1/23/2024 0 Comments Alstralia cops leg sweepAnd that is when they’ve been hit in a motor center that produces instant loss of muscle tension. But by analyzing the way people fall, we’ve determined that it takes 2/3 of a second to a full second or more for a person to fall to the ground from a standing position. “A suspect falling to the ground from being shot would be a significant change. This allows the officer to continually defend himself, but because the brain is trying to do 2 things at once–shoot and assess–a very significant change in the offender’s behavior needs to take place in order for the officer to recognize the change of circumstances. “Now they’re taught to ‘shoot and assess,’ to judge the effect of their shots as they continue to fire, an on-going process. This required 1/4 to 1/2 second, during which time the suspect could keep firing, if he hadn’t been incapacitated. “Twenty years ago officers were trained to ’shoot then assess.’ They fired 1 or 2 rounds, then stopped to see the effect. His ability to threaten lives hasn’t necessarily been stopped.”Īs to preventing so-called “overkill” from shots that are fired after a threat is neutralized, Lewinski offers these observations: “On the other hand, if an officer manages to take a suspect’s legs out non-fatally, that still leaves the offender’s hands free to shoot. A suspect who’s hit there can bleed out in seconds if one of the major arteries is severed, so again shooting just to wound may not result in just wounding. However, areas of the lower trunk and upper thigh are rich with vascularity. “Legs tend initially to move slower than arms and to maintain more static positions. So where does shooting only to wound come in when even areas considered by some to ‘safe’ from fatality risk could in fact carry the same level of risk as targeting center mass? But shooting at the upper arms, there’s a greater chance you’re going to hit the suspect’s brachial artery or center mass, areas with a high probability of fatality. “The upper arms move more slowly than the lower arms and hands. Plus, the officer himself may be moving as he shoots. “Even if the suspect held his weapon arm steady for half a second or more, an accurate hit would be highly unlikely, and in police shootings the suspect and his weapon are seldom stationary. We hope this information proves useful to you in addressing any shoot-to-wound advocacy that may arise in your jurisdiction. In light of this resurfacing of misguided “shoot-to-wound” thinking, Force Science News is reissuing a “position paper,” originally introduced following Paterson’s ’06 proposed legislation, that discusses why shooting to wound versus shooting to stop is neither practical nor desirable as a performance standard. When Michael Paladino, president of New York’s Detectives Endowment Association, showed him the bill he reportedly scoffed and suggested that it be called the “John Wayne Bill” because of the unrealistic, movie-like sharpshooting skills it demands of officers. It reflects a misconception of real-life dynamics and ends up imposing unrealistic expectations of skill on real-life officers.” “In reality, this thinking is a result of ‘training by Hollywood,’ in which movie and TV cops are able to do anything to control the outcomes of events that serve the director’s dramatic interests. Shooting to wound is naively regarded as a reasonable means of stopping dangerous behavior. “When civilians judge police shooting deaths–on juries, on review boards, in the media, in the community–this same argument is often brought forward. Bill Lewinski, executive director of the Force Science Institute, told Force Science News in a 2006 interview centered on Paterson’s proposed legislation. “When I encounter civilian response to officer-involved shootings, it’s very often ‘Why didn’t they just shoot him in the leg?’” Dr. The New York Post has just reported that Brooklyn Assembly Members Annette Robinson and Darryl Towns have introduced a “minimum force” bill that would require officers to “shoot a suspect in the arm or the leg” and to use firearms “with the intent to stop, rather than kill.” Law enforcement exploded in protest and Paterson withdrew the bill. Paterson proposed that any officer who employed more than the minimum force necessary to stop a life-threatening suspect be charged with felony manslaughter. In response, he introduced legislation that would require officers to try to shoot offenders’ limbs instead of targeting locations that would more likely stop the threat but could also result in death. Do police officers really have to kill people when they shoot them? Couldn’t they be more humane and just aim for arms or legs?Īs reported in Force Science News, New York state Senator David Paterson pondered those questions in 2006 and concluded that officers were needlessly killing suspects.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |