KS:Witchta man dies after fake "Swatting" call

[OlBill]

Should we require them to see a weapon before they shoot?

That is precisely what has been required of our troops in a combat zone. At various times, they have been ordered not to fire until after they were fired upon.

I do realize the police have a difficult and dangerous job, but the USA is not a combat zone. If one of our troops had shot an unarmed person in Afghanistan or Iraq, he could expect a very long vacation to that big hotel in Kansas.

I know, I was one of them. I was also ordered not to carry once while down range. Of course being the good SF soldier I was, I followed that particular order to the letter.

There have been some citizens shot would ended up not having a weapon. Lavoy Finnicum was a criminal. He was not armed when he was shot.

I have long advocated using cover and distance to descalate. We used to want to blow up every door we saw too. Then we learned about what they were calling tactical call outs.

Rise of the Warrior Cops is an excellent work on the subject and how we got to this point.

[OlBill]

I do realize the police have a difficult and dangerous job, but the USA is not a combat zone.

I think you have touched on the root cause. Maybe somebody should explain that to Law Enforcement.

[WTR]

Police work is inherently dangerous . Ever Officer accepts that as part of the job. You simply cannot guess if a person has anything in their hands. You need to prosess the nerve to hold your fire until you KNOW if there is a weapon present . I'm tired of these Officer in their full combat regalia saying they thought there was a weapon when the victims hands prove to be empty or at worst holding a cell phone. If you don't have the nerve.....quit. Everyone wants to go home safely to their family. You shoot first and plead ignorance you need to go to jail. We need to hold the Police accountable.

[Ruark]

One thing for sure: you can count on the press for tweaking the story to make it as juicy as possible and to make the cop look like a homicidal lunatic.

Beyond all the points that have been made so far, I'm a little concerned about the incident itself going ultra-viral and generating copycats, a whole new nationwide epidemic.

[Liberty]

What really bothers me is I'm starting to wonder who the biggest threat is to my family while in my home. The good guys or the bad guys. What really scares me is the fact that It is necessary to consider this at all. Wasn't that long ago when I wasn't afraid of the local police. I have lived honestly and morally my whole life. But it seems that with this swatting and wrong address no-knocks. and quick to fire that is becoming common place I have more to fear from the so called good guys than I do from the tweakers home invaders. At least I can defend myself from the bad guys.

Maybe I'm reading to much into this stuff, I don't know. I liked it better when the lines between good and bad were more clear cut.

[Steve_M]

One thing for sure: you can count on the press for tweaking the story to make it as juicy as possible and to make the cop look like a homicidal lunatic.

Beyond all the points that have been made so far, I'm a little concerned about the incident itself going ultra-viral and generating copycats, a whole new nationwide epidemic.

You know they are going to squeeze it for all its worth. Swatting has been around for a while now so not being new, I hope we don't see a surge in incidents either.

You know, there are some other points of interest:

A friend and I were discussing this and he said that the police should have known something was up because you could tell the caller was lying in the 911 call. The only way we know that he was is because it's all after that fact -something my friend is unwilling to accept. When he didn't appear to know how many stories the house was and he didn't appear to know what kind of gun it was or even where the bedroom was. You can point to it as an "a-ha" moment. The 911 dispatcher couldn't see into the future though. I just try to put myself into these situation and imagine limiting myself to knowledge they had at the moment. It's easy for me then to read this guy like he's disconnected or on drugs, maybe even mentally impaired. You notice the caller did a good job of escalating the situation by indicating he was probably going to set the house of fire real soon.

As for the house not being a single level house as described, what is the protocol for a discrepancy like that? I'm quite sure they just can't leave and go get a beer.

There are no winners in this, the victims family or the police officer. For now, to me this looks like a unfortunate situation where someone couldn't follow verbal commands by a officer of the law - again . . . after the real person to blame tried to get a stranger on the internet killed. He did.

So a question just came to me. What would i do in this situation? I think if I perceived conflicting orders, I would just leave my hands in the air.

[cedarparkdad987]

Do not go outside. If you do go out side put your hands in the air and do not do anything else even if they tell you to. No matter what.

[K.Mooneyham]

I really hope the dirtball who made that phone call gets extradited to Kansas to stand and face his crime. Murder might be difficult because his lawyer will say it was just a prank and his/her client didn't mean for anyone to get hurt. But manslaughter, oh yes, because that call led directly to the death of a man. Not sure we'll ever hear the follow up on this one, though.

[Txtension]

Do not go outside. If you do go out side put your hands in the air and do not do anything else even if they tell you to. No matter what.

I find it hard to believe that if you just not answer the door, LE will go away. In fact now it totally justifies a crack team of commandos with APC's, tear gas, and flashbangs making a breaching action.

So you go outside hands up and refuse to obey any other lawful commands. Looks like you are on PCP, an extremely powerful drug that increases your strength, dexterity, constitution and hit points to ridiculous levels. And that's why everyone on scene emptied their mags reloaded and emptied those. And if you really were high, it's doubtful that they could have brought enough ammunition. But I digress; into the absurd

[Liberty]

Do not go outside. If you do go out side put your hands in the air and do not do anything else even if they tell you to. No matter what.

I find it hard to believe that if you just not answer the door, LE will go away. In fact now it totally justifies a crack team of commandos with APC's, tear gas, and flashbangs making a breaching action.

So you go outside hands up and refuse to obey any other lawful commands. Looks like you are on PCP, an extremely powerful drug that increases your strength, dexterity, constitution and hit points to ridiculous levels. And that's why everyone on scene emptied their mags reloaded and emptied those. And if you really were high, it's doubtful that they could have brought enough ammunition. But I digress; into the absurd

You left out shooting the dog.

[warnmar10]

You left out shooting the dog.

GASP! Oh no you di'n't!

[MechAg94]

Do not go outside. If you do go out side put your hands in the air and do not do anything else even if they tell you to. No matter what.

I find it hard to believe that if you just not answer the door, LE will go away. In fact now it totally justifies a crack team of commandos with APC's, tear gas, and flashbangs making a breaching action.

So you go outside hands up and refuse to obey any other lawful commands. Looks like you are on PCP, an extremely powerful drug that increases your strength, dexterity, constitution and hit points to ridiculous levels. And that's why everyone on scene emptied their mags reloaded and emptied those. And if you really were high, it's doubtful that they could have brought enough ammunition. But I digress; into the absurd

I figure the plan would be to stay inside and call 911 with the intent of getting in touch with the police outside. I don't know what else to do in that situation. If you are already outside, my only suggestion is to keep your hands up and/or away from your body or go spread eagle on the ground and don't move.

I haven't seen full video, but I am hearing that the man had several opportunities to raise his hands and did, but kept dropping them for some reason. I still don't like that he got shot, but I would like to see the whole thing. I am not sure how I would want police to behave different if at all.

[philip964]

Maybe just maybe he had a medical condition that kept him from keeping them raised for a certain length of time. Shoulder injury or pain come to mind. I don’t know but just not following directions should not be a justification for a shooting.

He may not have understood the Police Swat / citizen contract which appears to be - make one small offensive move and your immediately killed.