Moderators: Alyrium Denryle, Edi, K. A. Pital
Yes, quite right. Thanks...Graeme Dice wrote:Manslaughter most likely.Kamakazie Sith wrote:This cop is ONLY a murder if he intentionally hit the girl with the projectile. Anything else it was just a accident or maybe negligence.
Air rifles are designed to kill small game and have solid steel or lead projectiles and velocities easily as high as 1000fps as a result. If a paintball has more muzzle energy I would find that to be very strange, and in any case the fact that the projectile is a ball of paint rather then metal, and probably has greater diameter as well, makes the danger far less.Edi wrote:The most obvious question is what the hell are they doing using a direct fire weapon at crowds? Being hit in the eye can kill even with relatively low speed, light projectiles, because the eye socket reaches rather close to the brain and its back (despite the presence of a very thin bone) is not solid and does not withstand much force at all. People have died from air rifle shots, and afaik paintball projectiles have a lot more force behind them than compressed air rifles (not ones using CO2 canisters).
Do you know how many people have been killed after being hit by tear gas grenades? That's the alternative, and the number is not insignificant.
They should have arc projectile weapons (tear gas, pepper spray, skunk fluid, whatnot) for crowd control purposes, is what. Aside from the admittedly low risk of death unless being hit in the eye, direct fire weapons cause far more other kinds of liability issues, because they can cause injury.
Edi
Edi wrote:Penetration is based on force and pressure. Pressure is a function of force per unit of area. The paintball projectiles are larger yes, but not that significantly, and because they have more force, the penetration when they hit is just as guatranteed. They also have the additional lethality of having more momentum that does not bleed off as easily as the momentum of the far smaller air rifle pellet, which loses its energy a lot faster when it hits. Very simple physics, really. Using direct fire weapons against crowds is asking for trouble if you don't want to injure anyone.
Edi
Paintballs ARE significantly larger than air rifle pellets. And paintballs have the luxury of being hollow, liquid filled plastic balls vs. solid metal projectiles, which are more suited for penetration.
Actually if you're comparing copper/lead BBs', paintballs are on average much larger than then the pellets/BB's that are used in air rifles. As i have mentioned before, there are cases where people have been shot in the eye with paintballs and survived. Albeit blind in that eye. But this is the first death caused directly by a paintball round.The paintball projectiles are larger yes, but not that significantly, and because they have more force, the penetration when they hit is just as guatranteed.
Except it is not that simple. Police can't just escalate the level of force when they want to....if the police have escalated the level of force it is because you or whoever forced them to.White Haven wrote:Nonlethal weapons have got to be one of the worst ideas in recent memory to put in the hands of law-enforcement, for the simple reason that it creates the attitude of 'when in doubt, shoot, because no one will be hurt.' Even if you've got a nonlethal weapon, it should STILL be a last resort, not a 'This looks like it might get nasty, better start pumping pepper-spray into the crowd.' I don't know about you, but if I'm /not/ doing anything wrong, and some asshole with a badge starts firing low-grade chemical weapons at me, I'm going to take his fucking paintball gun and beat the shit out of him with it, or be damn tempted to, at any rate.
Kamakazie Sith wrote: Firing it into the crowd WAS NOT an accident. The death of the girl was....
no it wasn´t. the guy intentionally fired into the crowd, he knew what could happen (or he at least knew that he could possibly blind someone), he had no reason to fire and therefore it´s more than "just and accident."This is a retarded statement. Crowd control is not a students job, it is the job of a police officer.
neither student nor cop have any right to fire at peaceful people. still if the cop does it´s merely an accident? bullshit.salm two posts ago wrote: irrelevant. that doesn´t give the cop the right to fire at people who are not doing anything illegal at all.
there was absolutely no need at all to fire into that crowd so the student analogy is absolutely correct.
and incompetence justifies shooting somebody how?While the crowd didn't appear to be violent from one perspective it could have appeared to be violent from the officers perspective.
like mentioned by others and you, ok, manslaughter. (isn´t that the same as second degree murder? i´m not that familiar with american legal terms.)This cop is ONLY a murder if he intentionally hit the girl with the projectile.
Anything else it was just a accident or maybe negligence. As I said before the crowd could have appeared hostile to the officer from his perspective.
IIRC manslaughter is 3rd degree,2nd degree requires intent to kill, which we so far have no reason to assume (feel free to correct me). From what I gather manslaughter is roughly equivalent to 'Körperverletzung mit Todesfolge' in Germany. Could be negligent manslaughter which would correspond to 'Fahrlässige Tötung'.salm wrote: like mentioned by others and you, ok, manslaughter. (isn´t that the same as second degree murder? i´m not that familiar with american legal terms.)
Hopefully your neighboor took that cop to court for it. There is NO reason why an officer should put cuffs on that tight...none at all. I don't care if you're the most ruthless child rapist murder on the planet, a cop still has no legal right to place cuffs on a person that tight.White Haven wrote:In an ideal world, yes. But this is the world in which a neighbor of mine is stopped by a cop for pulling a legal U-turn, cuffed tight enough to cut his wrists pretty badly and thrown in the cruiser when he got out of his own car, and charged with /something/ (the officer's literally changed the charge at least once) for trying to tell the guy that the cuffs were way too tight. My faith in the maturity and common decency of police is, to put it mildly, low.
That is the purpose of those weapons. To disperse crowds...you are suppose to fire them at people! In fact if it is the weapon I'm thinking about you actually have to hit a person in order for it to have the desired effect.salm wrote:
If the cop can show that from his perspective he was seeing illegal activity then he'll have a defense.there was absolutely no need at all to fire into that crowd so the student analogy is absolutely correct.
neither student nor cop have any right to fire at peaceful people. still if the cop does it´s merely an accident? bullshit.
And a crowd being violent from another viewpoint demonstrates incompetence how?and incompetence justifies shooting somebody how?
If he is shown to be incompetent then it can be manslaughter. However, if he can demonstrate that the crowd was engaged in illegal activity from his viewpoint he'll be just fine.like mentioned by others and you, ok, manslaughter. (isn´t that the same as second degree murder? i´m not that familiar with american legal terms.)
sure. also at peaceful celebraters. you´re black&white fallacing here.Kamakazie Sith wrote: That is the purpose of those weapons. To disperse crowds...you are suppose to fire them at people! In fact if it is the weapon I'm thinking about you actually have to hit a person in order for it to have the desired effect.
as is said before, then he´s incompetent.As I said before from his perspective he may have had a reason to fire.
usually you can notice it like this:If the cop can show that from his perspective he was seeing illegal activity then he'll have a defense.
And a crowd being violent from another viewpoint demonstrates incompetence how?
what happens if someone shoots someone and then claims that it looked like the victim was beating his wife, but in reality he wasn´t?If he is shown to be incompetent then it can be manslaughter. However, if he can demonstrate that the crowd was engaged in illegal activity from his viewpoint he'll be just fine.
He's incomptent because people were being violent from his perspective. Really you and I have no idea. What I'm trying to point out to you is that from his perspective people may have actually been violent!salm wrote: sure. also at peaceful celebraters. you´re black&white fallacing here.
as is said before, then he´s incompetent.
See you're only assuming he saw that perspective....what I'm trying to get you to realize is that he may have actually seen a violent perspective and may have tried to put down some of those who were being violent and MISSED. That happens....usually you can notice it like this:
peacful: people yell, give high fives (like described in the article) and do not destroy stuff or beat each other.
For some reason you just can't imagine that he was trying to put down violent people. For some reason you think that everything was fine and dandy on that side.....violent: people yell, destroy stuff and beat each other.
oh wait, you´re right, since both involves yelling the copper probably thought that they must be rioting because they were yelling.
come on. a riot police man must be able to determine wheather it´s peacful or not even better. he´s supposed to be trained for situations exactly like this.
Depends on the evidence at hand.what happens if someone shoots someone and then claims that it looked like the victim was beating his wife, but in reality he wasn´t?
Which is exactly what police are trained to do. What i mean is police are trained to not use aggressive force as a measure to control crowds unless it is a last resort.White Haven wrote:He's waiting for the cop to stop trying to dick HIM over in court, so as not to give the asshole greater incentive to fire back. But yeah, this is all going on as we speak, current events, as it were. But like I was saying, give a cop nonlethal ranged weapons and he'll take on the mentality of 'this looks like it might turn ugly, I'll start shooting now just in case,' rather than 'this could turn ugly, but I'll wait until I know I have to shoot.' Especially given that one way to pretty much garauntee a riot is to start shooting innocent people with chemical weapons.
Given that even an illegal U-turn is a ticket matter I have the feeling your friend was up to more than you admit. And I bet if we saw the tape from the cruiser your friend wasn't politely trying to ask to loosen the cuffs either. He hadn't by any chance "had a few" before driving did he?White Haven wrote:In an ideal world, yes. But this is the world in which a neighbor of mine is stopped by a cop for pulling a legal U-turn, cuffed tight enough to cut his wrists pretty badly and thrown in the cruiser when he got out of his own car, and charged with /something/ (the officer's literally changed the charge at least once) for trying to tell the guy that the cuffs were way too tight. My faith in the maturity and common decency of police is, to put it mildly, low.
Just what is your friend charged with?White Haven wrote:He's waiting for the cop to stop trying to dick HIM over in court, so as not to give the asshole greater incentive to fire back.
The idea isn't of course to gas innocent crowds but the line between a happy crowd and a angry mob is a fine one, especially when there are already violent rioters out there. Most police try to avoid having it become burning and looting before they take action, and some times that does mean using force first. It's better to curtail it early than let it blow up and then try to fix it.White Haven wrote:But yeah, this is all going on as we speak, current events, as it were. But like I was saying, give a cop nonlethal ranged weapons and he'll take on the mentality of 'this looks like it might turn ugly, I'll start shooting now just in case,' rather than 'this could turn ugly, but I'll wait until I know I have to shoot.' Especially given that one way to pretty much garauntee a riot is to start shooting innocent people with chemical weapons.
Not 100% sure, but isn't it also inadvisable to get out of your car unless instructed to do so by the officer? If I were in his place and saw someone getting out of their car and I hadn't told them to do so, I might get just a little nervous/suspicious of their intent.Stormbringer wrote:Given that even an illegal U-turn is a ticket matter I have the feeling your friend was up to more than you admit. And I bet if we saw the tape from the cruiser your friend wasn't politely trying to ask to loosen the cuffs either. He hadn't by any chance "had a few" before driving did he?White Haven wrote:In an ideal world, yes. But this is the world in which a neighbor of mine is stopped by a cop for pulling a legal U-turn, cuffed tight enough to cut his wrists pretty badly and thrown in the cruiser when he got out of his own car, and charged with /something/ (the officer's literally changed the charge at least once) for trying to tell the guy that the cuffs were way too tight. My faith in the maturity and common decency of police is, to put it mildly, low.
As for the change in charges, it might be a matter of simply correcting a mistake. Or your friend's behaviour might have warranted a change.
