The Anchorage Police Department has
released new details on their latest shooting of a citizen. The salient points of their news *release:
- The victim had a Smith & Wesson .177 airgun which closely resembles a regular firearm;
- They shot at him twice with 40mm foam-tipped "sponge" rounds, hitting him once with no effect;
- When he pointed the airgun at them, they drew their service weapons and shot him five times, killing him.
To quote from the report cited above:
The Smith shooting, along with APD officer Boaz Gionson’s shooting of broomstick-armed man Shane Tasi in June and Alaska State Trooper Sgt. Paul Anthony Wegrzyn’s shooting of baseball bat-armed man Justin Lloyd Abrahamson,
has sparked a debate on the use of deadly force by law enforcement.
Some people at a July rally, organized by members of the Polynesian
community after Tasi’s death, questioned APD’s policy regarding shootings in such incidents.
Statistics from the Federal Bureau of Investigation show a rise in assaults on law-enforcement officers in Alaska despite a nationwide decline, with 253 assaults against officers in 2007 versus 386 assaults against officers in 2010.
The local debate on police use of deadly force rages on.
4 comments:
Rec'd this comment from S.S. via e-mail: "The only problem is that, as you reported last time, there are multiple witnesses that say the police were informed that the victim was only armed with a bb gun several times. Neighbors corroborated that the victim’s son repeatedly told the responding officers that the only weapon on the victim was the airgun and he kept shouting that throughout the entire confrontation. The police say they never heard that ... they would be the only ones that didn’t."
Rec'd this from S.S., again via e-mail: "So much for wondering if / when the “stuff” goes down (along with our constitution) our police force will act against the citizens. My guess is that they certainly will. I doubt there will even be much hesitation. I’m sure there are those officers that are good people, but I think the majority are bullies that got the job that allows them to pursue their need to have others submit to them. It’s very sad, but “to serve and protect” should be replaced with “to dominate and exterminate”. Gee, was that too strong?"
S.S. is entitled to his/her opinion. I promise to publish all comments whether I agree with them or not, as long as they are not profane or abusive.
If the perp doesn't drop it, can you 'really' trust the word of somebody standing on the sidelines??? And should you???
Old NFO, I wouldn't trust the word of a bystander, either. There are always two sides to everything.
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