Cut the guy a little slack. There had just been a shooting! You never know how you are going to act in an emergency situation like that.

I assume this is a reference to the Michael Brown case which is a good example of why you wait. 3 separate coroner reports concluded the same thing, and contradicted the hands up dont shoot narrative that the initial reports ran with.

It says something that so many black boys/men are killed in these situations that you legit can't keep them separate in your mind.

Trayvon was just killed by a wanna be cop, tho, so at least that's something.

Cops are all roided up nowadays too.

Also police forces favor hiring former military personnel. These guys coming back from warzones are often going to have some kind of PTSD coupled with training that encourages split second aggressive decisions in the face of a threat.

Hmm. Small sample. But I can't think of any of the recent cases involving ex military cops?

I assume the degree of training even a regular grunt goes through is >>>>>>>>>>> most police training.

Pretty bad generalizations, no?

This reminds me of the supper aggro commando rolling Texas cop who showed up to throw around black kids who had the temerity to have a pool party in a white neighborhood. Feels like for so many of these dudes this is just war games, and they're far too eager to play army guy.

People who've experienced actual danger and live fire are probably way less likely to get scared by the idea of a black person.

Why did she need to be cuffed in the police car? WTF

with her daughter inside

No idea how cops are trained but couldn't they have created a Tourniquet on his arm until EMT arrived?

I never served, but I asked a couple of ex-military friends of mine if they saw the same kind of attitude in the military, and they said that cops are way worse. Part of it being that in the military, if you've got someone who's overstepping their bounds, the rest of the unit typically roots it out pretty quickly because they're going to put the rest of their unit in danger. Secondly, you're in an actual warzone, not Barney Fife with a Rambo complex, so you don't need to go around looking for trouble in the same way.

What I haven't seen mentioned is why the car in Minny was pulled over in the 1st place? A broken tail light? What bull****. Odds cop was drug or warrant searching?
First step to ending police killings is to stop the war on drugs.

I was wondering about that as well. I guess I'm kind of assuming that he also had a chest wound in addition to getting shot in the arm as the girlfriend said. If the guy just bled out from an arm wound, that very likely makes this infinitely more tragic.

Nope. Not the first step.

The War on Drugs is a Bad Thing, we all get that. It is not however, the poisoned tree form which all these dead people of color keep falling. It's the racism (both from the police and the judicial system) and lack of accountability we see from the police that play a major role in why the War on Drugs is so destructive (rather than just being a dumb waste of resources).

He shot like 4 bullets, they would have easily penetrated his arm into his chest, his lungs were probably irreparably ruptured.

Well as long as they 'probably' didn't need to try first aid.

Wait for the facts! Haha didn't expect that line yet again.

not defending that.

Being a cop ****ing sucks. Anybody smart enough to go to college and graduate from there is not going to be a cop. Those people didn't drop six figures on four years of school to spend their lives policing ghettos and arresting thugs.

Even out of the not-so-smart group remaining, most of them can see that being a cop is a terrible decision. A NYPD officer starts at $45,000 per year. A sales clerk at Costco starts at $43,000/year. One of these jobs is clearly more important to society and challenging than the other yet a person recommending clothing gets paid only slightly less than somebody who can potentially take an innocent life with one wrong split-second decision.

So the ambitious and intelligent are driven away from being cops. So., who's left? Uneducated rubes who don't have the social skills to ask somebody for their Costco membership card. People who can't handle Costco shouldn't be the ones responsible for protecting society. Yet, this is the group of people we're supposed to put our trust in.

There's no question that there are cops who are essentially criminals wearing a badge. But I tend to stick to Hanlon's razor when I take a good look at who the cops actually are. These are mostly unintelligent, underpaid people put in positions to make difficult, life-altering (or ending) decisions within seconds. When you get people like that in positions of power, results like these should not be unexpected.

I work in downtown Minneapolis, and in our office today this is on everyone's minds and everyone has been talking about it. In general the twin cities are a pretty great place to live; it also feels like a fairly progressive society/area, so events like this seem all the more sad/depressing when juxtaposed against that culture.

No one gets too open about their opinions, being a place of work, but for the most part everyone seems to agree that:
(1) It's crazy that the victim's girlfriend is more calm than the officer. For lots of reasons, the cop should be more calm than he is, and to see someone else react more calmly really drives that point home.
And (2) it's very sad that nothing was done to try and save his life. Say what you want about not knowing exactly what happened leading up to four bullets being discharged, but what the hell is the point of keeping a gun pointed at someone who's been shot repeatedly?

Question - are cops trained to either (a) not shoot, or (b) shoot many times to make sure and kill the person?

I think movies and TV led a lot of people to believe falsely that cops are supposed to shoot for leg to disarm suspects. In reality when they fire it's to kill/prevent police deaths.

are camera phones the worst thing to happen to cops in a long time? seems like it.

If not the root, it is at least the trunk. It was specifically designed to oppress. (by Nixon) It's the states current biggest weapon against the poor and minorities.

It's a super handy dodge for these guys to pivot to the War on Drugs as a way to skirt around any discussion about institutional racism. Like when that guy selling lose cigarettes got strangled and Rand Paul came out decrying tobacco regulations. It's not hard to see what's going on.

I think this is a little simplistic. I think roughly 45% of new cops have college degrees, at least in the studies I've seen.

And while the pay is low to start it often goes up dramatically after a few years on the job (at least the NYPD is like that). Not to mention many aim for higher ranks, detective, etc. It can be a solid career.

Interesting fact though, a study from Michigan State showed that the cops with degrees were less likely to use force (http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releas...-dcn020515.php). Although they were also more likely to be dissatisfied with the job overall. Anyway, maybe police departments need to start requiring at least a 4-year degree for employment.

The war on drugs is the very definition of institutional racism.