Electric Lib

News

I was just watching the news while enjoying my dinner when I saw a story that was apart from the usual Predisent Bush, monkeypox news stuff. It was about a pretty young (probably in his 20's) Black guy who was driving drunk along some road. So the cops started chasing after him and he finally got out of his car and began staggering over to some store. He was holding up a cell phone that the police claimed to think was a gun. So, they shot him eight times in the back. The tape was later analyzed and decided that it was in fact a cell phone.

I have a few problems with this story. Firstly, from 10-20 feet away from someone you should be able to tell the difference between a cell phone and a gun. Secondly, I really don't think there is a need to shoot someone eight times in a row. Even one shot would signifigantly impair most people, so eight is obviously overboard. And lastly, the fact that they shot him in the back is even worse. Had they shot him in the front there may have been some reason to think he was threatening them, but walking away isn't very threatening.

In the end, they determined it a "police suidice" or something like that, which means the victims forced the cops to kill him- gave them no other choice. Though based on my knowlage of the story, that's ridiculous. Some people are saying the cops were being racist and I'm sure that was a part of it, but I think mainly it was a case of the cops overreacting and using deadly force as the first resort instead of the last. Posted by lib at June 11, 2003 07:31 PM