Should a Police Officer Have the Right to Kill a Person Based Only on the Fear the Officer Experiences??

[AthenaAwakened]

Regardless of the situation,

Is it a complete defense for an officer to simply say. "I feared for my life, therefore I used deadly force?"

You can't say, "Regardless of the situation," in a matter that depends upon the situation.

Begging your pardon sir, yes I can.

Time and time again when Police officers shoot and kill unarmed civilians, the officers involved state early on that they feared for their lives, that they saw what they thought was a weapon, the civilian exhibited menacing behavior, etc.

And the unwavering and uncritical supporters of the thin blue line weigh in across the internet screaming at the top of their keyboards that if the officer felt threatened, then that was good enough reason to shoot an unarmed person, regardless of guilt..

At what point did he fear for his life? Some people wake up with a feeling of dread that something bad is going to happen. Sometimes people make errors in judgment and someone gets hurt. It may have been what we call an "honest mistake," but it does not relieve the person of responsibility for their actions.

This is the crux of our current crop of "stand your ground" laws. What matters in a SYG plea is not the reality of the circumstances, but the state of mind of the ground stander.

The question is simple

Should a Police Officer Have the Right to Kill a Person Based Only on the Fear the Officer Experiences?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Reality: Any person has this right, not just officers.

There are two differences between police use of force and civilian use of force:

1) Civilians must come in with clean hands--you're not allowed to use force in self defense if you started the problem in the first place. Such a restriction makes no sense for police as most use of force incidents involve apprehending a suspect--a situation the officer initiated.

2) Civilian use of force is generally limited to immediate threats. Police use of force does not require the threat to be immediate, merely that it's not going to be preventable if the officer doesn't act now.

Beyond that in some states civilians are only allowed to protect family. Officers have no such restriction.

The actual decision to pull the trigger is the same, though: Would a reasonable person in the same situation, knowing what the person knew (thus you don't get to play monday morning quarterback and add things like "the gun was not real" that the shooter didn't know), think that it was needed to defend self or others?

That's nice; but it totally ignores the question.

You just described how things ARE in the USA.

The question was about how things SHOULD BE.

Or are you of the opinion that that is how things SHOULD BE, simply because they ARE?

Is there any sane country with a substantially different rule on self defense?

About the only difference I'm aware of is whether you have a duty to retreat or not.

(I'm not counting places like Iran where a woman is guilty of murder if she kills a man even when it's clear self defense and she didn't even intend to kill him.)

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Regardless of the situation,

Is it a complete defense for an officer to simply say. "I feared for my life, therefore I used deadly force?"

No. The jury decides whether a reasonable person would fear for their life in the same situation.

 

[ksen]

lol, like it ever makes it to a jury.

 

[bilby]

That's nice; but it totally ignores the question.

You just described how things ARE in the USA.

The question was about how things SHOULD BE.

Or are you of the opinion that that is how things SHOULD BE, simply because they ARE?

Is there any sane country with a substantially different rule on self defense?

Who fucking cares? The question is how things SHOULD BE. If every single country in the world has exactly the same rules, that still says exactly NOTHING about whether those rules are what SHOULD BE, it only says what they CURRENTLY ARE.

Are you of the opinion that something that is not currently done anywhere cannot be better than the status quo?

In 1780, would you have answered the question 'SHOULD a nation be run as a republic, rather than as a monarchy?' with 'Is there any sane country which is not some form of monarchy?'

Does how things ARE tell us how they SHOULD BE? Of course not.

 

[Bronzeage]

[

The question is simple

Should a Police Officer Have the Right to Kill a Person Based Only on the Fear the Officer Experiences?

I wish it was simple.

We don't know the fear the officers experiences. Do we take his word for it? We have a dead civilian on the ground and policeman who says, "I was scared.

What you really ask is, can a police officer be excused for killing a person because he claims he feared bodily harm, or actually, do we just take his word for it?

The standard of proof in our legal system has always been beyond "reasonable doubt." When a man is accused of a crime, it's his right to claim anything in his defense. Whether it is enough to excuse his actions, is a matter of reasonable doubt.

 

[TSwizzle]

Here's an example of something that is not right.

Daily Mail

 

[Bacillus anthracis]

If a physical struggle should ensue because the officer instigated a confrontation and that act leads to the killing of an civilian, should the resulting death be the fault of the officer who initiated the disturbance?

Not necessarily, no.

And why not?

Because your hypothetical is too broad.

I don't think so. And TSwizzle felt it sufficiently limited that it could answered.

"instigated a confrontation" What does that mean?

Well let's see

Instigate -- incite someone to do something, especially something bad.

confrontation -- a hostile or argumentative meeting or situation between opposing parties.

Do you need a definition of "a" as well?

If you instead wrote that the officer hit a civilian without cause, leading to a tussle, then that may be what you're going for.

No, that would be what you are going for. I know what I wanted to say, and I said it. If you don't like it, feel free to step away from it.

In any case, it's not the "right" to kill but a legally excusable killing.

You did read the question, right?

All of us can be legally excused of a killing, not just cops. Got to look at the totality of the circumstances rather paint a broad brush of "instigated a confrontation."

I didn't ask about what was legal or illegal. The question is

Should a Police Officer Have the Right to Kill a Person Based Only on the Fear the Officer Experiences?

If you don't like the question, you need not feel compelled to respond to or engage with it in any shape, form or fashion. I may be hurt by such a decision, but I will "endeavor to persevere".

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Which does not answer the question.

Should a Police Officer Have the Right to Kill a Person Based Only on the Fear the Officer Experiences?

It's an inappropriate question because you're not allowing for degree. The general legal question is this:


The elemental parts of the general question are many:

Would a reasonable police officer in the same position feel the need to use lethal force?

Further, was it an intuitional killing, or an accident? What was the size of the officer vs. that of the suspect? Where did this occur? Did the officer know the suspect from prior incidences? If so, what was the reputation of the suspect? Were there eyewitnesses? What did they say to whom, at what point did they say it, and what was the tone of voice they used to express their narration in? Were the suspects sober? If not, how intoxicated were they? Was it nighttime or day? How far were they standing from the incident when it took place? And there are more but I have to go.

Otherwise, the question you've set up may as well ask if a super mean bully should be able to murder a pony that's minding its own business.

See above post.

No. Okay, I did read it, but you've answered nothing substantively. There are laws and rules and elements that make up those rules. Example: in California to convict someone of first degree murder the killing must unlawful, done with the intention of causing great bodily harm or death, did indeed cause that, and was done with deliberation and premeditation.

The depth of the question you're asking is, "Is it okay for a cop to kill someone when they fear for their life?" The only difference being that you've put the word "cop" into the mix. That's it.

Have you considered the privileges and immunities that the police have and why?
Have you considered the federal constitutionality and what the Supreme Court has decided on police P&I?
Do you know anything in any meaningful detail about the above two factors?
Are you at least familiar with the model penal with respect to its rules for murder of 1st and 2nd degree murder, voluntary manslaughter, involuntary manslaughter, or negligent homicide?

Until you have at least that much information so that you can design a hypothetical based on a situation where the question of one person's culpability as it relates to causing the death of another person, you're really just making stuff up that in no way has any relationship with reality.

You want a one-sided answer to a one-sided simplistic question that without further elaboration is utterly meaningless.

But if you want as simple an answer to the question you asked, then, YES, a police officer who fears for their life may take the life of another. It's a bad answer to a poorly asked question.

 

[another1]

Someone should invent a gun that fires non lethal paralyzing pellets. Know what I mean? Like the puke stick in Minority Report. That would be cool. They could put electricity into the pellets. How hard could it be?
As for cops like Tensing, the murderer of Sam Dubose, I don't think he intended to murder Dubose. He probably did get scared and he overreacted. Does Tensing deserve life in prison? I think he doesn't. Dubose was doing criminal stuff when he got shot. If he sat still and obeyed the law, I doubt he would have been murdered. Twenty years sounds fair for letting his fear get the best of him. What a dumb move.

 

[AthenaAwakened]

[

The question is simple

Should a Police Officer Have the Right to Kill a Person Based Only on the Fear the Officer Experiences?

I wish it was simple.

It kinda is.

We don't know the fear the officers experiences.

No, we don't know and we can't know.

Do we take his word for it? We have a dead civilian on the ground and policeman who says, "I was scared.

What you really ask is, can a police officer be excused for killing a person because he claims he feared bodily harm, or actually, do we just take his word for it?

No, what I really asked was what I actually asked. Before we can ask can he be excused, we have to decide SHOULD he be excused. Our Politics are our morality put into practice

The standard of proof in our legal system has always been beyond "reasonable doubt." When a man is accused of a crime, it's his right to claim anything in his defense. Whether it is enough to excuse his actions, is a matter of reasonable doubt.

Not asking about legality, but morality.

 

[Bronzeage]

[
Not asking about legality, but morality.

Since he will be tried in a court of law, legality will matter. We don't try people for committing immoral acts, except in the court of public opinion.

Our common moral code recognizes it is wrong to kill another person, except in certain circumstances. After a killing, we have to examine the circumstances.

A police officer lives in a world of special circumstances and we give him special privileges. That is simple reality. Of all our public servants who deal with crisis situations, firemen, paramedics, etc, the police officer is the only one who is expected to step close to real danger. When a fire engine arrives at a burning building, the Fire Chief's first concern is the safety of his fire fighters. He will not send them into a situation where he thinks there is a real hazard.

This complicates things. A police officer is not issued a license to kill, but he has that capacity and is trained to kill. Killing is a function of his job. If we eliminate the "special circumstances" exclusion to our "Thou shalt not kill" moral code, it would be immoral in any situation to kill a person, without regard to reasons.

Special privileges come with special responsibilities. When a police officer kills a person, he has the responsibility to ensure this is last possible way to deal with the situation. All others avenues must be blocked, before lethal force is permitted. The police officer who fires his gun while other choices exist, has violated his special responsibility, whether someone is hurt, or not. If he fires his gun because of anger, that is a moral violation. If he fires in fear, that is also a moral violation. For a killing to be justified, it must be the result of conscious decision that it is the only choice in order to protect his life, or the life of another.

This decision may have to be made in a fraction of a second, which makes things difficult to resolve.

The real problem here comes down to an often overlooked fact. A gun is useless as a tool for self defense. It's only function is as an offensive weapon. If two men face each other with intent to harm, and both have a gun, neither can defend themselves. Their only option is to offend the other guy first.

 

[AthenaAwakened]

[
Not asking about legality, but morality.

Since he will be tried in a court of law, legality will matter. We don't try people for committing immoral acts, except in the court of public opinion.

Our common moral code recognizes it is wrong to kill another person, except in certain circumstances. After a killing, we have to examine the circumstances.

A police officer lives in a world of special circumstances and we give him special privileges. That is simple reality. Of all our public servants who deal with crisis situations, firemen, paramedics, etc, the police officer is the only one who is expected to step close to real danger. When a fire engine arrives at a burning building, the Fire Chief's first concern is the safety of his fire fighters. He will not send them into a situation where he thinks there is a real hazard.

This complicates things. A police officer is not issued a license to kill, but he has that capacity and is trained to kill. Killing is a function of his job. If we eliminate the "special circumstances" exclusion to our "Thou shalt not kill" moral code, it would be immoral in any situation to kill a person, without regard to reasons.

Special privileges come with special responsibilities. When a police officer kills a person, he has the responsibility to ensure this is last possible way to deal with the situation. All others avenues must be blocked, before lethal force is permitted. The police officer who fires his gun while other choices exist, has violated his special responsibility, whether someone is hurt, or not. If he fires his gun because of anger, that is a moral violation. If he fires in fear, that is also a moral violation. For a killing to be justified, it must be the result of conscious decision that it is the only choice in order to protect his life, or the life of another.

This decision may have to be made in a fraction of a second, which makes things difficult to resolve.

The real problem here comes down to an often overlooked fact. A gun is useless as a tool for self defense. It's only function is as an offensive weapon. If two men face each other with intent to harm, and both have a gun, neither can defend themselves. Their only option is to offend the other guy first.

uh huh

what do you personally believe? Not talking about legality, courts, any of that.

I believe fear is not enough.

Oh look, the sky didn't fall.

 

[abaddon]

[
Not asking about legality, but morality.

Since he will be tried in a court of law, legality will matter. We don't try people for committing immoral acts, except in the court of public opinion.

Our common moral code recognizes it is wrong to kill another person, except in certain circumstances. After a killing, we have to examine the circumstances.

A police officer lives in a world of special circumstances and we give him special privileges. That is simple reality...

One could draw the conclusion from what you wrote that you do not think officers should have the right to kill a civilian based only on fear he might get hurt.

The simple reality is some of the videos showing police attacking and even killing people reveal too often that they had better options all along during the encounter. Then, too often, the officer gets paid leave until a prosecutor cherrypicks “the facts” in a way that he can conveniently dismiss the matter without it going to court. Too often the fellow officers in the department conceal evidence because the primary duty they feel is to one another, to their "brotherhood". Too often those fellow officers don't step up during the brutalization of a citizen to say "hey, man, cool the fuck down!" Too often people excuse a slaying with "Well, the officer felt he was in danger so the civilian lost all right to life at that point". It'd be nice if everything got examined more closely and all the nuances were taken into account. But, too often, they're not.

 

[ksen]

[
Not asking about legality, but morality.

Since he will be tried in a court of law

Er, probably not.

 

[Bronzeage]

Since he will be tried in a court of law, legality will matter. We don't try people for committing immoral acts, except in the court of public opinion.

Our common moral code recognizes it is wrong to kill another person, except in certain circumstances. After a killing, we have to examine the circumstances.

A police officer lives in a world of special circumstances and we give him special privileges. That is simple reality. Of all our public servants who deal with crisis situations, firemen, paramedics, etc, the police officer is the only one who is expected to step close to real danger. When a fire engine arrives at a burning building, the Fire Chief's first concern is the safety of his fire fighters. He will not send them into a situation where he thinks there is a real hazard.

This complicates things. A police officer is not issued a license to kill, but he has that capacity and is trained to kill. Killing is a function of his job. If we eliminate the "special circumstances" exclusion to our "Thou shalt not kill" moral code, it would be immoral in any situation to kill a person, without regard to reasons.

Special privileges come with special responsibilities. When a police officer kills a person, he has the responsibility to ensure this is last possible way to deal with the situation. All others avenues must be blocked, before lethal force is permitted. The police officer who fires his gun while other choices exist, has violated his special responsibility, whether someone is hurt, or not. If he fires his gun because of anger, that is a moral violation. If he fires in fear, that is also a moral violation. For a killing to be justified, it must be the result of conscious decision that it is the only choice in order to protect his life, or the life of another.

This decision may have to be made in a fraction of a second, which makes things difficult to resolve.

The real problem here comes down to an often overlooked fact. A gun is useless as a tool for self defense. It's only function is as an offensive weapon. If two men face each other with intent to harm, and both have a gun, neither can defend themselves. Their only option is to offend the other guy first.

uh huh

what do you personally believe? Not talking about legality, courts, any of that.

I believe fear is not enough.

Oh look, the sky didn't fall.

Personally, I believe a policeman should be willing to risk being shot in order take control of the situation. If he cannot overcome fear of this and make a rational decision in the time allowed, he is in the wrong job.

If a police officer said, "I believed my life was in danger," instead of "I feared for my life,"? Is that different?

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Since he will be tried in a court of law, legality will matter. We don't try people for committing immoral acts, except in the court of public opinion.

Our common moral code recognizes it is wrong to kill another person, except in certain circumstances. After a killing, we have to examine the circumstances.

A police officer lives in a world of special circumstances and we give him special privileges. That is simple reality...

One could draw the conclusion from what you wrote that you do not think officers should have the right to kill a civilian based only on fear he might get hurt.

The simple reality is some of the videos showing police attacking and even killing people reveal too often that they had better options all along during the encounter. Then, too often, the officer gets paid leave until a prosecutor cherrypicks “the facts” in a way that he can conveniently dismiss the matter without it going to court. Too often the fellow officers in the department conceal evidence because the primary duty they feel is to one another, to their "brotherhood". Too often those fellow officers don't step up during the brutalization of a citizen to say "hey, man, cool the fuck down!" Too often people excuse a slaying with "Well, the officer felt he was in danger so the civilian lost all right to life at that point". It'd be nice if everything got examined more closely and all the nuances were taken into account. But, too often, they're not.

That is an astute conclusion.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

lol, like it ever makes it to a jury.

Prosecutors have a pretty good idea of what the jury will say and won't bring a case before a jury unless they think they will win. A prosecutor not charging someone they don't think they can convict is one doing his job correctly even if you want the guy convicted.

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Is there any sane country with a substantially different rule on self defense?

Who fucking cares? The question is how things SHOULD BE. If every single country in the world has exactly the same rules, that still says exactly NOTHING about whether those rules are what SHOULD BE, it only says what they CURRENTLY ARE.

Are you of the opinion that something that is not currently done anywhere cannot be better than the status quo?

In 1780, would you have answered the question 'SHOULD a nation be run as a republic, rather than as a monarchy?' with 'Is there any sane country which is not some form of monarchy?'

Does how things ARE tell us how they SHOULD BE? Of course not.

When everyone applies basically the same standard doesn't that suggest that it's the right standard??

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Here's an example of something that is not right.

Daily Mail

No video there.

Note, however, that this is one of the common causes of officer shootings--the cops corner somebody in a car, he wants to escape and drives at the officer. Unless the officer has something really solid to jump behind the only sure defense is to take out the driver before jumping aside as otherwise the car could simply correct for his jump aside. The officer is not expected to read the guy's mind and figure out if the threat is intended to be lethal or simply to scare him.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Someone should invent a gun that fires non lethal paralyzing pellets. Know what I mean? Like the puke stick in Minority Report. That would be cool. They could put electricity into the pellets. How hard could it be?

Very hard, indeed--as in you'll get a trip to Stockholm for taking the first baby step in this direction.

No chemical agent could be dispersed from the impact point through the body fast enough to be a useful defense weapon. Thus you can exclude them.

Physical force can't incapacitate without doing severe damage.

That leaves energy.

We have an electric incapacitating weapon--the taser. Note the limits, though:

1) It only works while anchored into the target. Anything that deflects or stops the barbs renders it ineffective.

2) It requires two separate leads with enough voltage on them that you can't simply use an insulated wire without making it too heavy (and if it's too heavy it either inflicts a lot of damage or it doesn't go far enough.) Thus it's easy for the wires to short out.

3) It only incapacitates while the power is applied.

4) Note that it is inherently impossible to build the requisite generator in a pellet even if you somehow overcame the first three issues. This is a fundamental limit based on the breakdown voltage of air, even magic nano circuits won't let you build it.

The other form of energy that could be employed is sound. Nobody's shown how to incapacitate with sound.

Hence the development of such a weapon requires the discovery of some new type of energy--and that's going to get you a Nobel.

As for cops like Tensing, the murderer of Sam Dubose, I don't think he intended to murder Dubose. He probably did get scared and he overreacted. Does Tensing deserve life in prison? I think he doesn't. Dubose was doing criminal stuff when he got shot. If he sat still and obeyed the law, I doubt he would have been murdered. Twenty years sounds fair for letting his fear get the best of him. What a dumb move.

In a case like that the choices are basically do nothing and hope it turns out ok, or take the shot. I don't think Sam Dubose intended to harm the officer, he just didn't think about the fact that his actions endangered the officer.

The officer didn't want to end up like the 14 year old kid here who didn't let go fast enough when someone in a car snatched it. The kid fell, went under a wheel and died.

 

[bilby]

Is there any sane country with a substantially different rule on self defense?

Who fucking cares? The question is how things SHOULD BE. If every single country in the world has exactly the same rules, that still says exactly NOTHING about whether those rules are what SHOULD BE, it only says what they CURRENTLY ARE.

Are you of the opinion that something that is not currently done anywhere cannot be better than the status quo?

In 1780, would you have answered the question 'SHOULD a nation be run as a republic, rather than as a monarchy?' with 'Is there any sane country which is not some form of monarchy?'

Does how things ARE tell us how they SHOULD BE? Of course not.

When everyone applies basically the same standard doesn't that suggest that it's the right standard??

Funny, I never would have picked you as a Monarchist.

 

[another1]

On twitter you'd be branded a major racist for saying that Dubose did anything wrong at all. I totally agree with you and I've tried to explain reality to twitter. I'm apparently a racist for doing so. More likes than dislikes but still a racist, which hurts my feelings and confuses me.
Btw couldn't we pour some electricity into pellets and shoot them rapidly at a (white) villain to test this new stopping technique? One capsule wouldn't do much, but when shooting a sub machinegun it may work. I was also thinking about flying tripwires made of advanced materials that have electric installed in them. We could look to fiction for real solutions like Batman and even Spiderman devices. What about tranquilizer darts? That would certainly be less deadly than bullets. Also I think it would be a good idea for law enforcement to dress more intimidatingly. Demon masks and prosthetic wings that allow an officer to fly five feet above the ground would lower the crime rate. It sounds ridiculous but no less ridiculous than shooting a bullet at a person who is holding a knife. While they're at it, they should design guns with a little wore creativity. If societies are going to be so insane, they should reflect this insanity in their weapons. The general idea being pistols that double as dinosaur puppets. They could put in speakers that make a goofy roaring sound after each fire. I'm jus sayin, if things are insane, things should be insane.