Comments by "Skankhunt36" (@skankhunt3624) on "Body cam video shows police shooting woman during Dade City traffic stop" video.
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@Duffelbag Drag excerpt from The Chief’s Chronicle; New York State Assn. of Chiefs of Police
PERF Guiding Principle #8
Shooting at vehicles must be prohibited.
My concern with Guiding Principle #8 is simple: Policy language that definitively prohibits an action will inevitably result in a situation where an officer violates the policy under reasonable circumstances, which in turn can create issues that must be dealt with if litigation results. In fact, the PERF report acknowledges in a quote on page 46: “A strict policy does not mean there will never be an exception to the rule.” If you know this will reasonably happen, then policy should provide for such a possibility. Additionally, administrators must understand that the root cause of some issues cannot be addressed by merely adopting a “shall not” policy.
Consider two real-life examples to illustrate this point:
Following a brief pursuit, an offender pulls into his open garage with officers right behind him. One officer pulls his car close to the bumper of the suspect vehicle. The suspect locks himself in his car and refuses to open the door. The officer on the driver’s side decides to cross between the vehicles with the intent of breaking out a passenger-side window. The suspect puts the car in reverse as the officer is behind the car, pinning the officer’s legs between the bumpers. The suspect then slams on the gas and both vehicles proceed down the long driveway with the officer trapped between the cars, screaming for help and in pain.Another officer is moving alongside the suspect’s window with his gun out, screaming for the suspect to stop. The suspect ignores the repeated warnings and the trapped officer is dropping down lower. The other officer fears the trapped officer is going to die if this continues. He fires three rounds into the suspect’s chest. The suspect’s foot immediately comes off the gas and the vehicles stop, allowing for the trapped officer to be extricated.Remember, this is a real-life example. Witnesses stated they could not believe how long the officer waited until he shot the driver. As it was, the trapped officer was never able to return to full duty and had to retire. Without the actions of the other officer, he would have lost his legs and/or his life. But using the PERF recommendation, this would be a violation of policy. Bottom line: Completely banning behavior may come back on you.
Compare this with another recent real-life example. An officer is investigating a noise complaint involving loud music coming from a vehicle parked on a street. The officer starts to interview the lone driver/occupant, who drives forward and then puts the car into reverse and backs into a roadway. The officer runs alongside the vehicle and then, once the vehicle is backed into the roadway, stands in front of the vehicle with his gun out, yelling at the driver to stop. The vehicle starts to move forward with the driver’s hands visible through the windshield. The officer steps to the side while the vehicle continues forward, veering right, away from the officer. As the car races past him, the officer fires several shots at the vehicle, striking and injuring the driver. During the subsequent radio transmissions, the officer indicates that the driver tried to hit him and that he barely got out of the way. By the context and tone of his transmission, it does appear that the officer truly perceived and believed this to be the case. The officer’s in-car video, however, appears to make it clear the driver could have very easily run over the officer, and yet apparently chose not to.
PERF is correct to identify shooting at vehicles as a problem. Too many line-of-duty deaths and injuries, as well as unnecessary shootings of civilians, occur when officers shoot at moving vehicles rather than trying to move out of the way (see Philip D. Wright, FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, Officer Survival Spotlight: The 4,000-Pound Bullet, April 2016). Administrators should also understand that the U.S. Supreme Court has never issued a blanket ruling that it is permissible for officers to shoot at vehicles. They have instead only ruled it was allowed in certain cases and under specific sets of circumstances that meet the Graham standard of objective reasonableness (see Plumhoff v. Rickard, 134 S.Ct. 2012 (2014) and Mullenix v. Luna, 136 S.Ct. 305 (2015)). So, in addition to officers placing themselves at risk, shooting at a moving vehicle may also be placing other persons at risk under circumstances that would violate the Fourth Amendment.
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