The cop was given information that the gun may be fake but I see now the police are denying getting that info. Surely the cop could have handled it better.

someone was concerned enough to call the cops, that means it wasn't just a kid playing, it was a kid threatening people with a very realistic gun.

This exactly. Tasering wouldn't have killed and if shooting was necessary, to the leg would have been better.

because if you believe the kid has a gun it only takes a split second to kill someone.

Why did the kid have a very realistic gun, and why was he threatening other people with it and why were people calling 911 begging cops to come figure it out?

A gun that the caller said may have been fake. I would nt expect a member of the public to be able to tell a real or fake but I';m horrified that a trained cop cant tell the difference even when warned.

Come on Arista FFS. The police's job is not to execute, obviously juvenile kids -- realistic toy gun or not -- when there are other options.

I have seen enough real-life documentaries on US cops to know that in similar situations involving grown men armed with real guns, one cop at least, has his weapon drawn, while the other has his taser at the ready.

It takes no longer to fire a taser than it does a firearm, and when the 'suspect' is quite evidently a child, immobilising should always take precedence over shooting to kill.

The guy who made the 911 emergency call reporting the incident maintains that he said "on two occasions" that the gun was "probably fake" and that the person holding it "was probably a juvenile".

Yet, the police seek to mitigate these trigger-happy pair of rogues by explaining that "the two officers at the scene were not told about the caller's comments."

So fecking what? Whose fault is this monumental, inexcusable, breakdown in police procedure and strategy? Vital information concerning a possible armed suspect is not relayed to the officers in the front line and this is tendered as an excuse?

You can 'bet ya by golly wow', that if the 911 caller had reported that the 'suspect' had been a 20 stone 'gang-banger' wielding a genuine gun, that such vital information would definitely have found its way 'post haste' to any attending officers.

The fact that the police authorities claim that such information was not relayed in the case of a 12 year old with a toy gun, does not ring true to me, and I believe that it was indeed relayed, but ignored by a trigger happy thug who had his own agenda. I believe such a claim by the authorities is an 'after the fact' bit of 'damage limitation' in an attempt to 'close ranks' and protect two of their own.

I also believe that racism is the real cause behind this unacceptable killing, but not institutional racism endemic in the police itself, but rather the deep seated personal racism of at least one of the attending officers.

Any authority attracts maggots who have their own agenda. Sexual deviants, bitter, twisted hate-filled men who were bullied at school, racists, sociopaths, and even psychopaths, all seek roles within the police force, prison service or childrens' homes because those positions empower them, and affords them the opportunities to realise their secret agendas.

The trouble is, that 50 years ago, standards of entry to such authorities and institutions were so rigorous, employment applications by these maggots were - for the most part - rejected out of hand.

Unfortunately, as society degenerates with each passing year, standards fall accordingly, and institutions and authorities have now more than their share of these maggots.

Think about it; policemen and prison officers are not recruited from Mars - they are recruited from the same fecked up degenerate society we all live in. As, indeed are those people who hold the power positions in the organisations which recruit these officers.

Even the 'good guys' in today's police have not the same moral compass as their counterparts of 50 to 60 years ago, because society has not. What was deemed unacceptable behaviour then by individual 'bobbies' and the force in general, does not raise an eyebrow in todays force, or in its individual officers - because it is now acceptable by society's (degenerate) standards.

There are rogues and racists in the police forces of any country, and as long as the authorities place protecting their own before 'protecting and serving' the public interest, then they are as culpable as the maggots they are covering up for.

Finally, the people living in the communities affected by these 'incidents' are not stupid - they 'know' the 'status quo' regarding racism in the police force which serves them, and they should be listened to.

The cost of continually disregarding them and dismissing their testimony is a price which will eventually bankrupt all of us - on both sides of the pond.

I would imagine many calls to cops the Joe Public says it may be a fake gun, how the hell is the average joe to know. The cops training will state "treat it like a real gun"

I feel sorry for the poor cops

and are there not black cops too?

:facepalm:

WOW!!!!!!!

I can't blame the cops.Those Airsoft guns are made to look real.The cops are trained to shoot to the torso,If they shoot someone with a gun in the leg then they stand a good chance of being shot and killed.You don't wave guns around in America real or fake and if a cop has a gun pointed at you and says "put your hands in the air" or "get on the floor" you f'king do it!You DON'T reach into your pants and pull a weapon out!I am English and i know this.This kid was an American citizen,He should know this,His parents should have told him this and wtf was he doing wandering around a playground in America with a very real looking replica handgun scaring kids?There have been cases of kids getting hold of guns and killing their class mates,The risk is very real for those police.This kid or his parents or both were stupid imo.

If your post is a response to mine LT, then you should re-read mine, because the attending cops were certainly not your 'average Joe' - they were -- suposedly -- mature police officers who had undergone the most rigorous of training in dealing with just such situations as this, and being trained police officers, should have 20/20 vision, therefore should have readily identified that the 'suspect' was a child. What's more, they were armed as serving police officers with tasers as well as firearms, and should have adopted different tactics which involved immobilising the child rather than shooting to kill.

FFS one of the cops was a 10 year veteran.

And I should think - real weapon or not - the fact that there were two mature cops against a 12 year old child gave the cops a monumental advantage in deploying a disabling strategy ie; one covering with levelled firearm while approaching and the other taser-ready.

This is not the first racially motivated murder by cops in American history, and while ever there are apologists supporting these rogue bastards, it won't be the last.

To be honest the cops were damned if they do, damned if they don't. Had they not shot him and it had been a real gun and innocent bystanders were killed there would be outcry as to why they hadn't shot him first. As an untrained member of the public it's easy to say he should have been approached and they should have realised it was a fake etc etc etc but we have no real idea as to how the incident unfolded, just reports.

On the flip side if it were my 12 year old with a toy gun shot to death by the police I would be creating holy hell too....

WTF??? What relevance has this?

the constant cry that racism played a part

The problem is it looked so real
it did not have any plastic orange on it


http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/...d-460x276.jpeg

Well done to the manufacturers for making it look so real but I still think a trained officer with 10 years experience should be able to tell the difference and even if he cant the fact that its obviously a child whos brandishing the gun should indicate that to subdue the threat did not require lethal force.

you may well think that but as you have no police training, no experience in the field and a pretty obvious agenda

we can conclude that your view is at best, misguided

I have as much as you and I dont assume what the training will be but I do assume an experience officer would know the the difference and if he didnt then he'd be barely competent at best.

EDIT: Whts my agenda? What are you trying to imply?

The point is Anniek, that they had no need to shoot this child. They had alternatives, they chose not to employ.

I understand that we do not know the full truth, but there is such a phenomena in America called 'Suicide By Police' - when a person elects to die by drawing a weapon on cops and is 'gunned down' for his troubles. I have watched a few documentaries on this subject and read other material on it, and I have witnessed with my own eyes and ears the normal strategy of the armed cops attending such people. In all cases, the 'would-be-suicide' has actually had a real weapon raised against the cops, who have their weapons trained on him. However, there has still been dialogue, with the cops repeatedly asking the 'subject' to "lower his weapon". The amount of level-headed patience exhibited by the cops has been truly remarkable. In most cases which I have seen, the situation ends with the 'subject' repeatedly refusing to comply and ultimately being 'gunned down' as he wished to be. In two instances the subjects were tasered and immobilised.

This was very clearly an option in this case, and nothing will convince me that the 12 year old child had to be executed in such a manner by two mature, fully trained cops - one a 10 year veteran.

There were alternatives.

I have read and seen enough examples of racially motivated crimes by police over the years to recognise when another one fits the brief.

And this is it.

I suppose you think George Jackson the 'Black Activist' was really 'gunned down' in the outer yard of Soledad Maximum Security prison by reluctant armed guards whilst he was 'trying to escape'?

You think that this shooting was because the cop hated black children?

What relevance has that? We have had a long succession of WHITE Prime Ministers but none of them have done feck all for me. :shrug::shrug:

Yes. I believe at least one of these cops gave vent to his own twisted anger and I really believe that there would have been a very different strategy employed and a very different outcome had the child been white.

I don't know if we will ever learn the truth but I have a feeling we will.

Google 'David Oluwale' if you think these 'racist' atrocities are beyond even our cops. Not institutional racism of the force as a whole, but that of individual officers, which is still 'covered up' by their employers though.

I haven't googled - it might not come up - but I have a book on it somewhere. He was a virtual mentally backward black down-and-out who was hounded and abused by Leeds cops. They used to piss on him while he slept rough in shop doorways among other atrocities.

Anyway, LT - not the first time that we have not agreed, but I am convinced this poor yank kid was a victim of at least one of the cops own twisted racism.

Horrid. RIP.
I hate how trigger happy the american police are

i wonder how trigger happy you'd be, if you went out everyday on calls where you don't know if you ever get to see your family again.

Cops are the bravest people on the planet.

especially in a county like America where you know there are guns everywhere.