The Shooting Gallery: Police Violence MEGATHREAD

[Grey Fox]

Lewiston, Maine is in the middle of a mass shooting event. 16 dead and 50 injured so far.

https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/lewiston-maine-shootings-active-shooter-10-25-23/index.html

[jimmy olsen]

Lewiston, Maine is in the middle of a mass shooting event. 16 dead and 50 injured so far.

https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/lewiston-maine-shootings-active-shooter-10-25-23/index.html

Up to 22 now.

Manhunt still underway.
https://edition.cnn.com/us/live-news/lewiston-maine-shootings-active-shooter-10-25-23/index.html

[crazy canuck]

1 killed 21 injured at Kansas City celebration

[Jacob]

1 killed 21 injured at Kansas City celebration

Has a motive been established?

[crazy canuck]

Not that has been reported

[grumbler]

1 killed 21 injured at Kansas City celebration

Has a motive been established?

I'm betting that it is linked to the unhinged right-wing conspiracy theories about the Chiefs and the Super Bowl.

[HVC]

Looks like a dispute between some guys.

[DGuller]

Have bodycams become so effective at preventing questionable police shootings that we now have to pad this thread with the standard mass shootings?

[jimmy olsen]

Have bodycams become so effective at preventing questionable police shootings that we now have to pad this thread with the standard mass shootings?

Here you go

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/feb/16/florida-acorn-cop-shooting

A Florida sheriff's deputy mistook the sound of an acorn hitting his patrol cruiser for a gunshot and fired multiple times at the SUV where a handcuffed Black man was sitting in the backseat, officials said.

The man, who was being questioned about stealing his girlfriend's car, was not injured during the 12 November shooting. He was taken into custody but released without being charged. The officer who initiated the shooting resigned.

The Okaloosa county sheriff's office released the body-camera video and an internal affairs report this week, addressing the acorn for the first time.

Investigators viewing the video from deputy Jesse Hernandez's body camera saw an acorn falling just before shots were fired, an internal affairs report by the sheriff's office concluded. The acorn bounced off the patrol vehicle's roof.

That morning, Hernandez, a sergeant and another deputy had responded to a call from a woman who said her boyfriend had stolen her car and was sending her threatening messages. The woman told deputies that the man had a weapon, the report said.

Police detained the boyfriend and searched his car after handcuffing him and placing him the back of Hernandez's patrol car.

That's where he was when the acorn hit the vehicle.

As Hernandez approached the passenger side door of his patrol car, he heard a popping sound which he later told investigators he perceived to be a gunshot. And he said he believed he had been hit.

"He began yelling 'shots fired' multiple times, falling to the ground and rolling," the sheriff's report said. "He fired into the patrol car."

Sgt Beth Roberts heard the gunfire and Hernandez's screams – and began firing into the car as well, the report said.

While the county's state attorney's office found no probable cause for criminal charges, the sheriff's internal affairs investigation determined Hernandez's use of force was "not objectively reasonable". Hernandez resigned on 4 December, the sheriff's office said.


Roberts' use of deadly force was found to be reasonable, and she was exonerated, the report found.

The Okaloosa sheriff, Eric Aden, said he realizes the situation was "traumatic" for the suspect, and his office has incorporated the shooting into training for other deputies.

He also said he did not believe that Hernandez acted with malice.

"Though his actions were ultimately not warranted, we do believe he felt his life was in immediate peril and his response was based off the totality of circumstances surrounding this fear," Aden said.

Reviews of the case by the sheriff's criminal investigations division and the county's state attorney's office found no probable cause for criminal charges for Hernandez, who started with the agency in January 2022.

[Valmy]

Yeah that is a crazy story. He does some kind of ninja roll and then just unloads his fire arm in the general direction of...the acorn I guess. And then his partner who was talking to somebody some distance away just comes running in and unloads her entire fire arm at...nothing in particular. Just in the general direction. And the police consider this a "reasonable" response. And they wonder why people fear them.

All you have to do to justify firing your weapon in a neighborhood is feeling unsafe? Hell everybody who sees either of those officers in their neighborhood should be justified in unleashing their entire arsenal in random directions by that standard.

It is a damn miracle nobody was injured. And both of them should have been fired and should never do police work again. But she will stay in her current role and while Hernandez has resigned, be sure he will be back on the street with a different police force soon enough.

[Tonitrus]

My impression is they didn't shoot at "nothing" but at his own police cruiser...initially he, and then both, thinking their detained suspect inside had somehow kept a gun hidden.

Nevertheless, it still looks, and is, rather ridiculous.

[Jacob]

It displays the fundamental cowardice that underpins the American approach to policing.

[Valmy]

It displays the fundamental cowardice that underpins the American approach to policing.

I am not saying police officers do not get killed or injured in the line of duty. They do and their sacrifice should be honored.

But I do feel like their example gets played up in the mind of the police like they are an occupying military force and the citizens are all out to get them. But the statistics only have police offices as the 19th most dangerous job in the country behind jobs like truck drivers and most manual laborers. It is just not the case that the common citizens, or even the criminal population, are out to get police officers. Covid is by far the biggest killer of cops this decade (and of course the Police Unions have fought hard to protect their members from having to get vaccinated...)

But yet, there does seem to be an enormous amount of paranoia and those people who are supposed to keep the public safe by reviewing police actions seem to act with the expectation that being shot at is something cops just should expect to encounter. Bear in mind something like only 25% of cops will ever draw their weapon even once in their entire career.

[Razgovory]

I did not know that Covid was the leading cause of death of police in 2022.  Death by Fox News.

[HVC]

I'm assuming he's retired armed forces and PTSD trigger got him spooked. Could also just be a very bad cop.