While the news media is often right there with the attorneys in examining every possible mistake made by an officer in a police shooting incident, I have to say I'm not so quick to judge.
The legal requirement in most states to make a shooting, whether by police officer or armed citizen, justifiable is the reasonable belief that one's life is in immediate danger. In other words, if a reasonable person in that exact same situation would believe that he was in danger of death or great bodily harm, it would be justifiable to use deadly force to protect one's self as long as the threat remained.
Though police officers go through intensive training and probably have often thought about what they would do in this or that scenario, the decision on whether to shoot or not to shoot must be made within seconds and oftentimes fractions of seconds, and that with a flood of adrenaline which quickly causes focus on only one thing and a loss of awareness of surroundings and of the fine motor skills which are often used when officers practice shooting on the range (a reason I tell people who buy a handgun for self defense that gun sights are far less important than choosing a gun which is simple to operate, fits the hand and can be quickly and naturally pointed accurately without adjustment when the sights come into view). But, when that split-second decision to squeeze the trigger is made, attorneys and others who review the evidence and sometimes video recordings, can spend hours, days and weeks determining what was the right course of action.
In the years I served in law enforcement, the only shots I had to fire in the line of duty were to destroy animals injured in highway accidents. For a few years, it seems, I shot broken up deer almost every night.
Though I practiced as often as I could with the department's only scoped rifle, the time I had to take aim at a drunk man who had fired shots into his home and toward his family made me aware of how difficult it is to maintain control and keep exact aim when adrenaline begins to flow. I was glad the bad guy saw me with the rifle and surrendered to the other officer I had come to assist. I've wondered since how things would have turned out had he responded differently and pointed his weapon at the responding officer.
Other than assisting on drug raids and building searches and making a few arrests, the only other time I recall drawing my service weapon in the line of duty was on a late-night stop in the middle of nowhere. I turned and stopped a motorist on an empty U.S. Highway because his trailer lights were not working. My only objective was to assist him in getting the lights back on. Yet, when he stopped, he jumped out of his pickup truck and came toward me with his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket. When I told him to stay in his vehicle, he just kept coming. When I drew my service weapon - a rather large .45 caliber revolver - he stopped and showed me his hands and removed his jacket. When I told him the reason for the stop, he calmed down, reconnected his trailer lights and continued on his way.
To this day, I don't know if he had a weapon in his coat pocket. Being the only sheriff's officer out that night in our 900-squaremile county, I just kept a light on him while he reconnected his trailer lights and turned him loose. I didn't consider the risk of a wrestling match worth it to try to search him or his truck. He claimed to be former law enforcement but didn't, in my view, respond as a law enforcement officer would have responded.
I've asked myself since, “What if he had kept coming toward me with his hands in his pockets? Would I have been justified if I fired?” (I don't know that I would have fired without more evidence of a weapon, but then my instructors at the police academy were a bit critical of my hesitancy to fire soon enough in a few of our “shoot, no shoot” drills).
And so, would I have been justified to fire on the man in this late-night traffic stop? If he was armed, probably yes. If he would have been unarmed, many would have said no. If I would have let him shoot me from his pocket, I would have been blamed for not exercising due caution. If I would have let him attempt to take my weapon, who knows how that might have ended!
What would a reasonable person think in that exact situation? Would a reasonable person fear great bodily harm or death if a person disobeyed clear commands from an armed law enforcement officer and moved toward him in a threatening manner? Had the man continued to disobey my commands and approach me and had I fired, my law enforcement career could have ended quickly if the man was unarmed. If his hand was found to be holding a pistol or a knife, no one would have questioned my actions. But I wouldn't have known until it was too late - one way or another - for me or for him.
My point? It may be easy for attorneys and the news media to pass judgment, but they weren't there. Adrenaline was not flowing through their veins. They didn't have to determine in an instant whether the threat of death or great bodily harm was real. Nor do they have to live with knowing, after the fact, that another course of action might have been better.
Randy Moll is the managing editor of the Westside Eagle Observer and can be contacted by email at [email protected].
Opinion, Pages 6 on 05/01/2013