Police Kill Man Attempting to "Open Carry" ..wait for it...

[George S]

What kind of training would have prevented this? It's a bad confluence of events. Crawford meant to harm I believe but acted in a way that police perceived as threatening in the split second they had to react.

They did not need to shoot him as quickly as they did.

Maybe, but the fact that he raised the gun as he was ordered down sealed his fate I'm afraid.

The only reason it sealed his fate was because the cops shot him unnecessarily quickly. There is no way they needed to open fire that quickly.

And had the victim had an automatic weapon, as the police were led to believe, his swinging it up calls for fire.

And, yes, other plans could have led to better results.

 

[bigfield]

What kind of training would have prevented this? It's a bad confluence of events. Crawford meant to harm I believe but acted in a way that police perceived as threatening in the split second they had to react.

They did not need to shoot him as quickly as they did.

Maybe, but the fact that he raised the gun as he was ordered down sealed his fate I'm afraid.

The only reason it sealed his fate was because the cops shot him unnecessarily quickly. There is no way they needed to open fire that quickly.

And had the victim had an automatic weapon, as the police were led to believe, his swinging it up calls for fire.

I'd have to ask someone trained in firearms combat about that, but at that range, a shooter would surely hit nothing but store merchandise, firing an automatic rifle one-handed from the hip. They could have waited a split second longer to confirm that he was aiming at them or threatening them with the gun.

The cops also cannot blame their hastiness on the words of some bystander. Because the bystander could turn out to be unreliable. (In this case, it was because he lied repeatedly to the dispatcher).

 

[ZiprHead]

I think the biggest issue here for me that makes me think the cops wildly over-reacted is that this occurred in an open-carry state. Even if this weapon was real and loaded, Crawford was still doing nothing wrong.

As a matter of fact, I believe if the weapon was real (and the guy was white) the NRA and open carry promoter types would be up in arms (literally)over this.

 

[Shadowy Man]

When will the #notallcops twitter feed start?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Apparently he did drop the gun, but I don't actually hear any actual commands prior to the shooting (the ones after can be heard clearly). Grand jury concludes it was justified...

From what I have seen in that video, he only dropped the gun after shots were fired. Immediately before the shots were fired he actually started lifting the gun which is what probably caused the police to open fire. Then he runs for cover but returns and runs toward the gun.

So I can definitely see why "no bill" was returned.

Agreed. I don't think he was actually aiming the gun, but rather turning towards the voice. From the point of view of the cop it's someone swinging a gun towards them, though.

The real problem is people should not be handling realistic replicas as if they were toys.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I'd have to ask someone trained in firearms combat about that, but at that range, a shooter would surely hit nothing but store merchandise, firing an automatic rifle one-handed from the hip. They could have waited a split second longer to confirm that he was aiming at them or threatening them with the gun.

The cops also cannot blame their hastiness on the words of some bystander. Because the bystander could turn out to be unreliable. (In this case, it was because he lied repeatedly to the dispatcher).

An automatic weapon places it's *FIRST* round just as accurately as one that is not automatic. It's only later rounds that are less accurate and tend to climb into the sky if you don't have enough control of your weapon.

Remember, these aren't true machine guns, but select-fire weapons. Civilian weapons have safe and single shot modes. Military versions have safe/single shot/burst or safe/single shot/automatic modes. The mode the weapon is in only controls what happens *AFTER* a round is fired.

 

[Shadowy Man]

I guess you really can't blame the cops for shooting a man holding something that looks like a gun, if they're willing to shoot a man for reaching into his car to get his driver license if he is asked to show it or his cane if he's a septuagenarian during routine traffic stops.

 

[Toni]

From what I have seen in that video, he only dropped the gun after shots were fired. Immediately before the shots were fired he actually started lifting the gun which is what probably caused the police to open fire. Then he runs for cover but returns and runs toward the gun.

So I can definitely see why "no bill" was returned.

Agreed. I don't think he was actually aiming the gun, but rather turning towards the voice. From the point of view of the cop it's someone swinging a gun towards them, though.

The real problem is people should not be handling realistic replicas as if they were toys.

Can you give evidence that suggests Crawford did not think the gun was a toy? As you would define toy, not as many media outlets and some gun enthusiasts describe 'toy' to include the pellet gun Crawford had.

Personally, if I saw something like that lying in a Walmart shelf, not in a box, I would not think it was a real gun.

 

[Mumbles]

From what I have seen in that video, he only dropped the gun after shots were fired. Immediately before the shots were fired he actually started lifting the gun which is what probably caused the police to open fire. Then he runs for cover but returns and runs toward the gun.

So I can definitely see why "no bill" was returned.

Agreed. I don't think he was actually aiming the gun, but rather turning towards the voice. From the point of view of the cop it's someone swinging a gun towards them, though.

The real problem is people should not be handling realistic replicas as if they were toys.

That's not good enough.

And, frankly, I don't see it. What I *do* see, is one or more cops just rushing in and firing on a man who was holding a BB gun. The man who was shot then runs around in a panic, and then the police kill him.

If events happened as the videotape shows, then the police are murderers.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Agreed. I don't think he was actually aiming the gun, but rather turning towards the voice. From the point of view of the cop it's someone swinging a gun towards them, though.

The real problem is people should not be handling realistic replicas as if they were toys.

Can you give evidence that suggests Crawford did not think the gun was a toy? As you would define toy, not as many media outlets and some gun enthusiasts describe 'toy' to include the pellet gun Crawford had.

He was handling it like one would handle a toy, not like one would handle a real gun.

He also swung towards the officer rather than dropping it when challenged.

Personally, if I saw something like that lying in a Walmart shelf, not in a box, I would not think it was a real gun.

But the cops didn't see it sitting on a shelf. They saw it in his hand.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Agreed. I don't think he was actually aiming the gun, but rather turning towards the voice. From the point of view of the cop it's someone swinging a gun towards them, though.

The real problem is people should not be handling realistic replicas as if they were toys.

That's not good enough.

And, frankly, I don't see it. What I *do* see, is one or more cops just rushing in and firing on a man who was holding a BB gun. The man who was shot then runs around in a panic, and then the police kill him.

If events happened as the videotape shows, then the police are murderers.

I do agree he ran around in a panic. He knew it wasn't real. The problem is that it looked real, the cops didn't know. They had a report of a man waving a gun around, the saw a man with a gun, when challenged he swung it in their direction. (Yes, I realize he was just looking at the challenger, the motion wasn't intentional.)

The fundamental problem is when you don't treat a realistic weapon as real someone might feel you are threatening them.

 

[Cobalt]

Agreed. I don't think he was actually aiming the gun, but rather turning towards the voice. From the point of view of the cop it's someone swinging a gun towards them, though.

The real problem is people should not be handling realistic replicas as if they were toys.

That's not good enough.

And, frankly, I don't see it. What I *do* see, is one or more cops just rushing in and firing on a man who was holding a BB gun. The man who was shot then runs around in a panic, and then the police kill him.

If events happened as the videotape shows, then the police are murderers.

That's what I see too.

 

[bilby]

Can you give evidence that suggests Crawford did not think the gun was a toy? As you would define toy, not as many media outlets and some gun enthusiasts describe 'toy' to include the pellet gun Crawford had.

He was handling it like one would handle a toy, not like one would handle a real gun.

He also swung towards the officer rather than dropping it when challenged.

Personally, if I saw something like that lying in a Walmart shelf, not in a box, I would not think it was a real gun.

But the cops didn't see it sitting on a shelf. They saw it in his hand.

But as ZiprHead points out above, this is an open carry state - even if he had had a real gun, what he was doing would have been perfectly legal.

The law in Ohio is quite clear; openly carrying a firearm is not cause for the police to act at all, much less to shoot someone dead. The police shouldn't have intervened at all unless he shot someone - or at the very least threatened to shoot someone. At no time did he do any such thing.

 

[Toni]

Can you give evidence that suggests Crawford did not think the gun was a toy? As you would define toy, not as many media outlets and some gun enthusiasts describe 'toy' to include the pellet gun Crawford had.

He was handling it like one would handle a toy, not like one would handle a real gun.

He also swung towards the officer rather than dropping it when challenged.

Personally, if I saw something like that lying in a Walmart shelf, not in a box, I would not think it was a real gun.

But the cops didn't see it sitting on a shelf. They saw it in his hand.

They did. And they were also primed to believe that there was an active shooter because someone lied about what he saw/was seeing. And after. We can forgive Ritchie for not knowing the difference between a pellet gun and an assault rifle: after all, he was not really in the Marines. But the police officers ARE supposed to have training about what to look for, how to assess a dangerous situation and dare I say it? Defuse a dangerous situation. I would expect that officers of the law, with sufficient training in fire arms, crisis management, cultural sensitivity, community relations, human behavior, etc. to be able to do a bit better than a wannabe puffed up fake ex-Marine with a hero complex.

I wish I believed that the color of Crawford's skin had nothing to do with why Ritchie perceived him as a threat or why the police officers perceived him as a threat, but I cannot convince myself that they didn't see a young black man in a Walmart and assume what was in his hands was a loaded assault rifle.

 

[bilby]

He was handling it like one would handle a toy, not like one would handle a real gun.

He also swung towards the officer rather than dropping it when challenged.

Personally, if I saw something like that lying in a Walmart shelf, not in a box, I would not think it was a real gun.

But the cops didn't see it sitting on a shelf. They saw it in his hand.

They did. And they were also primed to believe that there was an active shooter because someone lied about what he saw/was seeing. And after. We can forgive Ritchie for not knowing the difference between a pellet gun and an assault rifle: after all, he was not really in the Marines. But the police officers ARE supposed to have training about what to look for, how to assess a dangerous situation and dare I say it? Defuse a dangerous situation. I would expect that officers of the law, with sufficient training in fire arms, crisis management, cultural sensitivity, community relations, human behavior, etc. to be able to do a bit better than a wannabe puffed up fake ex-Marine with a hero complex.

I wish I believed that the color of Crawford's skin had nothing to do with why Ritchie perceived him as a threat or why the police officers perceived him as a threat, but I cannot convince myself that they didn't see a young black man in a Walmart and assume what was in his hands was a loaded assault rifle.

If it was, he would have been acting completely lawfully; Ohio is an 'Open carry' state. Simply having a loaded gun in your possession isn't even cause for the police to speak to you, much less shoot you dead.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

He was handling it like one would handle a toy, not like one would handle a real gun.

He also swung towards the officer rather than dropping it when challenged.

Personally, if I saw something like that lying in a Walmart shelf, not in a box, I would not think it was a real gun.

But the cops didn't see it sitting on a shelf. They saw it in his hand.

But as ZiprHead points out above, this is an open carry state - even if he had had a real gun, what he was doing would have been perfectly legal.

The law in Ohio is quite clear; openly carrying a firearm is not cause for the police to act at all, much less to shoot someone dead. The police shouldn't have intervened at all unless he shot someone - or at the very least threatened to shoot someone. At no time did he do any such thing.

You don't go swinging a gun around even in an open carry state. You can carry it slung (as you usually see in the protests) or you can carry it in a proper carry position. You do not play with it!

http://www.usacarry.com/brandishing-firearm/

 

[RavenSky]

I think the biggest issue here for me that makes me think the cops wildly over-reacted is that this occurred in an open-carry state. Even if this weapon was real and loaded, Crawford was still doing nothing wrong.

As a matter of fact, I believe if the weapon was real (and the guy was white) the NRA and open carry promoter types would be up in arms (literally)over this.

^^^ agree completely, which makes the grand jury's decision even more baffling (unless we factor in the "scary black guy" factor)

 

[bigfield]

I'd have to ask someone trained in firearms combat about that, but at that range, a shooter would surely hit nothing but store merchandise, firing an automatic rifle one-handed from the hip. They could have waited a split second longer to confirm that he was aiming at them or threatening them with the gun.

The cops also cannot blame their hastiness on the words of some bystander. Because the bystander could turn out to be unreliable. (In this case, it was because he lied repeatedly to the dispatcher).

An automatic weapon places it's *FIRST* round just as accurately as one that is not automatic. It's only later rounds that are less accurate and tend to climb into the sky if you don't have enough control of your weapon.

It can only place its first found accurately if the shooter actually aims the weapon, i.e. by bringing it up to his shoulder and holding it two-handed. Crawford didn't aim the BB gun at all.

 

[RavenSky]

Can you give evidence that suggests Crawford did not think the gun was a toy? As you would define toy, not as many media outlets and some gun enthusiasts describe 'toy' to include the pellet gun Crawford had.

He was handling it like one would handle a toy, not like one would handle a real gun.

He also swung towards the officer rather than dropping it when challenged.

Personally, if I saw something like that lying in a Walmart shelf, not in a box, I would not think it was a real gun.

But the cops didn't see it sitting on a shelf. They saw it in his hand.

In an "open carry" state. Even if it had been a real gun, Crawford did nothing wrong.

 

[RavenSky]

He was handling it like one would handle a toy, not like one would handle a real gun.

He also swung towards the officer rather than dropping it when challenged.

Personally, if I saw something like that lying in a Walmart shelf, not in a box, I would not think it was a real gun.

But the cops didn't see it sitting on a shelf. They saw it in his hand.

But as ZiprHead points out above, this is an open carry state - even if he had had a real gun, what he was doing would have been perfectly legal.

The law in Ohio is quite clear; openly carrying a firearm is not cause for the police to act at all, much less to shoot someone dead. The police shouldn't have intervened at all unless he shot someone - or at the very least threatened to shoot someone. At no time did he do any such thing.

You don't go swinging a gun around even in an open carry state. You can carry it slung (as you usually see in the protests) or you can carry it in a proper carry position. You do not play with it!

http://www.usacarry.com/brandishing-firearm/

YOU might not, but nearly every photo of the "open carry" nut bags shows at least one of them swinging their REAL guns around no differently that Crawford was doing with a toy gun.

Are you suggesting that it would be acceptable to shoot and kill the "open carry" nut bags too?