Shoot first then ask questions later? Your thoughts?

Question

By BRETT ZONGKER, Associated Press Writer

2 hours, 13 minutes ago

BERWYN HEIGHTS, Md. - Mayor Cheye Calvo got home from work, saw a package addressed to his wife on the front porch and brought it inside, putting it on a table.

Suddenly, police with guns drawn kicked in the door and stormed in, shooting to death the couple's two dogs and seizing the unopened package.

In it were 32 pounds of marijuana. But the drugs evidently didn't belong to the couple.

Police say the couple appeared to be innocent victims of a scheme by two men to smuggle millions of dollars worth of marijuana by having it delivered to about a half-dozen unsuspecting recipients.

Answer 1

Welcome to America

Answer 2

2 innocent and absolutely harmless dogs were murdered by cops for sport.  1 of the dog was trying to run into another room out of panic and fear, yet he was chased and shot dead too.  

And after the killing they say, "dogs were shot dead in self-defense"

Also no search warrant issued.  And this is no ordinary man, he is a mayor.  And this raid was so badly mismanaged, that when the mayor said, "I am the mayor", cops said,

"you sure are no mayor. get real"

In the end the cops will lose a big lawsuit and end up paying millions worth of taxpayer money.  

Answer 3

If it went down that way then a**** need to be kicked. Folks will get fired for this. Makes me wonder though how often does this sort of thing happen to folks NOT well connected who get no air time.  

Answer 4

That is outrageous! If these protectors and servants really want to reduce crime, they should apply pressure to legislators to make fewer activities illegal. I assure you, fewer laws mean less crime.

Throw away the key.

Let's end the drug war...and wage drug peace!

Answer 5

The sad thing about this is that it will reflect on every officer, no matter if they're in the States, Canada, or wherever. Whenever the media gets a story about a questionable things a cop has done, there are too many people at the ready to shout '**** the pigs!' or say/imply that all officers will act this way.

Being the daughter of a cop, I've learned that there's a lot of negative stigma surrounding police officers, no matter if they're good or not so much.

Shoot first, questions later, is a tricky thing. It's never going to be black and white, clear cut. If these officers really did do this, and shot the dogs for fun, then they deserve to be fired.

However, in the cases of people with weapons, and the police give them ample time to drop the weapon, and then taser (where I live, it's what happens generally before shots are fired) them, and still they have the weapon, any indication that the suspect is going to use the weapon is a chance for the officer to shoot.

People can say all they want when they write into news papers, or online here, but they cannot fully understand anything until they've been through it. I've never been through it, and my father hasn't ever been involved in a shooting, but he was stabbed while wearing a bulletproof vest. He didn't have the time to draw his weapon, but should things have worked out differently, and my dad hadn't been wearing his vest (they weren't mandatory) I completely would've been behind him shooting the man charging at him with the butcher knife.

The case above is an unfortunate one, and in Winnipeg, there have been two recent deaths at the hands of police.

For the first one, a teen was brandishing a knife, and after telling him to drop the weapon, and getting no compliance, the officer tased him. He died from circumstances regarding the taser, whether drugs were involved or not. People were up in arms about this, but they've got to realize that the kid had a better chance of living through being tased than shot.

At least people weren't crying racism in the above story, as they were with both recent deaths here.

Answer 6

Cops do that all the time.

Answer 7

History will repeat itself until people become intolerant of overzealous police.  This country is ideally founded to escape unlawful persecution.  There have been many incidents of immoral agendas disguised as police work.

Law enforcement has been used to delay civil rights and social progress.

Answer 8

Shoot once, ask question - if no response - empty clip.

Answer 9

If the officers followed their departments shooting policy they may be off the hook. the best way to determine is to record the entire situation via gun camera recorder etc.