Last Friday, Los Angeles Police Department officers shot dead a mentally ill man who had already gotten out of his car after a police chase with his hands up. The incident, which was broadcast on national television for all to judge, was the latest in a string of more than a dozen police shootings that have surfaced in the news just in thelast few months. Before that, it was the fatal shooting of 19-year-old Tyler Comstock after his father called the cops to report that his son drove away in his car. And other incidents involved death during traffic stop, calls to police for help with a mentally ill family member, and a man whose watering hose was mistaken for a gun.
This guy didn’t need to be dead and this officer doesn’t need to have this kind of shooting on his conscience for the rest of his life. … It’s bad for all.While national data is not collected on police shootings, available studies suggest excessive use of police force is rarely punished. In the Iowa incident, the county attorney deemed the shooting legally justified, raising renewed questions about when police can and should turn to use of a gun, when another tactic or tool might do the job. While the LAPD incident is still under investigation, a critical look back at several of the other recent incidents through ThinkProgress interviews with former officers, firearms trainers, and academics, reveal that policy and training may be as much to blame as human error.
seriously we hire people to do the dirty work so to speak, we run them through an assembly line of psych test which if you think about it DMV gives or use to give a socially acceptable test which the applicant gets to answer without a professional present, now look around how many accidents, road rage, and just plain crazy drivers are there on the roads we pay for, those test don't do the job.
cops especially should have to go through at least a interview once a week not just after thry killed someone it might prevent those dead citizens.
like the guy in NM who shot at a mother and five kids after scaring all hell out of them anybody would have tried to escape that preconcieved scenario if you are of color like they were.
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/11/18/21518468-cop-fires-at-minivan-full-of-kids-after-traffic-stop-scuffle-in-new-mexico?lite
or the cop in ILL. who killed to girls and wanted workmen's comp, who was responsible for allowing these killers on the street?
