Must be a Day that Ends in Y
Anonymous asked for a thread on the BART shooting and subsequent Oakland riots. Video of the shooting here. Article on the riots here. I think the cop's reaction is pretty strong evidence that at the very least he didn't intend to pull the trigger. Is that enough to beat a manslaughter or possibly a murder 2 charge? I don't know. Does it justify rioting and looting? No of course not.
I just hope BART/Oakland and whatever authorities are investigating this have a higher integrity than the LAPD. Now there's a corrupt organization.
I just hope BART/Oakland and whatever authorities are investigating this have a higher integrity than the LAPD. Now there's a corrupt organization.
posted by Armen Adzhemyan at 9:54 AM
26 Comments:
Why do blacks only decry violence and murder when it is a white man that killed a black man?
Where is their outrage over a high black on black murder rate?
And when will people learn not to get up when the police have detained you?
And your evidence for this is what, now? How involved are you in Oakland community action that you would know what the level of outrage is on a regular basis? And why do you assume that there is no outrage instead of questioning whether it garners national media attention.
And nice level of discourse--"why do blacks"--that's millions of people your are talking about.
The justifications for random acts of violence in that article seem strange to me. They seem to go along the lines of "at least we're not killing you," as if there was some kind of either-or choice between being killed by cops or being attacked by a mob.
I find it pretty incredulous the argument he didn't mean to pull the trigger. What was the excuse for pulling his gun and pointing it at a restrained suspect in the first place? He was on the ground and being restrained by multiple officers with no justification for that level of force. Even if he didn't mean to pull the trigger, why was his finger in the trigger guard? He could have just as easily shot his partner who was sitting on the suspect.
The only possibly credible explanation I have heard for pulling the weapon was that he thought he was reaching for a taser. Still seems pretty unlikely: a loaded pistol is much heavier than a taser and would feel very different in the hand.
Even after watching the tape multiple times, I still can't figure out what happened. It is very sad that Oscar Grant was killed. It is even more sad that people would use this as an excuse for violence when something like a peaceful vigil or protest seems more appropriate.
Not that it diminishes the loss, but how many people are killed by Bart police? It seems like this tragedy was an anomaly and people are using it to make their various political points about other unrelated law enforcement agencies. Is there honestly an ongoing problem with BART police and their tactics?
Had I spent time to collect my thoughts and write them in an articulate fashion as a comment for this thread, [I hope] they'd look a lot like 12:50 above.
It's not necessarily true that a gun can't be mistaken for a taser. I know many taser manufacturers make tasers to feel and weigh the same as a handgun. Some are made to be bright yellow, which seems to make sense for keeping cops from mistaking them, but if it's bright yellow it can't be used to deter a suspect b/c it's obviously not a gun. I've also been told that the reason taser manufacturers make the taser feel/look like a gun is at the request of police. So maybe it doesn't really matter if it's an easy mistake to make if the police receive the tasers knowing the mistake can be made.
I just hope BART/Oakland and whatever authorities are investigating this have a higher integrity than the LAPD.
I hope so too, Armen, but I don't know. My faith was shaken when I heard it took six days to interview the officer. Maybe law enforcement accidents or incidents are different, but people involved in firefighting accidents are interviewed immediately. The reasons are obvious. To give the officer six days of exposure to intense media coverage and public speculation seems like a pretty unconscionable piece of fact-finding. We know they had contact with him duringthat time (they were moving him from place to place in response to death threats) so why didn't they interview him?
Second, I'm not impressed to hear that because the officer quit, there will be no internal affairs investigation. Why is that? The shooting was absolutely an internal affair when it happened, right? Shutting down an internal affairs investigation because the officer is no longer with the department, whether or not it is technically permissible, is not at at all confidence inspiring. It suggests that the department does not consider the incident a department problem.
Third, the Oakland PD investigation of the Chauncey Bailey doesn't inspire much confidence, either.
I'm not trying to rag on our public servants or armchair quarterback -- there is a lot I do not know. I understand their job is incredibly difficult, even if I do not understand everything about their job, and I respect that. But if I have these questions, other people surely have these questions, too, and for that reason I hope the Oakland PD and BART authorities answer them in a public way. Even if the answers turn out to be very unfavorable to the city, the city should hear them. What did Armen call it? Oh yeah, "integrity."
It's difficult for me to believe that this officer intentionally shot the man. I have pretty bad eyesight, but can't seem to see him drawing the gun. This means that 1. he drew the inadvertently, as some have suggested, 2. he never drew the gun, and it fired through the bottom of the holster (guns can fire without pulling the trigger, even with a safety on, particularly if you are carrying around a pistol with a chambered bullet), or 3. he drew the gun and inadvertently fired.
Whatever the case may be, it's pretty ridiculous to think the cop intentionally shot this guy.
You're saying it might have gone off in the holster? Really? You're sure there wasn't a second shooter and the BART cop's gun never even went off? It seems about as likely.
Here is a video with a better angle:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXWSgG-KNng&feature=related
The taser theory seems odd to me, but what do I know? When I saw the video, it initially looked to me like the cop was standing up and drawing his weapon to secure the suspect while the other cop put on the handcuffs. Looks a little like this accidental shooting by an officer while securing a suspect:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-yT5NC4cPM&feature=related
That is why you never touch the trigger until you're ready to shoot.
Lastly, Andy said "guns can fire without pulling the trigger, even with a safety on, particularly if you are carrying around a pistol with a chambered bullet." That's just not true, especially for modern guns carried by police. Second, modern safeties physically prevent the firing pin from striking the primer, even when the gun is dropped or struck hard. Safeties can fail in cheap, "Saturday Night Special" guns, but that guns just go off by themselves is a myth.
Lastly, I think that instead of saying that there is danger of an accidental shooting "particularly if you are carrying around a pistol with a chambered bullet," you meant to say that you can ONLY have an unintentional shooting if you keep live round in the chamber. I can't think of any possible way a gun can fire WITHOUT a round in the chamber. It's a good point, though, and hence more departments should use the Israeli Draw:
http://pistol-training.com/archives/183
To add to the above, looks like the shooting officer was unsteady on his feet as he was getting up. Im betting he took out the weapon to secure the suspect, put his finger on the trigger, and pulled it accidentally decause he was still trying to regain his balance. Like I said before, BAD idea to touch the trigger before you're ready to shoot.
If the guy didn't resist police or do anything to get him to detained in the first place, this would have all been avoided.
It is not as though the BART police officer pulled out his gun and randomly shot the guy.
I blame the dead guy.
You're a jerk.
9:22, you're awesome. Personally, I'm a huge fan of police discretion, too. I mean, why do we need the courts or "due process" at all, when cops are out there making calls on the beat?
Jerk.
9:22 may be tactless, but he makes a point. This would have been a simple arrest, and there would have been no need for the cop to ever reach for a weapon, had the arrestee not struggled so much.
Discretion is beside the point, P. There's no discretion to shoot someone who is not a threat. This is about whether the cop's actions in a high-stress situation are beyond the pale of policing. I.e., if the shooting was accidental, is it still such bad policing that the officer should not be allowed to be on the job at all?
I think if the shooting was not accidental, then no question, he should be fired and probably charged with manslaughter, at the least.
I'm with 9:22.
If this was a deliberate killing, the cop should be prosecuted, of course. But given his immediate reaction it just seems extremely unlikely that it was intentional.
Some people want to act thuggish and then expect the world to treat them with the utmost respect. That's BS. Actions have consequences, and if you act like a threat, you'll get treated like a threat.
Patrick: Of course cops shouldn't have discretion to shoot people at will. This cop failed to handle his gun properly and should be prevented from holding arms in future jobs, even if his act was unintentional.
To the two commenters above: even if the shooting was accidental, it does not negate any of the elements for involuntary manslaughter and probably not for murder 2 either. That this guy should never be allowed within a mile of any firearm is I think beyond dispute at this point. But way to state the obvious.
"The police were detaining him, and he started to stand up. Because there was probably a reason they were detaining him in the first place, it's his fault he was shot in the back and killed."
Seriously? Am I the only one who thinks that reasoning is nuts?
I also think that 9:22 makes a point.
There wouldn't have been an accident if Oscar Grant simply complied with the police.
Murder 2, Armen? An accidental shooting by an officer during the course of an arrest of a resisting suspect hardly garners malice aforetought. But I agree with you otherwise.
9:22 -- Everyone has moments when they act a little idiotic. Doesn't mean they deserve to die. But a good lesson in life -- don't fight with guys who have guns.
Maybe it's a reach, maybe it's a slam dunk (to an Oakland jury), but I relied on a skim of People v. Watson, 30 Cal. 3d. 290, 300 (1981) ("second degree murder based on implied malice has been committed when a person does an act, the natural consequences of which are dangerous to life, which act was deliberately performed by a person who knows that his conduct endangers the life of another and who acts with conscious disregard for life") (internal marks and citations omitted). In our laws we show a lot of deference to the split-second judgments of police officers. I think that goes both ways. As someone trained in the handling of firearms, you should know that putting your finger on the trigger of a gun while you're still trying to regain your balance puts a person's life at risk.
Seriously? Am I the only one who thinks that reasoning is nuts?
You're not the only one. There are plenty of examples of excessive force that blur the lines. This is not one of them.
I think 9:22's comment is decontextualized and just generally insane. There are at least two different videos of this incident -- the man is clearly NOT a threat, is restrained and under physical control, by witness accounts was begging not to be tazed and was complying, and could have been quelled by ANY other method than a bullet to the back. Whether or not this incident underlies a greater issue with BART police violence does not take away from the fact that THIS incident was wrong and THIS officer committed murder.
I think the positions taken by most public officials (the BART Commissioner, Mayor of Oakland) have been right on. I just hope the CA AG's office steps up and removes the case for review.
"and could have been quelled by ANY other method than a bullet to the back"
I don't think a tickle fight would have done much to quell him.
I would not say it is clear that the man was not a threat and was just laying there.
If you see this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXWSgG-KNng you will see that immediately before he was shot, he was attempting to get back up. You can even tell this by the reaction of the officer over his head. He has his left leg down, but when Grant begins to resist, he immediately switches his position to restrain him further. About a second later, Mesherle gets up shoots him.
From what I can see, the man is a threat, is not complying, and is not under physical control.
I did not say that Grant deserved to be shot because he tried to get up. If the shooting was an accident, it could have been avoided if Grant had complied with the officers.
If it was intentional, then clearly Mesherle should be prosecuted.
You can't disregard the context of the shooting, particularly if it was an accident. The entire situation would have been avoided if Grant had simply obeyed the officers.
9:22, in what sense is your point relevant? If he hadn't been on that train, none of this would have happened. If he hadn't gotten out of bed that day, etc. The list goes on. But in a legal sense, it doesn't rise to the level of proximate cause (which is the officer's [gross?] negligence.
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