I wasn't there. I didn't see what happened. I'm in no position to make any kind of judgement if the police acted appropriately or not. But I like to think I'm a rational human being.
Let's look at a couple of facts. You are a police officer. There is a person with a knife standing about 20 feet away. If that person decides to charge at you with the knife you have less than three seconds to draw your gun and fire. Even if your gun is already drawn, how long do you wait before you fire? You have barely enough time to say "STOP RIGHT THERE" before that person is in your face. Now, as we heard in the news. The person that was shot was mentally disturbed. I have worked for many years with severely emotionally/mentally disturbed people. Frequently, they are not rational. They do not act or think rationally. That's why insanity is an affirmative defense in our courts. They are also frequently dangerous (i.e. the mother that went to California and killed her son). What would your reaction be to someone walking down the street swinging a machete? I have a machete. I got a yard stick and measured it. It's about 20 inches long, and just under 4 inches wide. That's a hell-of-a knife. Now, let's say you're a police officer. You have a shot gun. We'll say the shotgun is 36 inches long (go get a yard stick and hold it like a shotgun). Someone with a 20 inch machete comes at you and strikes the end of your 36 in shotgun. The blade of that machete is striking the shotgun less than 12 inches from your hand. Would you feel that your life was in imminent danger? Would you shoot? Why didn't the officer shoot him before he got that close? I wasn't there. I didn't see it. I'm in no position to make a value judgement. Sadly, the person with the weapon was killed. However, I'm thankful that an innocent person wasn't hurt or killed by a disturbed individual with a weapon. By the way...Where's Spike Moss? Isn't he gonna use this incident for some personal publicity? (Sorry, I couldn't resist). Joel Brand [EMAIL PROTECTED] SW Mpls (Not written on city time) _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest option, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
