What Exactly Does Brandishing A Knife Mean And What Ever Happened To.....

[global1]

shooting to maim a person versus shooting to kill? Just asking?

[madville]

1. Shooting to maim is a TV/movie myth

Might as well ask why they didn't just shoot the knife out of his hand, neither are realistic scenarios.

[Aerows]

4. Police and military are taught to shoot to the chest/torso

It's the quickest way to bring a person down. While I wish that officers could shoot guns out of people's hands, shoot people in the legs or disable them, that kind of isn't in their wheelhouse when being rushed by a criminal.

[GeorgeGist]

54. Some civilized countries disagree.

[Hooked_n_Looped]

59. Which ones have 'shoot to wound' as an established policy?

[madokie]

60. I would say Most civilized countries disagree

other than that I agree with you

[Suich]

2. Years ago, a guy was threatening cops with a knife,

and they shot and killed him.

A lot of people questioned why they could not have shot him in the arm or leg.

As I understand it, the cops are not sharp-shooters and generally aim for the widest part of the body, i.e., the torso.

[ncjustice80]

5. If that is the case maybe they should consider

A different proffession.

[Codeine]

7. Nobody is a sharpshooter in that situation.

The body's own chemists plays hell with accurate shooting in a fight-or-flight reaction.

Rather than ask for unrealistic shooting skills I'd rather have them simply rely less on shooting at all, and even less still on shooting lethal weapons.

[Travis_0004]

12. If a cop shot to wound they would be convicted

If they are a threat then shoot center of mass in the chesr until the threat is over.

If they are aiming for the legs (good luck on a moving targrt) then the prosecution can argue that theg were not really a threat and hopefully that cop would be in jail for a long time.

I have a better idea. Dont charge a cop with a weapon.

[RandySF]

42. Then go find James Bond

or some other fictional character that can shoot with that kind of accuracy.

[Warpy]

52. Yes, the cops are trained to drop him fast

so he won't be a threat to them or any bystanders.

They don't go for arms or legs because they're harder to hit and bystanders might be injured by a wild shot.

Since the training is thus, the four wounds in Brown's arm must have been made because his arms were in front of his torso and his hands were raised.

Still, the one piece of evidence that might make Wilson's story a little more believable is his uniform. If all this happened at close range as he alleges, there will be blood spatter on his uniform.

[Aerows]

3. If you carry knives and aim them at police

I would be surprised if you don't get shot. And honestly, rightfully so.

[Codeine]

6. In an adrenaline situation accuracy is compromised.

Shooting for "center mass" is about all one can do and still hope to hit the target reliably. The notion that cops - or anyone else in a life or death situation - ever aimed to injury is mythology.

What we need are reliable, effective, hard hitting non-lethal measures. I'd like to see stun guns used more than firearms, for instance. That would mean spending money on developing fast, accurate stun guns rather than urban cop tanks, so that ain't gonna happen, I'm afraid.

[GitRDun]

8. On another post

I suggested tazing..other self defense mechanisms. Everyone seems OK with killing. I agree with you.

The chief of police was asked about tazers and said some of the cars are equipped with tazers. He did/would not say whether or not the car involved was equipped with tazers.

I think I am in the minority here.

Seems most are OK with lethal force.

I would at least like to know what other options might be available. Witnesses said, according to chief of police it was "suicide by cop". May have been a clean shoot.

I just would hope we would make non-lethal force a priority....at least talk about it.

[Codeine]

11. I want to see tazer guns become the standard sidearm.

They'd need to be more powerful and quicker to deploy to make that an actionable notion, but we make machines that land on other planets -- we can make a good, powerful, fast-deploying stun gun.

[RandySF]

43. A taser is not a good idea if the other person has a gun.

[ncjustice80]

13. Murder

There were two cops- they could have just wrestled the knice away. It was *murder* plain and simple. All cops should have their guns taken away and replaced with tazers.

[Codeine]

15. They should not have tried to wrestle anything away.

Then someone gets cut, perhaps badly. Just taze them. Make the primary sidearm a taser, period.

[IronGate]

22. Tazers don't always work, especially someone hopped up on drugs.

The best tool for someone attacking with a knife is a firearm.

[Codeine]

23. That's why we need better, more powerful tazers.

And I'm skeptical of the "hopped up on drugs" line. It's the other side of the "just shoot to wound" canard.

[IronGate]

25. I've witnessed it.

I remember years ago reading a story about how Las Vegas Police shot a guy hopped up on PCP 21 times, 2 of the shots were to the head and this guy kept coming at them until he finally died.

And more powerful tazers will more than likely cause heart attacks, todays tazers have caused several heart attacks already with some deaths.

[Codeine]

27. I'm sure there may be heart attacks.

But I'll take "this might kill a negligible number of people it is used on" vs. "this will kill very nearly ever person it gets use on" every time.

[sunnystarr]

47. Between 2001 and 2008, 351 people

have been killed due to tazing by the police according to Amnesty International.

I wonder if anyone cares about the rising use of the taser as a lethal weapon? At least we know that the Department of Justice cares. They issued a report about the pattern of abuse against the mentally ill in Portland that included the frequent, unnecessary use of Tasers. Recent deaths have begun to reignite the debate on taser torture.

http://electronicvillage.blogspot.com/2009/05/taser-related-deaths-in-united-states.html

[ncjustice80]

65. Still better than guns

400 cops got away with murder last year alone, the tazer ia better than what they use now!

[GitRDun]

61. How about mace? eom

[IronGate]

62. Same with mace, doesn't always stop a person. nt.

[MohRokTah]

18. A knife is a lethal weapon and the only option when a knife is involved is lethal force.

Sad, but true.

A knife is the weapon of choice for the majority of those who decide to commit suicide by cop. Cops are profoundly affected at a psychological level when involved in an incident of suicide by cop. The PTSD can be much more severe than our veterans experience.

[IronGate]

21. Are you for real? Wrestle the knife away?

A knife is a deadly weapon, especially in the hands of someone who knows how to use it.
No cop in their right mind will attempt to "wrestle" a knife away from a person.

[Jenoch]

26. Maybe when there is a perp with a knife

causing trouble in your community, you could volunteer to 'wrestle' the knife away and save the day.

[GitRDun]

14. I agree

Non lethal force should be the norm. It's the 21st century for god's sake. We can't subdue folks without killing them? We suck if that's the case!

[Codeine]

16. Agreed. Take all that money we spend on

equipping Podunk police departments with fucking mine-resistant-vehicles and use it to give them good, powerful tazers.

[Jenoch]

28. Tazers are already kiing people.

If they are made 'good, powerful tazers' they will be lethal and will likely be more lethal than a gunshot wound.

[Codeine]

31. Since getting shot by the police is approaching

a 100% fatality rate now I'd argue that the tazer represents a hugely-safer alternative to having a handful of 40mm bullets enter you at high velocity.

[Jenoch]

37. Do you have a link that provides information

that proves that getting shot by police is approaching a 100% fatality rate?

I agree, a Bofors 40mm autocannon is more lethal than a tazer (sic).

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bofors_40_mm_gun

[Codeine]

41. LMAO!! .40 caliber, of course.

I'm rather embarrassed by that.

[Jenoch]

45. I can be a smartass sometimes.

But I am quite certain that perps shot by cops survive much more often than they become fatalities. Do you have a link with information that says otherwise?

My brother was shot by a Taser once and it brought him down, but he was not a crazed lunatic or a perp on drugs. (He volunteered for a demonatration in a controlled environment, not necessarily an example of real-world use of the device. If a perp was in front of me with a gun or a knife, I would not depend on a Taser to subdue the perp. If they would not comply with demands to drop the weapon, and they advanced, I would shoot until they were no longer advancing with a weapon which I can only assume they itended to use to kill or to seriously injure me.

[Codeine]

46. No, like I posted further down the thread

it's a perception on my part, and it may be incorrect.

[Jenoch]

48. I'm aware of a situation where a guy was

hit 9 times with .45ACP by cops and survived. Apparently he was not even that bad of a guy, he just went off his meds and had a gun. I don't have a link either, it was so long ago I would not know what to search for.

[mythology]

66. It is the norm to not use lethal force

The overwhelming number of interactions between the police and the public, including those where force is used doesn't involve lethal force. Just because you may hear of more, doesn't actually mean it's very common.

The reported number of people killed by local police is 400 a year. That's just over 1 a day.

[cvoogt]

9. At least some of those cops carry tasers

The officer who gave the press conference today said so. I don't get why the gun is the weapon of choice seemingly every single time.

[Jenoch]

30. A Tazer is used on an aggresive perp

who is not armed with a lethal weapon. A Tazer is not an appropriate response when the perp is aggressive and armed with a lethal weapon. That's when the appropriate response is the use of a forearm. It is never accurage to say a perp is armed with 'only' a knife.

[moriah]

49. Uh-oh, our forearms are weapons?

Guess that explains why Darren Wilson was so threatened by the guy with his hands up....

[Jenoch]

50. My comment has nothing to do with Wilson.

I do not know if he was equipped with a Taser.

[moriah]

51. I was poking fun at your typo.

Guess that didn't go over so well.

[cvoogt]

58. Well ..

I heard on Twitter the victim was brandishing a butter knife or small pocket knife. Have seen no corroboration on that. Dude was acting erratic and may have had mental issues. There was a similar case where I live last year (Virginia); employee at Costco's seafood department had a knife (because she guts fish for a living) and had a mental breakdown. Cops came, one of them said "we don't have time for this" and shot her dead. Problem solved, I guess.

My point is, being a cop is dangerous for sure, but more and more it seems there is an inclination to prefer killing even in cases where less-than-lethal force could have been tried first. An erratic guy with a maybe 3-inch blade (or even perhaps a butterknife as I have seen rumored on the web) is a different story from a focused psycho with a machete. Many of our militarized cops won't risk scuffing up their jackboots though, and instead shoot to kill at the slightest justification.

[Gman]

10. the word "brandishing" creates much more of a visual image

therefore it sells more advertising space.

[MohRokTah]

17. Cops have NEVER shot to maim or wound.

It is a physical impossibility.

The decision by law enforcement to pull their service weapon ALWAYS means they have no other choice but to use lethal force.

Pulling a service revolver means they have to kill. There is no other choice in the matter. All other options have been exhausted and they must now kill the suspect.

[Codeine]

24. Perhaps then they should have something

better to pull than their firearm

And perhaps, just perhaps, they need to pull that firearm a lot less fucking frequently than they have been in recent years

[joeglow3]

36. Do you have any stats showing an increase in police related firearm deaths?

[Codeine]

39. I do not. It's a perception on my part.

One that may well be incorrect, now that you mention it. Our perceptions are colored by our most recent, vivid experiences, be they first-hand or via media exposure.

That said, I goddamned guarantee that - increase or not - there are far, far too many people dying in police shootings. Room many bad shootings, too many "good" shootings that could have been handled other ways, just too damned many shootings period.

[MohRokTah]

57. I could go along with that. eom

[Throd]

20. Why didn't they shoot the chain holding the chandelier right above him?

[deathrind]

29. Just a thought...

We can subdue and catch large and very lethal animals...seems to me there has got to be a better way than the current method used to subdue humans.

[exboyfil]

32. Net firing gun

[Codeine]

33. That may very well be the stupidest

most impractical thing I've ever seen.

[gordianot]

34. I take it the net is sticky how do you remove that?

[Codeine]

35. Was it sticky?

That might render slightly less useless. But with no information beyond silly visuals and bad funk guitar I couldn't be sure.

[gordianot]

38. Not really sure but come on drawing a knife falling on the ground there has to be a punch line.

Maybe Police could carry a butterfly net.

[RandySF]

40. Because not even the police are that accurate.

It's not the movies where the cops can shoot a knife out of a hand or hit a leg. When it's hitting the fan, you go for the part of the body you're most likely to hit.

[RandySF]

44. There are two extremes that annoy the hell out of me.

One is people like my dad who think the police is always right, there are people who always assume that every cop is just out to commit murder. You can't lump these two cases together.

[NaturalHigh]

53. Anyone who shoots to "maim" is an idiot.

That's a good way to get stabbed and get the gun taken.

Real life often doesn't work like television.

[X_Digger]

64. And get charged for an unlawful discharge, assault w/ deadly weapon. n/t

[seveneyes]

55. Best advice is to not pull a weapon on any law enforcement persons

There is no future in it.

[NaturalHigh]

56. I had a similar thought.

[TorchTheWitch]

63. because if the threat is not so severe that deadly force is required

than you have no reason to use a gun.

Shooting to maim means you don't need to shoot at all.