Police Taser 16 year old with broken back

[EZ22]

And like I said, they were chasing him and somehow shot him in the chest. Fishy.

 

[Cotton]

Yeah you can't listen to the family after anything like that. They are pissed (rightfully so) but everything they are saying now is emotional and usually exaggerated.

He clearly had something "to hide"... they caught him in the act and he ran. At the worse (assuming they caught him) he's in jail 5 minutes and pays a big fine when he goes to court.

In this case though, they clearly were in fear of their lives so they tasered him.

The thing is, how would the cops know if he had a gun on him? If they had been telling him to turn over and put his hands behind his back and he didn't, or worse reached into his pocket, I would say that's a situation that would cause the cops to have reasonable dear for their safety. It's just dumb to run. You made the point exactly. Had he just not run he would have been, at worst, in jail for 5 mins with a fine.

 

[Carp]

He was running backwards.

 

[Cotton]

It's illegal to deface someone else's property, and the kid was wrong and deserved at minimum a fine.

Forget that he died for a second, he didn't even deserve to be tasered unless he produced a weapon or tried to fight them. You shouldn't be able to taser someone because they can out run you after committing a petty, non violent crime.

I agree, and there is no way to know if he was fighting them by reading that article. But, if he was then a taser has been deemed a reasonable tool for getting compliance. It's much better than using a gun.

 

[Cotton]

And like I said, they were chasing him and somehow shot him in the chest. Fishy.

He could easily have fallen and flipped over to face them, or they could have had him on the ground trying to gain compliance and he ended up on his back and got tazered.

 

[Cotton]

Obviously, they were mad about the graffiti and were trying to kill him.

 

[NoDak]

And like I said, they were chasing him and somehow shot him in the chest. Fishy.

Just because they were chasing him, doesn't automatically mean they were out in the open and behind him.

According to the police report, Hernandez-Llach was attempting to elude officers by running through “alleyways, past apartment buildings, into doorways and down hallways.” The chase came to an end when he was shot in the chest by an officer's taser.

He could have been hiding in a doorway or whatever, and they came around the corner to find him. Seems plausible. Not saying what they did was right, but would explain how he was hit in the chest when they were "chasing" him.

 

[Cowboysrock55]

The cops should get a pass on this one. Their job is dangerous and you never know when a guy mangled on the side of the highway isn't in reality a genius super villain lying in wait for cops to rush to his aid.

Everyone knows the most dangerous animals are the injured ones...

Seriously though taser use is pretty out of control and over the top with police. Sometimes I wonder how much they really help and how much they are used to simply torture people who piss officers off.

 

[EZ22]

Just because they were chasing him, doesn't automatically mean they were out in the open and behind him.



He could have been hiding in a doorway or whatever, and they came around the corner to find him. Seems plausible. Not saying what they did was right, but would explain how he was hit in the chest when they were "chasing" him.

Yeah, that's possible, sure. I'm just saying tasering him was bullshit. What happened to good old police brutality, just kicking his ass and hauling him to jail. I wish there were pictures of these guys, I bet they were slobs.

 

[Cotton]

I'm just saying that cops get killed because they sometimes don't take the necessary force to protect themselves because of stories just like this causing the public to demonize them. Here are just a few:




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The last one has a 16 year old kid killing a cop. Showing that you have to suspect everyone.

 

[Jiggyfly]

He was running backwards.

Nice.

 

[Jiggyfly]

I'm just saying that cops get killed because they sometimes don't take the necessary force to protect themselves because of stories just like this causing the public to demonize them. Here are just a few:




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The last one has a 16 year old kid killing a cop. Showing that you have to suspect everyone.

So in your mind the cop should have tazed these guys 1st?

I am not making lite of these horrible situations I just don't understand how they fit the conversation.

 

[Cotton]

So in your mind the cop should have tazed these guys 1st?

I am not making lite of these horrible situations I just don't understand how they fit the conversation.

They are examples of how cops get killed when they don't take measures to protect themselves. The cop in the first video should have shot that dude as soon as he saw him loading the gun. The second cop should have made the other guy get out of the car and put his ass in handcuffs detaining him to protect himself. The cop in the 3rd video was more unfortunate than not protecting himself. But, it shows that even a 16 year old can pull a gun out and kill you, hence the need to never think you are safe even when a kid runs from you when you are just chasing them for graffiti.

 

[Bluestar71]

I'm just saying that cops get killed because they sometimes don't take the necessary force to protect themselves because of stories just like this causing the public to demonize them.

That doesn't give them the right to use extreme force as a first resort. And that's what cops are doing increasingly across the country. Not all of them, of course. But enough that examples of over the line behavior are popping up every day.

It's perfectly understandable that they have an extremely dangerous and too many times deadly line of work. But that doesn't give them a license to go wild on everyone because we're all potential killers or something. They're treating soccer moms and old men in wheel chairs as the same threat level as some gang banger with an AK. Better judgment among officers on the street needs to make a comeback.

 

[Cotton]

That doesn't give them the right to use extreme force as a first resort. And that's what cops are doing increasingly across the country. Not all of them, of course. But enough that examples of over the line behavior are popping up every day.

It's perfectly understandable that they have an extremely dangerous and too many times deadly line of work. But that doesn't give them a license to go wild on everyone because we're all potential killers or something. They're treating soccer moms and old men in wheel chairs as the same threat level as some gang banger with an AK. Better judgment among officers on the street needs to make a comeback.

Tazing isn't extreme force. Shooting them with a gun is. Tazing is the alternate to pulling their weapon. They used bean bags for a while but that wasn't effective enough in subduing without deadly force so they turned to tazing as a method. Now, if you want to argue that they should go back to beating someone into compliance fine, but you can't argue that they are doing the wrong thing given the tools they have been approved to use.

 

[Jiggyfly]

Tazing isn't extreme force. Shooting them with a gun is. Tazing is the alternate to pulling their weapon. They used bean bags for a while but that wasn't effective enough in subduing without deadly force so they turned to tazing as a method. Now, if you want to argue that they should go back to beating someone into compliance fine, but you can't argue that they are doing the wrong thing given the tools they have been approved to use.

Tazing is also not a 1st resort and its not approved for use just because you feel like it.

 

[Cotton]

Tazing is also not a 1st resort and its not approved for use just because you feel like it.

What is the 1st resort to subduing a perceived dangerous person?

Kicking their ass with batons? Sometimes you can't reach them.

 

[Smitty]

Tazing isn't extreme force.

Given the increased prevalence of death by tazer, one could argue that it is. Or at least still unreasonable.

 

[Smitty]

What is the 1st resort to subduing a perceived dangerous person?

Kicking their ass with batons? Sometimes you can't reach them.

Well, maybe for something like vandalism, letting them get away has to be protocol if you can't catch them.

Would the police risk a high speed chase down a highway, endangering the lives of others, to catch a graffiti artist, even if he's trying to evade them in a vehicle? Of course not, it's just not reasonable.

 

[Cotton]

Given the increased prevalence of death by tazer, one could argue that it is. Or at least still unreasonable.

Then argue that they should change the tools that the cops are given, not how they are used.