when called in as a result of the emergency calls? Surely you're not that naive?
I believe they would have communicated factual information, not speculation. How does one tell the difference between a mass murder committed by a mass murderer versus one committed by a terrorist?
Policy and training is wrong. There should be an arrested suspect, not a dead one.
Says you, half a world away from the comfort of your armchair.
We both have access to all the same information. Neither of us was an eyewitness to any of it. You are no different from me.
You're in a group of one at the moment.
Well, yes, that part of what you say is true.
Time to change the policy and procedures.
I think you should stick to your campaign to stop ignorant, prejudiced and untrained police shooting black people for no reason and don't harm your position by arguing badly about lawful and necessary shooting of armed terrorists.
If you've been following this thread then you know that I periodically check for updates on the incidents I've posted about. At some point an official report will be issued and people can look back on what they've posted here and see how well their speculations panned out.
Did the police think he was wearing a suicide vest at the time they killed him?
There's no point in speculating about what they were thinking.
No, no, sorry, I wasn't clear enough. That's not what I meant.
You said that "a man with a suicide vest is a clear and present danger, period." I was trying to remind you of a point I had made in earlier posts, that it is possible, since there's a news report that police shot the suspect in the chest and abdomen, that they did not think he was wearing a suicide vest.
I agree with you that a man with an actual for real suicide vest represents a grave danger, but whatever the suspect was wearing was not a vest (it could have been a belt) and was fake anyway.
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