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This guy was on his probationary period in an at-will state. There is no action to be brought here outside of public pressure.

 Ouze wrote:
This guy was on his probationary period in an at-will state. There is no action to be brought here outside of public pressure.

More's the fething pity.

Still despicable. Burn West Virginia to the fething ground.

And this is what happens to the good cops. They get butted out by the thugs. And the department protects the thugs.

I do my best to respect and trust police, but seriously, at this point that feels like half insanity to do that at this point.

Wrongful termination? Accusations of slander?

It appears to have been during his probation period in a right to work state. I don't think that would fly. Wouldn't stop them from trying though but thats not usually their bag.

Unless there is an element of this that we have not seen(i.e. if the two Barney fething Fifes had the gun in question pointed at them when they rolled up), everything about the way this was handled violates the standards that many police departments put forth for their officers.

Well clearly only have a bit of the story, but I am not disagreeing with you.

This officer should be held up as an example of policing at its finest, not thrown out because two fething yahoos decided to John McClane it up. Those are the two who should be out on their asses.

Again we only have a tiny bit of the story. I'd like to hear more. But based only on the admittedly lopsided hit piece of the article, I'd agree with you.

Still despicable. Burn West Virginia to the fething ground.

Thats not especially helpful.

Still despicable. Burn West Virginia to the fething ground.

We all want to. but for other reasons.

EDIT: wow i suck at quote.

Remember, those old boys can shoot, and would probably invite you to try it.

 Ouze wrote:
Yeah, it's very unclear to me why the first cop was peacefully de-escalating the situation, the second 2 cops show up, shoot him, and he's the bad guy. They were free to take cover, hell even draw and target the guy from cover while the first cop did his thing. Ultimately the only life that needed to be at risk was the first cops, and he clearly was OK with that risk. It's kind of amazing to me that he got fired for that.

He's the bad guy because he had assessed the situation and used non lethal force and then two officers come in and shoot the guy, thus opening a pretty clear excessive force/wrongful death claim. This is all about covering liability, not sound law enforcement. Hopefully the local voters will have something to say about this.

 jmurph wrote:

 Ouze wrote:
Yeah, it's very unclear to me why the first cop was peacefully de-escalating the situation, the second 2 cops show up, shoot him, and he's the bad guy. They were free to take cover, hell even draw and target the guy from cover while the first cop did his thing. Ultimately the only life that needed to be at risk was the first cops, and he clearly was OK with that risk. It's kind of amazing to me that he got fired for that.

He's the bad guy because he had assessed the situation and used non lethal force and then two officers come in and shoot the guy, thus opening a pretty clear excessive force/wrongful death claim. This is all about covering liability, not sound law enforcement. Hopefully the local voters will have something to say about this.

That is an excellent theory for what is occurring.

 Ouze wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
The first response to seeing someone with a gun should not be to shoot them, unless they are in the process of shooting at people, in which case a shooting may be justified.

See, I feel like this goes too far in the other direction. I don't think it's reasonable to require police to actually be under fire before using lethal force. I'm not sure exactly where the needle should be there, but it's slightly before that.

Prestor made a good point that having a gun out on your own property isn't illegal (although brandishing is, but that's an escape into semantics). While I said previously that I think a gun in the hand is within the envelope for lawful, reasonable lethal force, I will definite concede that context can really, really sway things here and it's not at all black and white. When I say "I don't think you need to wait for the gun to be pointed at you", I'm meaning, like, a guy screams "I'm going to kill you pigs" and pulls a gun, not "cops stop a guy in the woods holding a hunting rifle and shoot him on sight because he had a deer gun".

That is my stance right there in a nutshell. Something else to consider that isn't brought up is the records of the other two officers. Are they hotheads or new, or people that use lethal force as a habit? Are they stand out officers who perhaps have seen situations like this end badly for fellow officers?




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Ouze wrote:
This guy was on his probationary period in an at-will state. There is no action to be brought here outside of public pressure.

More's the fething pity.

Still despicable. Burn West Virginia to the fething ground.

Destroy West Virginia and everyone in it because of the justified or unjustified actions of two policemen? What a trail of carnage you would leave as a cop.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
The first response to seeing someone with a gun should not be to shoot them, unless they are in the process of shooting at people, in which case a shooting may be justified.

Also, how have they slanted the reporting against the police when the article is written in support of a police officer?

Here are some excerpts from the OP, pretty clearly indicating the bias of the reporter. A couple of other incidents with the terminated cop were mentioned, but not described or elaborated on.




West Virginia cop fired for not killing a man with an unloaded gun

By Radley Balko

September 12 at 5:23 PM 

"We’ve tracked countless cases here where cops were able to keep their jobs after killing unarmed people, killing people after responding to the wrong house, killing people and then lying about it . . . the list goes on.

Give the Weirton, W.Va., police chief some credit. He’s come up with a new spin on the the same problem. He just fired a cop for not killing someone"



"What Mader did upon arriving at the scene is a hell of a lot braver course of action than simply opening fire when the suspect doesn’t immediately disarm. What Mader did is in fact exactly what we want cops to do when someone is in crisis. It’s also precisely what law enforcement officers say they do on a daily basis — put themselves at risk in order to save lives. Mader should have been given a medal. Unfortunately, two more cops then showed up, and quickly shot Williams dead. "


"I hope he’s given the same second chance that corrupt, trigger-happy cops are given. My hunch is that he’ll be driving trucks."


A quick study of Radely Balko shows that he has an interesting history: http://shameproject.com/profile/radley-balko/


This is the guy that wrote the story getting people here all heated up.

Relapse wrote:

 Dreadwinter wrote:
It doesn't matter what their nature was. What you are saying is that anybody with a gun talking to police can expect to be executed for having a gun. Something that all 2nd amendment lovers should be horrified by.

These situations are all different, even the one you linked about the cop trying to talked down the armed man. The people are different, the situations are different, the environment is different. Treating them all the same is absolutely ridiculous. The people living in the area that these cops operate should be frightened, because this means that the cops are always going to shoot first.

Exactly my point with the links. Some people here are acting like it's a cookie cutter treatment that an an armed and potentially dangerous individual should be reasoned with on the basis of a heavily biased news story. As the link I posted shows in it's various stories about officer murders, there are times reasoning is not an option and police end up dead. It's boils down to an in the moment interpretation of what is going on.
Obviously the circumstances matter,but we don't have any real source we can trust on what was happening here. The author of the article obviously has an axe to grind and slanted the reporting against the police.

But why it's so exclusive to USA that police are shoot first ask later? If not shooting right away leads to police killings so often why in other countries where police aren't shooting so trigger happy they get killed lot less frequently than in USA even when factoring in population size?

Just a thought but maybe it is related to how police shoot first ask second...When you know you are going to get shot anyway might just as well try to shoot first yourself.

tneva82 wrote:

Relapse wrote:

 Dreadwinter wrote:
It doesn't matter what their nature was. What you are saying is that anybody with a gun talking to police can expect to be executed for having a gun. Something that all 2nd amendment lovers should be horrified by.

These situations are all different, even the one you linked about the cop trying to talked down the armed man. The people are different, the situations are different, the environment is different. Treating them all the same is absolutely ridiculous. The people living in the area that these cops operate should be frightened, because this means that the cops are always going to shoot first.

Exactly my point with the links. Some people here are acting like it's a cookie cutter treatment that an an armed and potentially dangerous individual should be reasoned with on the basis of a heavily biased news story. As the link I posted shows in it's various stories about officer murders, there are times reasoning is not an option and police end up dead. It's boils down to an in the moment interpretation of what is going on.
Obviously the circumstances matter,but we don't have any real source we can trust on what was happening here. The author of the article obviously has an axe to grind and slanted the reporting against the police.

But why it's so exclusive to USA that police are shoot first ask later? If not shooting right away leads to police killings so often why in other countries where police aren't shooting so trigger happy they get killed lot less frequently than in USA even when factoring in population size?

Just a thought but maybe it is related to how police shoot first ask second...When you know you are going to get shot anyway might just as well try to shoot first yourself.

We do have cartels and heavily armed druggees here. That is one big difference. The cat people are pretty annoying too, but we'll deal with them with the Revolution comes.
Its not. In the rest of the Americas its shoot first and then just disappear the body. Or alternatively its arrest and you never see them alive again.

And there's no criminals and drug users elsewhere in the world? Funny how those keep popping up in news outside USA then...Somebody must inform reporters they are reporting of ghosts!

tneva82 wrote:
And there's no criminals and drug users elsewhere in the world? Funny how those keep popping up in news outside USA then...Somebody must inform reporters they are reporting of ghosts!

Outside of the Iron triangle I don't think there are many who equal individuals such as EL Chapo and his organization with tens of thousands of members who have access to rockets, submarines, and armored vehicles, no actually.

ok maybe Russia.

 Frazzled wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
And there's no criminals and drug users elsewhere in the world? Funny how those keep popping up in news outside USA then...Somebody must inform reporters they are reporting of ghosts!

Outside of the Iron triangle I don't think there are many who equal individuals such as EL Chapo and his organization with tens of thousands of members who have access to rockets, submarines, and armored vehicles, no actually.

ok maybe Russia.

And how often are those rockets and armoured vehicles and submarines used to kill US policemen in the USA?

I mean, this latest shooting happened in West Virginia. That is around 1,500 miles from the Mexican border. You can't blame everything on having a particularly well armed criminal group in the next country over.

Also, from 2006 to 2010, the drug cartels killed ~6000 people in the USA. In 2010 alone there were ~13000 murders total in the USA. The amount of people killed by the cartels is not large enough to justify affecting how the police interact with the general population country-wide.

tneva82 wrote:
And there's no criminals and drug users elsewhere in the world? Funny how those keep popping up in news outside USA then...Somebody must inform reporters they are reporting of ghosts!

You don't have cartels on your doorstep that are knocking off, literally, 60,000 people per year in a Warzone like setting. These are the people coming into the U.S. as well as street gangs that aren't averse to murder.
On the flip side, there are more than a few instances in the police memorial link I posted that talk of murders of police being taken into custody instead of being riddled with bullets.





This man gives a good over view of Mexican Cartels: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VYU25aJpg5o

They evidently have them in Northern Virginia.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/ms-13-members-convicted-of-three-northern-virginia-murders/2016/05/09/3d32c668-1609-11e6-9e16-2e5a123aac62_story.html

BUT I agree that the training is not focused on "defusing the situation" but on controlling the situation and reacting quickly to a potentially violent threat.
You can say what you want but if another individual is waving a pistol, thats justified in any jurisdiction anywhere on the globe (except Liechtenstein of course, as Hernan Desoto once said*: Germany, so far from God, so close to Liechtenstein).



*There is no proof Hernan Desoto said that as he died centuries before Germany was formed. but who knows, he was speaking Spanish and what self respecting Blackfoot knows Spanish?

 Ouze wrote:
This guy was on his probationary period in an at-will state. There is no action to be brought here outside of public pressure.

Then maybe the problem is At-Will states?




De-rail Achievement: Unlocked

It is interesting that the author of this heavily biased article is the guy leading most of the posters here around by their noses.

A little profile of Radely Balko for those who might have missed it:

http://shameproject.com/profile/radley-balko/

Well, we can agree on the problem even if we don't agree on the solutions. 80% of problem solving is getting people to agree there is a problem int he first place.

Relapse wrote:
It is interesting that the author of this heavily biased article is the guy leading most of the posters here around by their noses.

A little profile of Radely Balko for those who might have missed it:

http://shameproject.com/profile/radley-balko/

What's your point? Every journalist has an agenda, they choose what stories they cover and how they write about them. I wouldn't recommend anyone only reading once source about any newsworthy event. I agree with you that Balko has an axe to grind but that doesn't mean that he doesn't raise important points or draw attention to important stories. It should be disconcerting to people that at a time of consistently decreasing levels of violent crime that we have more SWAT teams and armored vehicles in our police departments than ever.

Here are a bunch of other stories about the same event that weren't written by Balko. Is there some fact or aspect of the events that you think Balko didn't include or manufactured? Balko doesn't even mention that the suicidal man was black, something that BET's article felt was pretty important to mention. The Pittsburgh Post Gazette article states that the suicidal man unloaded the pistol in front of his wife and told her he was going to make the cops kill him and was then waving his pistol around between Mader and the other 2 cops and one of the cops shot him in the back of the head behind his right ear. Balko didn't mention that detail either. The Truth About Guns article includes a quote from Mader that he felt the other officers did the right thing shooting the man because they didn't have the same information and context that Mader had. Balko didn't use that quote.

http://www.bet.com/news/national/2016/09/14/ridiculous--west-virginia-cop-fired-for-not-shooting-black-man-h.html
http://www.post-gazette.com/local/region/2016/09/11/Weirton-fired-officer-who-did-not-fire-at-man-with-gun/stories/201609090080
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2016/09/johannes-paulsen/west-virginia-cop-fired-not-shooting-suspect/
http://www.complex.com/life/2016/09/white-west-virginia-cop-fired-not-shooting-suicidal-black-man

The point is, most posters here are working their opinions off a heavily biased article, written by someone they would in all likely hood accuse of being a Breibart clone.

Relapse wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

Relapse wrote:
It is interesting that the author of this heavily biased article is the guy leading most of the posters here around by their noses.

A little profile of Radely Balko for those who might have missed it:

http://shameproject.com/profile/radley-balko/

What's your point? Every journalist has an agenda, they choose what stories they cover and how they write about them. I wouldn't recommend anyone only reading once source about any newsworthy event. Here are a bunch of other stories about the same event that weren't written by Balko. Is there some fact or aspect of the events that you think Balko didn't include or manufactured? Balko doesn't even mention that the suicidal man was black, something that BET's article felt was pretty important to mention. The Pittsburgh Post Gazette article states that the suicidal man unloaded the pistol in front of his wife and told her he was going to make the cops kill him and was then waving his pistol around between Mader and the other 2 cops and one of the cops shot him in the back of the head behind his right ear. Balko didn't mention that detail either. The Truth About Guns article includes a quote from Mader that he felt the other officers did the right thing shooting the man because they didn't have the same information and context that Mader had. Balko didn't use that quote.

http://www.bet.com/news/national/2016/09/14/ridiculous--west-virginia-cop-fired-for-not-shooting-black-man-h.html
http://www.post-gazette.com/local/region/2016/09/11/Weirton-fired-officer-who-did-not-fire-at-man-with-gun/stories/201609090080
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2016/09/johannes-paulsen/west-virginia-cop-fired-not-shooting-suspect/
http://www.complex.com/life/2016/09/white-west-virginia-cop-fired-not-shooting-suicidal-black-man

Do any of those articles also mention the suspect began walking towards the othe officers while waving his gun around? As was mentioned in yet another unlinked report?

Aside from the Pittsburgh Post Gazette article and TheTruthAboutGuns article? No, I don't think so.

Prestor Jon wrote:

Relapse wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

Relapse wrote:
It is interesting that the author of this heavily biased article is the guy leading most of the posters here around by their noses.

A little profile of Radely Balko for those who might have missed it:

http://shameproject.com/profile/radley-balko/

What's your point? Every journalist has an agenda, they choose what stories they cover and how they write about them. I wouldn't recommend anyone only reading once source about any newsworthy event. Here are a bunch of other stories about the same event that weren't written by Balko. Is there some fact or aspect of the events that you think Balko didn't include or manufactured? Balko doesn't even mention that the suicidal man was black, something that BET's article felt was pretty important to mention. The Pittsburgh Post Gazette article states that the suicidal man unloaded the pistol in front of his wife and told her he was going to make the cops kill him and was then waving his pistol around between Mader and the other 2 cops and one of the cops shot him in the back of the head behind his right ear. Balko didn't mention that detail either. The Truth About Guns article includes a quote from Mader that he felt the other officers did the right thing shooting the man because they didn't have the same information and context that Mader had. Balko didn't use that quote.

http://www.bet.com/news/national/2016/09/14/ridiculous--west-virginia-cop-fired-for-not-shooting-black-man-h.html
http://www.post-gazette.com/local/region/2016/09/11/Weirton-fired-officer-who-did-not-fire-at-man-with-gun/stories/201609090080
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2016/09/johannes-paulsen/west-virginia-cop-fired-not-shooting-suspect/
http://www.complex.com/life/2016/09/white-west-virginia-cop-fired-not-shooting-suicidal-black-man

Do any of those articles also mention the suspect began walking towards the othe officers while waving his gun around? As was mentioned in yet another unlinked report?

Aside from the Pittsburgh Post Gazette article and TheTruthAboutGuns article? No, I don't think so.

I'll give them a look.

Relapse wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

Relapse wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

Relapse wrote:
It is interesting that the author of this heavily biased article is the guy leading most of the posters here around by their noses.

A little profile of Radely Balko for those who might have missed it:

http://shameproject.com/profile/radley-balko/

What's your point? Every journalist has an agenda, they choose what stories they cover and how they write about them. I wouldn't recommend anyone only reading once source about any newsworthy event. Here are a bunch of other stories about the same event that weren't written by Balko. Is there some fact or aspect of the events that you think Balko didn't include or manufactured? Balko doesn't even mention that the suicidal man was black, something that BET's article felt was pretty important to mention. The Pittsburgh Post Gazette article states that the suicidal man unloaded the pistol in front of his wife and told her he was going to make the cops kill him and was then waving his pistol around between Mader and the other 2 cops and one of the cops shot him in the back of the head behind his right ear. Balko didn't mention that detail either. The Truth About Guns article includes a quote from Mader that he felt the other officers did the right thing shooting the man because they didn't have the same information and context that Mader had. Balko didn't use that quote.

http://www.bet.com/news/national/2016/09/14/ridiculous--west-virginia-cop-fired-for-not-shooting-black-man-h.html
http://www.post-gazette.com/local/region/2016/09/11/Weirton-fired-officer-who-did-not-fire-at-man-with-gun/stories/201609090080
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2016/09/johannes-paulsen/west-virginia-cop-fired-not-shooting-suspect/
http://www.complex.com/life/2016/09/white-west-virginia-cop-fired-not-shooting-suicidal-black-man

Do any of those articles also mention the suspect began walking towards the othe officers while waving his gun around? As was mentioned in yet another unlinked report?

Aside from the Pittsburgh Post Gazette article and TheTruthAboutGuns article? No, I don't think so.

I'll give them a look.

The Pittsburgh Post Gazette article is the one most other articles, including Balko's, are using as their primary source. The Truth About Guns is the most balanced article I found and you'll probably agree with it (you might want to bookmark that site).
Williams shouldn't have pointed a gun at the other cops and he was actively trying to commit suicide by cop so it's not surprising that he was successful and he bears responsibility for his death.
Mader had the situation under control when he was on scene and subsequently lost control over the scene when the other officers arrived and the likelihood of Williams getting shot increased exponentially. The situation worsened when the police presence increased and a man was killed when there had been a decent chance his life could have been saved. That's a policing failure and it shouldn't be swept under the rug and ignored because Williams' pistol created justification for a "good shoot."

Prestor Jon wrote:

Relapse wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

Relapse wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

Relapse wrote:
It is interesting that the author of this heavily biased article is the guy leading most of the posters here around by their noses.

A little profile of Radely Balko for those who might have missed it:

http://shameproject.com/profile/radley-balko/

What's your point? Every journalist has an agenda, they choose what stories they cover and how they write about them. I wouldn't recommend anyone only reading once source about any newsworthy event. Here are a bunch of other stories about the same event that weren't written by Balko. Is there some fact or aspect of the events that you think Balko didn't include or manufactured? Balko doesn't even mention that the suicidal man was black, something that BET's article felt was pretty important to mention. The Pittsburgh Post Gazette article states that the suicidal man unloaded the pistol in front of his wife and told her he was going to make the cops kill him and was then waving his pistol around between Mader and the other 2 cops and one of the cops shot him in the back of the head behind his right ear. Balko didn't mention that detail either. The Truth About Guns article includes a quote from Mader that he felt the other officers did the right thing shooting the man because they didn't have the same information and context that Mader had. Balko didn't use that quote.

http://www.bet.com/news/national/2016/09/14/ridiculous--west-virginia-cop-fired-for-not-shooting-black-man-h.html
http://www.post-gazette.com/local/region/2016/09/11/Weirton-fired-officer-who-did-not-fire-at-man-with-gun/stories/201609090080
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2016/09/johannes-paulsen/west-virginia-cop-fired-not-shooting-suspect/
http://www.complex.com/life/2016/09/white-west-virginia-cop-fired-not-shooting-suicidal-black-man

Do any of those articles also mention the suspect began walking towards the othe officers while waving his gun around? As was mentioned in yet another unlinked report?

Aside from the Pittsburgh Post Gazette article and TheTruthAboutGuns article? No, I don't think so.

I'll give them a look.

The Pittsburgh Post Gazette article is the one most other articles, including Balko's, are using as their primary source. The Truth About Guns is the most balanced article I found and you'll probably agree with it (you might want to bookmark that site).
Williams shouldn't have pointed a gun at the other cops and he was actively trying to commit suicide by cop so it's not surprising that he was successful and he bears responsibility for his death.
Mader had the situation under control when he was on scene and subsequently lost control over the scene when the other officers arrived and the likelihood of Williams getting shot increased exponentially. The situation worsened when the police presence increased and a man was killed when there had been a decent chance his life could have been saved. That's a policing failure and it shouldn't be swept under the rug and ignored because Williams' pistol created justification for a "good shoot."

As you say, Pittsburgh article is the best. On the other hand, I think it's prudent police procedure to back another officer up in the case of an armed suspect. The shooting was justified, but the question is, what can be learned from this that won't be forgotten when another officer is killed in a similar situation.

Relapse wrote:

The shooting was justified, but the question is, what can be learned from this that won't be forgotten when another officer is killed in a similar situation.

As Prestor Jon points out, officer #1 had situation under control.... officer #s 2 and 3 caused a loss of control, and reintroduced a whole lot into the situation that wasn't there previously.... In my eyes, the shooting was most definitely fething NOT "justified"

What can be learned from this is: pay attention to your fellow officers, if you arrive at a scene late and he/she has it under control, don't feth everything up by trying to be John Fething Wayne!

 Henry wrote:
So, an ex-marine tried to de-escelate the situation using military and police training and it was two other idiots who slaughtered the person who needed help. I thought part of the problem was the police hiring all these psycho killer butcher-snipers from the army.

How do you know the other officers didn't also serve in the military? Just making it up or do you know something?

 Easy E wrote:
I honestly don't blame cops for then going out and shooting people because they are doing exactly what we are training them to do.

I put the fault at the feet of the training we offer to our police force. That is a systematic problem and not an individual problem. There is no point blaming the cops for doing what we are training them to do.

Yeah, it is important to remember the history of this. There really was a steady increase in police killed in the line of duty through the 60s and 70s. Police training changed as a result - beat police and community policing was minimised, and instead you had a lot of practices to ensure the safety of officers, such as teaching officers to be more willing to draw and fire their guns.

The issue is that killings of police officers peaked in the 70s, and is now lower per capita than it has ever been. But the training and mindset hasn't changed.

Here's the graph on this I posted earlier.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

Relapse wrote:
It is interesting that the author of this heavily biased article is the guy leading most of the posters here around by their noses.

A little profile of Radely Balko for those who might have missed it:

http://shameproject.com/profile/radley-balko/

Thanks for finding and posting that. It's given me pause for thought, and plenty of reasons to believe there might be more to this story. Anyone who's resume starts with Cato and moves to Huffington is inherently suspicious - the only thing those two organisations have is putting agendas ahead of decent journalism.

That said, I'll never forgive SHAME for screwing up their acronym. Shame The Hacks Who Abuse Media Ethics is STHWAME. They could have just said Shaming Hacks Abusing Media Ethics and it would have worked. Idiots

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

Relapse wrote:

The shooting was justified, but the question is, what can be learned from this that won't be forgotten when another officer is killed in a similar situation.

As Prestor Jon points out, officer #1 had situation under control.... officer #s 2 and 3 caused a loss of control, and reintroduced a whole lot into the situation that wasn't there previously.... In my eyes, the shooting was most definitely fething NOT "justified"

What can be learned from this is: pay attention to your fellow officers, if you arrive at a scene late and he/she has it under control, don't feth everything up by trying to be John Fething Wayne!

According to one of the news links posted by Prestor, even the original officer on the scene said it was a justified shooting. What the article in the OP that has most people here worked up failed to mention is that the suspect began waving his gun around and walking at the other two officers.
Read the bio of the author that I posted and then tell me he is someone you would unquestionably believe.

Relapse wrote:

According to one of the news links posted by Prestor, even the original officer on the scene said it was a justified shooting. What the article in the OP that has most people here worked up failed to mention is that the suspect began waving his gun around and walking at the other two officers.
Read the bio of the author that I posted and then tell me he is someone you would unquestionably believe.

From one of Prestor's sites:

During the exchange between Mader and Williams, two additional Weirton officers arrived on the scene and Williams walked towards them, waving his gun. One of the officers then shot Williams in the back of the head, killing him on site.

The West Virginia State Police opened a month-long investigation to determine whether or not the shooting of Williams was justified. At the end of the investigation, the WV State Police concluded the shooting was appropriate. However, Mader’s supervisors felt that he acted inappropriately when he refused to shoot someone who appeared to pose a life threat.

Eleven days after the shooting, Mader returned to work and had a meeting with Police Chief Rob Alexander. In the meeting, Chief Alexander told him: “We’re putting you on administrative leave and we’re going to do an investigation to see if you are going to be an officer here. You put two other officers in danger.”

If we look at just that information right there... this Chief seems a bit dumb... He didn't put the other officers in danger, because they showed up late and re-escalated things. And the original responding officer, Mader, is not the one who said the shooting was justified... the "blue wall" did.

EDIT: just saw in the Pitt article where he said they were justified.... that was some very odd wording, to say the least.

Beyond that, I will grant you that the original article's author is pretty suspect... But... who honestly knew that fast food was in bed with alcohol and tobacco for lobbyist groups!? I tend to not believe anyone's writing at face value, though that SHAME link definitely gives fairly decent reasons/evidence for why in that guy's case.