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 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Wyrmalla wrote:
An issue with people describing America as having "problems" fails to be aware of the size of the country. If you treated the US as 50 different countries rather than a single one then would that opinion shift? Collect all the different crimes taking place over the whole of Europe (and the surrounding countries) and how do the total numbers look?

Of course, the numbers are high regardless.

The US numbers are exceptionally high even when considered by capita.

From wikipedia, the number of people killed by police firearms per 100 million people.

Can we please avoid turning this into a discussion on America's gun laws? Those threads are almost as much trouble as US politics threads

I said nothing about American gun laws, simply provided wikipedia stats on the number of people killed by police firearms as requested by the previous poster.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I said nothing about American gun laws, simply provided wikipedia stats on the number of people killed by police firearms as requested by the previous poster.

Good, then we can cease this tangent of comparing the UK to Europe for gun deaths and get back to the topic at hand.

Just another day in America where over militarized police murder yet another citizen. Nothing to see here, move along citizen.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Wyrmalla wrote:
An issue with people describing America as having "problems" fails to be aware of the size of the country. If you treated the US as 50 different countries rather than a single one then would that opinion shift? Collect all the different crimes taking place over the whole of Europe (and the surrounding countries) and how do the total numbers look?

Of course, the numbers are high regardless.

The US numbers are exceptionally high even when considered by capita.

From wikipedia, the number of people killed by police firearms per 100 million people.

United States 342
South Africa 634
Germany 12
Denmark 71
France 6
England and Wales 5
Netherlands 18
Australia 4
Austria 12
Finland 0
Norway 0

You should compare those rates to Latin America not Europe. We are not in Europe.

Latin America? With the favelas and the army going in once in a while to clear it out? Why would you not want the US compared to Western countries? Even if we say half or 3/4ths off for the drug cartel/gang problems its still a lot higher. Also the Denmark 71 number must be a mistake

The number for the Netherlands is likely a reflection of our organized crime problem.

Why because its not accurate. The US is part of the Americas, not Europe. If we were part of Europe, it would be the US of E.
We have a separate culture, history, and destiny.

Yeah and plenty of European countries have the same seperate history, culture and destiny. But overall the West as in Canada, the US, Australia, New Zealand and European states are roughly similar for a comparison to make sense. South America is as or even more different from the US than Europe. But socioeconomically and politically speaking the US fits better in a Western comparison. That's what I meant. The Americas is just a geographic area, the differences between say Haiti and the US are incredibly vast compared to a random other Western state and the US.

Plus in the future the USA might get to be friends with the USE regardless

No ferenner.

The west and southwest have far more in common with Latin America than Europe.

 Frazzled wrote:
The west and southwest have far more in common with Latin America than Europe.

I think that's a stretch even in the west and southwest (at least the portions I've travelled through felt culturally closer to my home in Australia than, say, Mexico), but my understanding was the police-killing-civilians rate was pretty high all over the USA, not just the south western parts.

 Frazzled wrote:
The west and southwest have far more in common with Latin America than Europe.

But if the west and southwest have more in common with L America than Europe doesn't that mean the rest of the country has less in common with L America and more with Europe?

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
[ Also the Denmark 71 number must be a mistake

I agree. Where did that number come from?

I mean, I found the Wiki page. I also realise that it is per 100 million (and we were 5.4 million in 2006 - where the number is from).

But it sounds really insane. It is front page stuff if the police draws a gun here (slightly hyperbolic), much less fire it.
Doing the math it means that about 4 people were killed by the Danish Police in 2006.

Ah, there we go;

"In 2006 the death of 4 people by police shootings prompted an investigation into the use of firearms by the Danish police force from 1996 to 2006."

Number of people killed by Police per year.

1996..........1997.....1998.......1999........2000........2001........ 2002........2003......2004......... 2005........2006
1............0..............0............0...............0.............3................2..............1............0................0..............4

4 people killed by the Police was enough to start an official inquiry, and an overhaul and strengthening of police fire arms training.

For any Americans here - fire arms training here means how to shot less - not how to shoot better.

Well, look at the numbers. California makes up 12% of the US population, in 2016. They accounted for 16% of police shootings resulting in death.

Arizona has 2% of the nations population, but accounted for 5% of police shootings resulting in death.

Texas has 8.6% of the population, but accounted for 9.7% of police shootings resulting in death.

New Mexico has .6% of the population, accounted for 2% of the shootings resulting in death.

So all of the major SW states all have a higher shooting rate then their population should warrant. 23% of the nations population accounts for 34% of police shootings that result in death. Definitely a significant imbalance.

Steelmage99 wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
[ Also the Denmark 71 number must be a mistake

I agree. Where did that number come from?

I mean, I found the Wiki page. I also realise that it is per 100 million (and we were 5.4 million in 2006 - where the number is from).

But it sounds really insane. It is front page stuff if the police draws a gun here (slightly hyperbolic), much less fire it.
Doing the math it means that about 4 people were killed by the Danish Police in 2006.

Ah, there we go;

"In 2006 the death of 4 people by police shootings prompted an investigation into the use of firearms by the Danish police force from 1996 to 2006."

Number of people killed by Police per year.

1996..........1997.....1998.......1999........2000........2001........ 2002........2003......2004......... 2005........2006
1............0..............0............0...............0.............3................2..............1............0................0..............4

4 people killed by the Police was enough to start an official inquiry, and an overhaul and strengthening of police fire arms training.

For any Americans here - fire arms training here means how to shot less - not how to shoot better.

Yeah, it was 4 people killed in Denmark in 2006, which normalised to a per 100 million figure is 71.

Places with small populations obviously have big swings when events like that occur. Averaged over more years it'd probably be closer to the rate for the rest of Europe.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 djones520 wrote:
Well, look at the numbers.

Link?

It was all taken from the Washington post.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Steelmage99 wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
[ Also the Denmark 71 number must be a mistake

I agree. Where did that number come from?

I mean, I found the Wiki page. I also realise that it is per 100 million (and we were 5.4 million in 2006 - where the number is from).

But it sounds really insane. It is front page stuff if the police draws a gun here (slightly hyperbolic), much less fire it.
Doing the math it means that about 4 people were killed by the Danish Police in 2006.

Ah, there we go;

"In 2006 the death of 4 people by police shootings prompted an investigation into the use of firearms by the Danish police force from 1996 to 2006."

Number of people killed by Police per year.

1996..........1997.....1998.......1999........2000........2001........ 2002........2003......2004......... 2005........2006
1............0..............0............0...............0.............3................2..............1............0................0..............4

4 people killed by the Police was enough to start an official inquiry, and an overhaul and strengthening of police fire arms training.

For any Americans here - fire arms training here means how to shot less - not how to shoot better.

Yeah, it was 4 people killed in Denmark in 2006, which normalised to a per 100 million figure is 71.

Places with small populations obviously have big swings when events like that occur. Averaged over more years it'd probably be closer to the rate for the rest of Europe.

Yeah I realize, but the imbalance is absurd. Going by numbers it seems for Denmark around 20-30 should be noted, not 71. I mean fidgiting with numbers from the Netherlands can put us anywhere from 10-30. So 18 seems an acceptable average. But Denmark seems to have been based of the highest number from one year, which is a terrible way to do these comparisons by whoever did it like that.

 djones520 wrote:
It was all taken from the Washington post.

Mmk, I found one site that had police kills by state over the past 5 years. I averaged over those 5 years and normalised by population, checked PA, VA, OH, NJ and came up with numbers of 39, 47, 34 and 28 per 100 million. So North Eastern states and avoiding the big cities and came up with numbers still much higher than Europe, which were more around the 0 to 18 mark (other that the anomalous year from Denmark). Adding Maryland gives 60, Illinois is 34, New York is 24.

I'm not going to go through all states, but yeah, on a whole the numbers are still on the high side for those more northern and easterly states.

EDIT: Sorry I'm an idiot, was looking at the wrong link, was looking at Police casualties (which includes traffic incidents) ignore all that, my apologies folks!
Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
Yeah I realize, but the imbalance is absurd. Going by numbers it seems for Denmark around 20-30 should be noted, not 71. I mean fidgiting with numbers from the Netherlands can put us anywhere from 10-30. So 18 seems an acceptable average. But Denmark seems to have been based of the highest number from one year, which is a terrible way to do these comparisons by whoever did it like that.

Yeah I agree, the numbers aren't calculated in the best way. I'm looking at them more as a way to broadly compare regions I guess because I can't be bothered doing the research to produce my own table

 djones520 wrote:
Well, look at the numbers. California makes up 12% of the US population, in 2016. They accounted for 16% of police shootings resulting in death.

Arizona has 2% of the nations population, but accounted for 5% of police shootings resulting in death.

Texas has 8.6% of the population, but accounted for 9.7% of police shootings resulting in death.

New Mexico has .6% of the population, accounted for 2% of the shootings resulting in death.

So all of the major SW states all have a higher shooting rate then their population should warrant. 23% of the nations population accounts for 34% of police shootings that result in death. Definitely a significant imbalance.

Well the amount of population might be involved. Because more people live there in concentrated areas policing might be more detached. While policing low population states especially outside of the cities might be more personal. Also I assume it depends on crime numbers in the area which might be higher due to population also leading to a higher number of actual justified violence (because the shooting statistics don't distinguish between victims I presume). Also this is just thinking out loud but perhaps more police officers are employed per person in those states than average? Which could shift these statistics.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
Yeah I realize, but the imbalance is absurd. Going by numbers it seems for Denmark around 20-30 should be noted, not 71. I mean fidgiting with numbers from the Netherlands can put us anywhere from 10-30. So 18 seems an acceptable average. But Denmark seems to have been based of the highest number from one year, which is a terrible way to do these comparisons by whoever did it like that.

Yeah I agree, the numbers aren't calculated in the best way. I'm looking at them more as a way to broadly compare regions I guess because I can't be bothered doing the research to produce my own table

I get the value behind it, the Demark 71 number just made me do a double take because it appeared so disproportionate. Nothing on you of course, if we had to set up our own systems Dakka would be a second job.

 djones520 wrote:
.

So all of the major SW states all have a higher shooting rate then their population should warrant. 23% of the nations population accounts for 34% of police shootings that result in death. Definitely a significant imbalance.

Still, take the SW states out and the rate is still grossly inflated compared with any other developed country.

Netherlands, Ireland, Italy, etc have drug and organised crime with plenty of weaponry (some it military-grade, thank the Balkan wars for that) too, and still they come out with way less people shot.

But yes, Honduras is worse off than the US if that was your point.

Ok, because I can't live with the great shame of screwing up in my previous post, here are the numbers broken down by state, using this website for the kill numbers in 2016...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/national/police-shootings-2016/

and this for the population....

https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_population

I made an excel spreadsheet and calculated these values (Name of State - Kills per 100M in 2016 - Total Kills for 2016)

Alabama - 514 - 25
Alaska - 944 - 7
Arizona - 721 - 50
Arkansas - 502 - 15
California - 352 - 138
Colorado - 560 - 31
Connecticut - 112 - 4
Delaware - 525 - 5
Florida - 291 - 60
Georgia - 252 - 26
Hawaii - 420 - 6
Idaho - 356 - 6
Illinois - 203 - 26
Indiana - 211 - 14
Iowa - 160 - 5
Kansas - 344 - 10
Kentucky - 406 - 18
Louisiana - 406 - 19
Maine - 150 - 2
Maryland - 249 - 15
Massachusetts - 176 - 12
Michigan - 131 - 13
Minnesota - 254 - 14
Mississippi - 268 - 8
Missouri - 345 - 21
Montana - 480 - 5
Nebraska - 367 - 7
Nevada - 476 - 14
New Hampshire - 150 - 2
New Jersey - 134 - 12
New Mexico - 1009 - 21
New York - 86 - 17
North Carolina - 325 - 33
North Dakota - 132 - 1
Ohio - 224 - 26
Oklahoma - 663 - 26
Oregon - 366 - 15
Pennsylvania - 172 - 22
Rhode Island - 189 - 2
South Carolina - 343 - 17
South Dakota - 462 - 4
Tennessee - 331 - 22
Texas - 294 - 82
Utah - 262 - 8
Vermont - 320 - 2
Virginia - 202 - 17
Washington - 357 - 26
West Virginia - 655 - 12
Wisconsin - 294 - 17
Wyoming - 342 - 2



Hopefully I didn't screw up my calculations, feel free to check my numbers, lol.

Just as a check the excel spreadsheet gives me a total of 962 kills for 2016 and a population of 322M, for a rate of 298 per 100 million people. Slightly less than the wikipedia page I quoted earlier, but still massively higher than Europe both on a country wide basis and on an individual state level.

 djones520 wrote:
Well, look at the numbers. California makes up 12% of the US population, in 2016. They accounted for 16% of police shootings resulting in death.

Arizona has 2% of the nations population, but accounted for 5% of police shootings resulting in death.

Texas has 8.6% of the population, but accounted for 9.7% of police shootings resulting in death.

New Mexico has .6% of the population, accounted for 2% of the shootings resulting in death.

So all of the major SW states all have a higher shooting rate then their population should warrant. 23% of the nations population accounts for 34% of police shootings that result in death. Definitely a significant imbalance.

Well in New Mexico's defense, that includes shootings a
If radioactive muties.

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I said nothing about American gun laws, simply provided wikipedia stats on the number of people killed by police firearms as requested by the previous poster.

Good, then we can cease this tangent of comparing the UK to Europe for gun deaths and get back to the topic at hand.

I think, talking about gun laws is different from talking about police brutality/gunfire. People isn't comparing USA to Europe for gun deaths, they are comparing numbers of people killed by the police. For example in Spain we don't have a problem with police killing people with guns. Police brutality in the other hand? Oh boy... the amount of people that receives a beating in a police station once they have been already arrested is a problem.

We also cannot be blind to the fact that the expansive and very permissive gun laws of the US, and the consequent higher likelihood of a potential perpetrator carrying a fire arm, absolutely influences the actions of law enforcement personnel.

Yes, it is apparently a prickly subject, but it certainly isn't a non-factor in what happened.
I say this, not to bring up any value (perceived or otherwise) of such gun laws, but rather to point out that those laws (good or bad) ARE a factor in these incidents.



....

Steelmage99 wrote:
We also cannot be blind to the fact that the expansive and very permissive gun laws of the US, and the consequent higher likelihood of a potential perpetrator carrying a fire arm, absolutely influences the actions of law enforcement personnel.

Yes, it is apparently a prickly subject, but it certainly isn't a non-factor in what happened.
I say this, not to bring up any value (perceived or otherwise) of such gun laws, but rather to point out that those laws (good or bad) ARE a factor in these incidents.
....

Indeed. Its definitely the primary reason Police have lenient use of their firearms. They have to have it simply because anybody could be armed. Reaching for your waistband, drunk or not, is inexcusable when police are giving you instructions. If you're being told to crawl, you don't reach down to pull up your pants. You crawl, you don't need your stupid baggy pants to do that.

It's simply unreasonable to make police, or indeed anybody acting in self-defense, to wait till the threat is totally confirmed. That's a good way to get killed first. If I find some intruder in my house and he starts coming towards me, I shouldn't have to make sure he's armed before I shoot him. Thankfully, we don't have to in this country.

 Grey Templar wrote:

Steelmage99 wrote:
We also cannot be blind to the fact that the expansive and very permissive gun laws of the US, and the consequent higher likelihood of a potential perpetrator carrying a fire arm, absolutely influences the actions of law enforcement personnel.

Yes, it is apparently a prickly subject, but it certainly isn't a non-factor in what happened.
I say this, not to bring up any value (perceived or otherwise) of such gun laws, but rather to point out that those laws (good or bad) ARE a factor in these incidents.
....

Indeed. Its definitely the primary reason Police have lenient use of their firearms. They have to have it simply because anybody could be armed. Reaching for your waistband, drunk or not, is inexcusable when police are giving you instructions. If you're being told to crawl, you don't reach down to pull up your pants. You crawl, you don't need your stupid baggy pants to do that.

It's simply unreasonable to make police, or indeed anybody acting in self-defense, to wait till the threat is totally confirmed. That's a good way to get killed first. If I find some intruder in my house and he starts coming towards me, I shouldn't have to make sure he's armed before I shoot him. Thankfully, we don't have to in this country.

A home intruder charging you in your home is a lot different than somebody pulling their pants up. One has clear intent to harm while the other is murky at best. In a murky situation, police should exercise restraint as not everybody they deal with is a hardened cop killer.

That is just a god awful argument.

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:

Steelmage99 wrote:
We also cannot be blind to the fact that the expansive and very permissive gun laws of the US, and the consequent higher likelihood of a potential perpetrator carrying a fire arm, absolutely influences the actions of law enforcement personnel.

Yes, it is apparently a prickly subject, but it certainly isn't a non-factor in what happened.
I say this, not to bring up any value (perceived or otherwise) of such gun laws, but rather to point out that those laws (good or bad) ARE a factor in these incidents.
....

Indeed. Its definitely the primary reason Police have lenient use of their firearms. They have to have it simply because anybody could be armed. Reaching for your waistband, drunk or not, is inexcusable when police are giving you instructions. If you're being told to crawl, you don't reach down to pull up your pants. You crawl, you don't need your stupid baggy pants to do that.

It's simply unreasonable to make police, or indeed anybody acting in self-defense, to wait till the threat is totally confirmed. That's a good way to get killed first. If I find some intruder in my house and he starts coming towards me, I shouldn't have to make sure he's armed before I shoot him. Thankfully, we don't have to in this country.

A home intruder charging you in your home is a lot different than somebody pulling their pants up. One has clear intent to harm while the other is murky at best. In a murky situation, police should exercise restraint as not everybody they deal with is a hardened cop killer.

That is just a god awful argument.

There are a lot of similarities. You don't know if either of them are armed. Both are doing something that is threatening. You shouldn't wait till you know one way or another.

The two big differences are firstly the home intruder is the one threatening you vs the cop being the one doing the threatening and the second is that it's the cop's job to deal with those situations.

I have a lot less sympathy for cops who wrongly kill someone in self defence than a home owner wrongly killing an intruder in self defence.

The cop should rightly be held to a higher standard.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
The two big differences are firstly the home intruder is the one threatening you vs the cop being the one doing the threatening and the second is that it's the cop's job to deal with those situations.

I have a lot less sympathy for cops who wrongly kill someone in self defence than a home owner wrongly killing an intruder in self defence.

The cop should rightly be held to a higher standard.

Disagree. If someone is reaching for their waistband, that is considered a threatening move in the presence of police. Since you could potentially be reaching for a gun or a knife. This is pretty much true in every country in the world, its not unique to the US.

 Grey Templar wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
The two big differences are firstly the home intruder is the one threatening you vs the cop being the one doing the threatening and the second is that it's the cop's job to deal with those situations.

I have a lot less sympathy for cops who wrongly kill someone in self defence than a home owner wrongly killing an intruder in self defence.

The cop should rightly be held to a higher standard.

Disagree. If someone is reaching for their waistband, that is considered a threatening move in the presence of police. Since you could potentially be reaching for a gun or a knife. This is pretty much true in every country in the world, its not unique to the US.

Honestly, I don't think that's enough. We need to consider raising hands to be threatening as well. What if the man on the floor begging for his life has some sort of weapon up his sleeve, like the guy from Django, or the other guy from the Punisher? You never know, and the only way for some cops to be able to do their job of enforcing the law and protecting citizens safely and efficiently is to gun down anyone not instantly complying with their orders.

Until the police are safe from wrist-deployable weapons, this country has a long way to go. You never know if a random traffic stop is going to involve a Mandalorian bounty hunter.

 Grey Templar wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
The two big differences are firstly the home intruder is the one threatening you vs the cop being the one doing the threatening and the second is that it's the cop's job to deal with those situations.

I have a lot less sympathy for cops who wrongly kill someone in self defence than a home owner wrongly killing an intruder in self defence.

The cop should rightly be held to a higher standard.

Disagree. If someone is reaching for their waistband, that is considered a threatening move in the presence of police. Since you could potentially be reaching for a gun or a knife. This is pretty much true in every country in the world, its not unique to the US.

So if I am walking down the street and pass a cop, then reach to pull my pants up, it is reasonable for a cop to shoot me dead?

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
The two big differences are firstly the home intruder is the one threatening you vs the cop being the one doing the threatening and the second is that it's the cop's job to deal with those situations.

I have a lot less sympathy for cops who wrongly kill someone in self defence than a home owner wrongly killing an intruder in self defence.

The cop should rightly be held to a higher standard.

Disagree. If someone is reaching for their waistband, that is considered a threatening move in the presence of police. Since you could potentially be reaching for a gun or a knife. This is pretty much true in every country in the world, its not unique to the US.

So if I am walking down the street and pass a cop, then reach to pull my pants up, it is reasonable for a cop to shoot me dead?

You were coming right at him! That cop just wanted to go home to his family.

 Grey Templar wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
The two big differences are firstly the home intruder is the one threatening you vs the cop being the one doing the threatening and the second is that it's the cop's job to deal with those situations.

I have a lot less sympathy for cops who wrongly kill someone in self defence than a home owner wrongly killing an intruder in self defence.

The cop should rightly be held to a higher standard.

Disagree. If someone is reaching for their waistband, that is considered a threatening move in the presence of police. Since you could potentially be reaching for a gun or a knife. This is pretty much true in every country in the world, its not unique to the US.

What part do you disagree with?

I never said reaching for his waist wasn't threatening, I said the popo should absolutely be held to a higher standard when identifying threats and dealing with them in a way that doesn't result in people being killed. Especially when the cop is the one instigating the engagement that lead to a potential threat in the first place (vs your example of a home invasion, in this case the cops are the ones doing the invading).

If you disagree with that, well, fine, but I don't think it's a remotely unreasonable argument that police shouldn't completely suck at their jobs of protecting and serving. We're better off not having cops at all than cops that gun people down whenever there might maybe perhaps be a threat.

When the rate of cops being gunned down by civilians comes within an order of magnitude of civilians gunned down by cops I might start to think cops need to be a bit more proactive in dealing with threats.

At this stage you could make the argument that a civilian gunning down a cop is more justified than vice versa because currently cops seem to be more threatening than the civilians.

 Spinner wrote:
Honestly, I don't think that's enough. We need to consider raising hands to be threatening as well. What if the man on the floor begging for his life has some sort of weapon up his sleeve, like the guy from Django, or the other guy from the Punisher? You never know, and the only way for some cops to be able to do their job of enforcing the law and protecting citizens safely and efficiently is to gun down anyone not instantly complying with their orders.

Until the police are safe from wrist-deployable weapons, this country has a long way to go. You never know if a random traffic stop is going to involve a Mandalorian bounty hunter.

However you need to add clarification to that statement: Only in US. Or at least only outside Europe. In Europe police can do their job just fine without gunning down people down all the time just like that.

I'm sooooo glad I wasn't born in US nor have any need to go there. Much more pleasant to live in safe country.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Disagree. If someone is reaching for their waistband, that is considered a threatening move in the presence of police. Since you could potentially be reaching for a gun or a knife. This is pretty much true in every country in the world, its not unique to the US.

Its true that a hand moving to the waistband is a signal. But you are completely wrong in claiming that it is enough to justify a use of lethal force. That's not true anywhere in the world, including the US. Police are trained to consider the situation, the suspect's statements, demeanor and body language as well as their previous level of compliance as well as the suspect's immediate actions.

Consider a policeman who hears screams, goes to the scene and sees a man standing over a woman. The man is belligerent and threatening to the officer, he moves towards the officer and only stops when ordered. The man then goes quiet for a half second, then moves his hand to his waistband. That's a lethal shoot even if the guy was reaching for a copy of the congressional medal he won for campaigning for police safety.

But then consider an officer who pulls a man over for a random breath test. The man is polite and immediately complies with every request from the officer. The RBT is passed, and at the end the officer hands the man back his license. When the man goes to place it in his pocket, the officer doesn't immediately draw and fire because all those cues before that told the officer the man had a very justified reason to move his hand to his waistband.

Those are extreme examples, obviously, but hopefully they make it clear how 'reaching for the waistband' is only one element of police risk assessment, there's a whole lot more the officer should assess.

 Ouze wrote:

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
The two big differences are firstly the home intruder is the one threatening you vs the cop being the one doing the threatening and the second is that it's the cop's job to deal with those situations.

I have a lot less sympathy for cops who wrongly kill someone in self defence than a home owner wrongly killing an intruder in self defence.

The cop should rightly be held to a higher standard.

Disagree. If someone is reaching for their waistband, that is considered a threatening move in the presence of police. Since you could potentially be reaching for a gun or a knife. This is pretty much true in every country in the world, its not unique to the US.

So if I am walking down the street and pass a cop, then reach to pull my pants up, it is reasonable for a cop to shoot me dead?

You were coming right at him! That cop just wanted to go home to his family.

He saw the hate in my eyes! (I don't hate cops!)

You know, we have had the argument used that since african americans are not disproportionately killed by the police, we should not do anything to stop it. Should that also apply to cops? I believe the figures showing that being a policeman isn't actually that dangerous of a job have been thrown around, why are they given special regard when they execute people?

Police deaths, not that high. Why are they allowed special privilege?