No place but Minneapolis

[Soccerdad1995]

Another example of officers out of control. And then there's the black Army Lt.

Two completely unrelated scenarios. The Army LT was not resisting arrest. He did not have any warrants for his arrest. He was not a thug looking for trouble. The cop in his case over reacted. The Lt put his emergency flashers on and drove slowly to a lighted place. His part in the issue in his case was not complying with the officers commands. He was playing intentionally stupid. Had he simply complied with the officers commands to get out of the car, he would not have gotten pepper sprayed. Just the same, he was done wrong by an over zealous cop. The young hood rat on the other hand, had a warrant for his arrest and attempted to fight off the cops and escape in his car.

I agree that these scenarios are unrelated and different.

In the case of the Army LT, sure he could have done more to help the officer do his job. That would have been nice of him. But the officer was also not exactly being the nicest person on earth, so I can understand why the LT might not have been in an extremely helpful mood. The officer also made things alot worse with his statements.

First, he completely validated the LT's stated concern for exiting the vehicle, when the LT said he was afraid to get out of the car, and the officer stupidly said "you should be afraid". I'm guessing the officer was just trying to be a tough guy and assert his authority, and didn't actually mean to imply that he would assault the LT if the LT complied with his orders, but it definitely looks like he was agreeing with the LT's stated concern / validating that the LT had a legitimate reason not to exit the vehicle.

Then the officer decided to make his inane statement along the lines of "you're about to ride the lightning". I'm assuming this referred to being Tasered, but "ride the lightning" is also a direct line from a very popular and well known movie where it refers to being executed (The Green Mile for those who haven't seen it).

Lastly, you had the officer trying to convince the LT to drop any complaints in exchange for the officer not issuing a ticket. I'm not an expert but that sure sounds like the officer expressing some acknowledgment of wrongdoing.

[oohrah]

Another example of officers out of control. And then there's the black Army Lt.

Well, I heard on the news today that he kept driving, slowly, for two minutes after the police first lit him up. He then refused to get out of the car when asked by officers. It seems that there might be another side to this story.

They fired the officer in question.

[PUCKER]

Negligent discharge, not an accidental discharge.

Warning Graphic!

Video

Warning Graphic!

Video does show what appears to be explicit negligence.

female officer yells, “I’ll tase you, I’ll tase you. Seconds later, the officer yells “Taser, Taser, Taser” shortly before the pistol is fired.

“Holy (expletive)! I shot him,” the officer says after apparently discharging the pistol instead of a Taser.

I'm gonna say that the video backs up the negligent, but UN-intended shooting scenario.

Thank you for posting, Paladin.

Watching this video...all I can say is "play stupid games..." well, you know the rest. If I had been the perp (I'm 50 WM, just for context)...and I acted the exact way that the perp did...I would expect the same outcome...meaning that I would expect to be shot for fleeing / evading...it's pretty simple...at least in my simple mind.

[parabelum]

Negligent discharge, not an accidental discharge.

Warning Graphic!

Video

Warning Graphic!

Video does show what appears to be explicit negligence.

female officer yells, “I’ll tase you, I’ll tase you. Seconds later, the officer yells “Taser, Taser, Taser” shortly before the pistol is fired.

“Holy (expletive)! I shot him,” the officer says after apparently discharging the pistol instead of a Taser.

I'm gonna say that the video backs up the negligent, but UN-intended shooting scenario.

Thank you for posting, Paladin.

Watching this video...all I can say is "play stupid games..." well, you know the rest. If I had been the perp (I'm 50 WM, just for context)...and I acted the exact way that the perp did...I would expect the same outcome...meaning that I would expect to be shot for fleeing / evading...it's pretty simple...at least in my simple mind.

After 20+ years of police experience, how the heck do you confuse a taser (roughly 8oz) from a glock (roughly 32oz)? Not to mention they were on opposite sides and she had it pointed at him for a bit. Troubling, very troubling. His conduct notwithstanding, there is an issue here. A big issue.

[srothstein]

After 20+ years of police experience, how the heck do you confuse a taser (roughly 8oz) from a glock (roughly 32oz)? Not to mention they were on opposite sides and she had it pointed at him for a bit. Troubling, very troubling. His conduct notwithstanding, there is an issue here. A big issue.

There are two ways to confuse the pistol and Glock. The first and most obvious is that I do not know that she was carrying them on opposite sides. That is how I was trained, but not everyone does that and it was advanced thinking when I went through Taser training because they were still a relatively new thing back then. But I was also taught something that almost no one does, carry the Taser in a normal left handed draw, not just on the left side in a cross draw. It means the left hand gets used to drawing the Taser while the right hand still draws the pistol. It helps just a little more with keeping them apart (IMO).

The second part is that we know that under stress, people lose some functions, such as fine motor control, and various senses such as auditory exclusion. When I was in a shooting, the detectives did not believe I could draw the hammer on the revolver and let it back down safely to squeeze the trigger double action. What was going through my mind was contradictory training. From the time I was 8, my father had taught me to shoot the revolver single action for accuracy. Then the PD taught me to shoot it double action for combat style shooting. I drew it and cocked it out of 35 years of habit, then remembered saying to myself that they said to fire it double action so I lowered the hammer and then squeezed off a round - and cocked it again out of habit, lowering it again. The detective found the fired round was not under the hammer like he expected and did not believe my explanation. I also suffered auditory exclusion and time dilation so that I heard three distinct pops (not even as much as a 22 produces) as my partner and I fired, and it felt like a lot of time between them. The neighbor who called it in said it sounded like one long boom to him and he heard no pause between the shots. I know the sense of touch and the judgement of the weight are also going to go when the person is under stress like that.

I honestly believe she thought she had her taser out. I also honestly believe that either she carried the taser on her right side OR she was under enough stress that her hand went to her pistol instead of her taser because of too much training with pistols and little to no recurrent training with tasers. In danger she reacted instead of making a thinking and calculated action. In a fight, you react how you were trained normally. If she got recurrent training in pistols (at least once a year and probably more, but no recurrent training with tasers), her reaction is going to be to draw. One of the problems with officers being gun people is they go practice with their pistols for fun and relaxation. This is still training and it reinforced in her subconscious where the pistol was. I know there have been quite a few times where I needed a pistol and it was suddenly in my hand and I had no recollection of even reaching for it let alone drawing it.

I don't really think there is a lot of mystery in this shooting. They had a suspect with a warrant that fought with them and ran back to get in his car. I think he was trying to drive away but since the warrant was for carrying a gun (reportedly), it might have been an attempt to get a weapon. I think, because of the passenger, it was an attempt to get away but we don't know that either. To the best of my knowledge, the shooting was not legally justified (not under Texas law and I doubt if Minnesota's is much different) but it was also not a crime.

Her resignation was probably a good thing for her and the department, despite the comments about it being to get a new job as a cop in some other city. She might, but I bet her decision after this was to get out of police work. This kind of mistake weighs heavily on the soul of good or even mediocre cops.

[03Lightningrocks]

After 20+ years of police experience, how the heck do you confuse a taser (roughly 8oz) from a glock (roughly 32oz)? Not to mention they were on opposite sides and she had it pointed at him for a bit. Troubling, very troubling. His conduct notwithstanding, there is an issue here. A big issue.

There are two ways to confuse the pistol and Glock. The first and most obvious is that I do not know that she was carrying them on opposite sides. That is how I was trained, but not everyone does that and it was advanced thinking when I went through Taser training because they were still a relatively new thing back then. But I was also taught something that almost no one does, carry the Taser in a normal left handed draw, not just on the left side in a cross draw. It means the left hand gets used to drawing the Taser while the right hand still draws the pistol. It helps just a little more with keeping them apart (IMO).

The second part is that we know that under stress, people lose some functions, such as fine motor control, and various senses such as auditory exclusion. When I was in a shooting, the detectives did not believe I could draw the hammer on the revolver and let it back down safely to squeeze the trigger double action. What was going through my mind was contradictory training. From the time I was 8, my father had taught me to shoot the revolver single action for accuracy. Then the PD taught me to shoot it double action for combat style shooting. I drew it and cocked it out of 35 years of habit, then remembered saying to myself that they said to fire it double action so I lowered the hammer and then squeezed off a round - and cocked it again out of habit, lowering it again. The detective found the fired round was not under the hammer like he expected and did not believe my explanation. I also suffered auditory exclusion and time dilation so that I heard three distinct pops (not even as much as a 22 produces) as my partner and I fired, and it felt like a lot of time between them. The neighbor who called it in said it sounded like one long boom to him and he heard no pause between the shots. I know the sense of touch and the judgement of the weight are also going to go when the person is under stress like that.

I honestly believe she thought she had her taser out. I also honestly believe that either she carried the taser on her right side OR she was under enough stress that her hand went to her pistol instead of her taser because of too much training with pistols and little to no recurrent training with tasers. In danger she reacted instead of making a thinking and calculated action. In a fight, you react how you were trained normally. If she got recurrent training in pistols (at least once a year and probably more, but no recurrent training with tasers), her reaction is going to be to draw. One of the problems with officers being gun people is they go practice with their pistols for fun and relaxation. This is still training and it reinforced in her subconscious where the pistol was. I know there have been quite a few times where I needed a pistol and it was suddenly in my hand and I had no recollection of even reaching for it let alone drawing it.

I don't really think there is a lot of mystery in this shooting. They had a suspect with a warrant that fought with them and ran back to get in his car. I think he was trying to drive away but since the warrant was for carrying a gun (reportedly), it might have been an attempt to get a weapon. I think, because of the passenger, it was an attempt to get away but we don't know that either. To the best of my knowledge, the shooting was not legally justified (not under Texas law and I doubt if Minnesota's is much different) but it was also not a crime.

Her resignation was probably a good thing for her and the department, despite the comments about it being to get a new job as a cop in some other city. She might, but I bet her decision after this was to get out of police work. This kind of mistake weighs heavily on the soul of good or even mediocre cops.

That explanation clears up a few questions I had. Thanks for the insight from someone who has actually been in a policing situation. The Monday morning quarterbacking from folks who have no real idea of what it is like to be in this situation is getting very old.

[Paladin]

After 20+ years of police experience, how the heck do you confuse a taser (roughly 8oz) from a glock (roughly 32oz)? Not to mention they were on opposite sides and she had it pointed at him for a bit. Troubling, very troubling. His conduct notwithstanding, there is an issue here. A big issue.

There are two ways to confuse the pistol and Glock. The first and most obvious is that I do not know that she was carrying them on opposite sides. That is how I was trained, but not everyone does that and it was advanced thinking when I went through Taser training because they were still a relatively new thing back then. But I was also taught something that almost no one does, carry the Taser in a normal left handed draw, not just on the left side in a cross draw. It means the left hand gets used to drawing the Taser while the right hand still draws the pistol. It helps just a little more with keeping them apart (IMO).

The second part is that we know that under stress, people lose some functions, such as fine motor control, and various senses such as auditory exclusion. When I was in a shooting, the detectives did not believe I could draw the hammer on the revolver and let it back down safely to squeeze the trigger double action. What was going through my mind was contradictory training. From the time I was 8, my father had taught me to shoot the revolver single action for accuracy. Then the PD taught me to shoot it double action for combat style shooting. I drew it and cocked it out of 35 years of habit, then remembered saying to myself that they said to fire it double action so I lowered the hammer and then squeezed off a round - and cocked it again out of habit, lowering it again. The detective found the fired round was not under the hammer like he expected and did not believe my explanation. I also suffered auditory exclusion and time dilation so that I heard three distinct pops (not even as much as a 22 produces) as my partner and I fired, and it felt like a lot of time between them. The neighbor who called it in said it sounded like one long boom to him and he heard no pause between the shots. I know the sense of touch and the judgement of the weight are also going to go when the person is under stress like that.

I honestly believe she thought she had her taser out. I also honestly believe that either she carried the taser on her right side OR she was under enough stress that her hand went to her pistol instead of her taser because of too much training with pistols and little to no recurrent training with tasers. In danger she reacted instead of making a thinking and calculated action. In a fight, you react how you were trained normally. If she got recurrent training in pistols (at least once a year and probably more, but no recurrent training with tasers), her reaction is going to be to draw. One of the problems with officers being gun people is they go practice with their pistols for fun and relaxation. This is still training and it reinforced in her subconscious where the pistol was. I know there have been quite a few times where I needed a pistol and it was suddenly in my hand and I had no recollection of even reaching for it let alone drawing it.

I don't really think there is a lot of mystery in this shooting. They had a suspect with a warrant that fought with them and ran back to get in his car. I think he was trying to drive away but since the warrant was for carrying a gun (reportedly), it might have been an attempt to get a weapon. I think, because of the passenger, it was an attempt to get away but we don't know that either. To the best of my knowledge, the shooting was not legally justified (not under Texas law and I doubt if Minnesota's is much different) but it was also not a crime.

Her resignation was probably a good thing for her and the department, despite the comments about it being to get a new job as a cop in some other city. She might, but I bet her decision after this was to get out of police work. This kind of mistake weighs heavily on the soul of good or even mediocre cops.

All good info Steve!

[philip964]

Wouldn’t this be manslaughter?

By your actions you kill someone and it was not your intention.

[srothstein]

Wouldn’t this be manslaughter?

By your actions you kill someone and it was not your intention.

There is another aspect to manslaughter that is required, a culpable mental state. In Texas, you must do this recklessly, which means you are aware of a risk and disregard the possibility. That does not apply in this case.

There is a possibility of a charge of criminally negligent homicide. This is killing someone through criminal negligence, which is defined as:

A person acts with criminal negligence, or is criminally negligent, with respect to circumstances surrounding his conduct or the result of his conduct when he ought to be aware of a substantial and unjustifiable risk that the circumstances exist or the result will occur. The risk must be of such a nature and degree that the failure to perceive it constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of care that an ordinary person would exercise under all the circumstances as viewed from the actor's standpoint.

This is a very high standard for negligence and very hard to prove. About the only way this could be shown for this case is if it was proven that her taser training included the possible confusion of it and a pistol (very likely it did), it included some practices on how to avoid this (such as carrying the taser on the opposite side from the pistol - again very likely it did), and she made a conscious decision to carry the taser on her side next to her pistol (I don't have any indication that she did or not). I honestly believe she probably carried the taser on the other side but her hand just reacted like muscle memory because she has so much more training in drawing a pistol. I am not sure if this charge could be proven, but it is possible. BTW, this is the highest charge I could think of for Chauvin in the Floyd case and I am pretty sure it would not hold there either.

[philip964]

Wouldn’t this be manslaughter?

By your actions you kill someone and it was not your intention.

There is another aspect to manslaughter that is required, a culpable mental state. In Texas, you must do this recklessly, which means you are aware of a risk and disregard the possibility. That does not apply in this case.

There is a possibility of a charge of criminally negligent homicide. This is killing someone through criminal negligence, which is defined as:

A person acts with criminal negligence, or is criminally negligent, with respect to circumstances surrounding his conduct or the result of his conduct when he ought to be aware of a substantial and unjustifiable risk that the circumstances exist or the result will occur. The risk must be of such a nature and degree that the failure to perceive it constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of care that an ordinary person would exercise under all the circumstances as viewed from the actor's standpoint.

This is a very high standard for negligence and very hard to prove. About the only way this could be shown for this case is if it was proven that her taser training included the possible confusion of it and a pistol (very likely it did), it included some practices on how to avoid this (such as carrying the taser on the opposite side from the pistol - again very likely it did), and she made a conscious decision to carry the taser on her side next to her pistol (I don't have any indication that she did or not). I honestly believe she probably carried the taser on the other side but her hand just reacted like muscle memory because she has so much more training in drawing a pistol. I am not sure if this charge could be proven, but it is possible. BTW, this is the highest charge I could think of for Chauvin in the Floyd case and I am pretty sure it would not hold there either.

So she may not face any criminal charges?

Civil but not criminal.

[Excaliber]

After 20+ years of police experience, how the heck do you confuse a taser (roughly 8oz) from a glock (roughly 32oz)? Not to mention they were on opposite sides and she had it pointed at him for a bit. Troubling, very troubling. His conduct notwithstanding, there is an issue here. A big issue.

There are two ways to confuse the pistol and Glock. The first and most obvious is that I do not know that she was carrying them on opposite sides. That is how I was trained, but not everyone does that and it was advanced thinking when I went through Taser training because they were still a relatively new thing back then. But I was also taught something that almost no one does, carry the Taser in a normal left handed draw, not just on the left side in a cross draw. It means the left hand gets used to drawing the Taser while the right hand still draws the pistol. It helps just a little more with keeping them apart (IMO).

The second part is that we know that under stress, people lose some functions, such as fine motor control, and various senses such as auditory exclusion. When I was in a shooting, the detectives did not believe I could draw the hammer on the revolver and let it back down safely to squeeze the trigger double action. What was going through my mind was contradictory training. From the time I was 8, my father had taught me to shoot the revolver single action for accuracy. Then the PD taught me to shoot it double action for combat style shooting. I drew it and cocked it out of 35 years of habit, then remembered saying to myself that they said to fire it double action so I lowered the hammer and then squeezed off a round - and cocked it again out of habit, lowering it again. The detective found the fired round was not under the hammer like he expected and did not believe my explanation. I also suffered auditory exclusion and time dilation so that I heard three distinct pops (not even as much as a 22 produces) as my partner and I fired, and it felt like a lot of time between them. The neighbor who called it in said it sounded like one long boom to him and he heard no pause between the shots. I know the sense of touch and the judgement of the weight are also going to go when the person is under stress like that.

I honestly believe she thought she had her taser out. I also honestly believe that either she carried the taser on her right side OR she was under enough stress that her hand went to her pistol instead of her taser because of too much training with pistols and little to no recurrent training with tasers. In danger she reacted instead of making a thinking and calculated action. In a fight, you react how you were trained normally. If she got recurrent training in pistols (at least once a year and probably more, but no recurrent training with tasers), her reaction is going to be to draw. One of the problems with officers being gun people is they go practice with their pistols for fun and relaxation. This is still training and it reinforced in her subconscious where the pistol was. I know there have been quite a few times where I needed a pistol and it was suddenly in my hand and I had no recollection of even reaching for it let alone drawing it.

I don't really think there is a lot of mystery in this shooting. They had a suspect with a warrant that fought with them and ran back to get in his car. I think he was trying to drive away but since the warrant was for carrying a gun (reportedly), it might have been an attempt to get a weapon. I think, because of the passenger, it was an attempt to get away but we don't know that either. To the best of my knowledge, the shooting was not legally justified (not under Texas law and I doubt if Minnesota's is much different) but it was also not a crime.

Her resignation was probably a good thing for her and the department, despite the comments about it being to get a new job as a cop in some other city. She might, but I bet her decision after this was to get out of police work. This kind of mistake weighs heavily on the soul of good or even mediocre cops.

This is a very well put together analysis and very much in line with my thinking on the incident.

[philip964]

Wouldn’t this be manslaughter?

By your actions you kill someone and it was not your intention.

There is another aspect to manslaughter that is required, a culpable mental state. In Texas, you must do this recklessly, which means you are aware of a risk and disregard the possibility. That does not apply in this case.

There is a possibility of a charge of criminally negligent homicide. This is killing someone through criminal negligence, which is defined as:

A person acts with criminal negligence, or is criminally negligent, with respect to circumstances surrounding his conduct or the result of his conduct when he ought to be aware of a substantial and unjustifiable risk that the circumstances exist or the result will occur. The risk must be of such a nature and degree that the failure to perceive it constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of care that an ordinary person would exercise under all the circumstances as viewed from the actor's standpoint.

This is a very high standard for negligence and very hard to prove. About the only way this could be shown for this case is if it was proven that her taser training included the possible confusion of it and a pistol (very likely it did), it included some practices on how to avoid this (such as carrying the taser on the opposite side from the pistol - again very likely it did), and she made a conscious decision to carry the taser on her side next to her pistol (I don't have any indication that she did or not). I honestly believe she probably carried the taser on the other side but her hand just reacted like muscle memory because she has so much more training in drawing a pistol. I am not sure if this charge could be proven, but it is possible. BTW, this is the highest charge I could think of for Chauvin in the Floyd case and I am pretty sure it would not hold there either.

So she may not face any criminal charges?

Civil but not criminal.

https://kstp.com/minnesota-news/brookly ... h/6074030/

Seems the mayor feels criminal charges are necessary.



But he also has some other interesting views as well.

[baseballguy2001]

This is straight from the Minnesota Statues - Manslaughter 2 - (1) by the person's culpable negligence whereby the person creates an unreasonable risk, and consciously takes chances of causing death or great bodily harm to another; - She meant to grab the Taser and grabbed her gun instead.

Open & shut.

You can talk about tunnel vision and auditory exclusion syndrome, but those items aren't captured by the body cams. She tells him 'I'll tase you' then after the kill shot, at point blank range, she's surprised, her weapon went off. That is either negligence, or an attempt at CYA knowing the body cam is rolling. There are no 'accidental' shootings, we all know that. Taking a life by negligence is a crime that should be punished. Especially for some one who should be a pro with firearms.

[philip964]

https://www.thesun.ie/news/6846144/daun ... minnesota/

Address leaked.

[parabelum]

This is straight from the Minnesota Statues - Manslaughter 2 - (1) by the person's culpable negligence whereby the person creates an unreasonable risk, and consciously takes chances of causing death or great bodily harm to another; - She meant to grab the Taser and grabbed her gun instead.

Open & shut.

You can talk about tunnel vision and auditory exclusion syndrome, but those items aren't captured by the body cams. She tells him 'I'll tase you' then after the kill shot, at point blank range, she's surprised, her weapon went off. That is either negligence, or an attempt at CYA knowing the body cam is rolling. There are no 'accidental' shootings, we all know that. Taking a life by negligence is a crime that should be punished. Especially for some one who should be a pro with firearms.

Bingo.This kid was a no good for nothing thug from what I can tell, but he did not deserve to die. She had over 20 years of police experience, and this “mistake” is both inexcusable and unacceptable, period. Fact that you have stress and other situational factors does not excuse nor does it offer reasonable explanation of killing someone in error. That is what your training is for precisely. It is what sets LEOs apart from untrained civilians.