There are two cases that are currently making news in New York that I think go together in terms of theme:
(Yes, there is more news in NY then just the Gov.)
In one case a off duty police officer was shot by other officers from a town the off duty officer was visiting. He had come to a court house, saw a man fighting another man and tried to break it up, his gun falls from his holster and when it hits the ground it fires off two shots, other officers come running, see a man(the off duty officer)with a gun on someone, they tell him to drop the weapon. He never says he is an officer, he does not drop the gun, they shoot and kill him.
Now the parents are mad because how dare this be seen as a justified shooting!
The police should have known.
And since the local justice system saw no wrong doing, they are pushing for federal and state people to look into it again and again and again until some one pays for this tragic mistake.
In another case a bunch of guys go out for a bachelor party. They get drunk. They happen to be in a club that was under watch by the law already. There are the normal things that happen when guys are all together, in a club, drinking, late at night and words get exchanged.
Someone has a gun
Someone says they have a gun
People argue
The police see a car coming towards them as they try to stop it and it looks like an officer may be killed.
They open fire and a man. who the press seems to want to make into some sort of hero for the mere fact that he was hours from being married, is killed and two of his friends are seriously injured.
Now the police must pay for defending themselves. They should have known this man was about to be married and not shot. They should have known what was in these men's minds as they drove away and hit a car because they thought they were about to be killed by some guys they had a dust up with inside the bar they just left.
Listen, mistakes happen. And yes not every police officer is pure. There are bad cops, bad dentists, bad lawyers, bad brick layers. But there are no perfect dentists, lawyers, priests, brick layers or cops. Why do we think that when an officer makes a mistake, a mistake that was based on all the facts presented to him in a spilt second he had to decide does he or does he not shoot, and based on all facts in that second he has he decides that since the man will not put down the gun or the car is seconds from running over a fellow officer or the man that he just told to put up his hands is going into a coat pocket for what could be a wallet, a gun, a knife, or an ice cream sandwich, that when he decides his best course of action is to fire do we then make his life hell and charge him with murder and bankrupt him as he defends himself in court?
Oh I know, because we somehow bred this super elite form of human to be police officers and they can read minds and make complex decisions that when laid out and explained and investigated and probed for months are still not 100 percent clear. they can make them in fractions of seconds. Right?
Or is it that in todays day we have decided that someone must pay for anything bad that happens to us? Your child is born with a birth defect, sue a doctor! You slipped on a wet driveway in a driving rainstorm and hurt your knee, sue the owner ! An officer of the law shot an armed man, armed with a gun or a 2 ton SUV, in the line of duty based on analysis of a situation that while MAYBE not correct, was a reasonable analysis based on facts, he must go to prison!!!
Tonight when you go to bed, remember those men and wonder why they put their lives on the line to protect you when more and more it is not just their physical lives they have to fear for when they put on that uniform, but now their freedom should they ever make a mistake.
Also remember that if you should ever need them to make that split second desicion, and they should shoot that guy pointing a gun at you, they might take an extra second to consider and second guess themselves. In that second they guy with the gun on you pulls the trigger. Shame that office second guessed himself, isn't it? But at least he does not face murder charges.
