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Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting

By Last Night in Little Rock, Section Crime in the News
Posted on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 04:28:55 AM EST
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by Last Night in Little Rock

A Florida 15 year old 8th grade student is brain dead after being shot by police because he pointed a pellet gun at them.

CNN reports this morning that the police were told by the school officials that the gun was a pellet gun before the shooting occurred, quoting the student's family's lawyer. One of the students friends who had the gun pointed at him at school took the gun away and could tell it was fake, and he told the school who told the police.

Apparently he painted it to look real, and he brandished it in a threatening manner in a classroom, apparently terrorizing other students.

Shoot first, ask questions later.

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    • Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting | 44 comments (44 topical)
    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#1)
    by soccerdad on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 04:50:42 AM EST
    did the word get out to all the officers?

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#2)
    by jimakaPPJ on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 05:48:06 AM EST
    SD - Good question. And why would they believe? If the information is wrong, one of them is dead. Sad anyway you look at it.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#3)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 07:40:18 AM EST
    If someone points a real looking gun at you, and someone else is yelling "it's a fake, don't worry" - what are you going to do? I have no idea what I'd do - I've never been in that kind of situation. In the mind of the cops at the scene, it was a life or death situation, and the visible evidence available at the time affirmed that notion. I'd cut those guys some slack. At least as it's been reported so far, this looks a lot like "suicide via police" to me.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#4)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 08:52:42 AM EST
    If someone points a gun at a police officer they deserve to be shot. Say they knew it was a pellet gun, what does that change? A pellet gun is no toy. Even if they knew it was a pellet gun, should the police take a few pellets before they do something?

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#5)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 09:03:08 AM EST
    I would suggest that if they knew it was a pellet gun and still felt threatened, they could have shot the kid in the leg or something. Problem is, this kid set out to make sure they couldn't know it was a pellet gun by altering it's appearance, and then refused to put it down when he had every reason to believe the guns being pointed at him were indeed real. As reported, this does seem like a case where this kid wanted to die.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#6)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 09:04:20 AM EST
    The sad thing is that we give law enforcement guns, but we no longer provide adequate training/practice on when and how how to use them. What ever happened to the option--common when I was young--of shooting to disable? So freaking many ways to do that, and yet police are shooting people dead with alarming frequency. I'm from Portland, and here the last person slain by police who felt insecure was a naked, unarmed whacked out kid. But this was a SWAT team--is this the best we can get from individuals trained to mange these types of crises?

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#7)
    by Johnny on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 09:07:10 AM EST
    Not quite sad, but definately sickening. And yeah... why not a leg shot or an arm shot or a kneecap or whatever? Why shoot dead?

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#8)
    by roy on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 09:14:58 AM EST
    Trust a kid to tell the difference between a firearm and a toy? Bad idea. But Gahnawal, if the article's correct and it was an Airsoft gun, it's entirely reasonable to call it a toy. These aren't the BB guns one uses to hunt small game. Kids and creepy adults shoot each other with them in wargames. They're maybe somewhat more dangerous than the plastic suction-cup guns you see in the grovery store checkout line.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#9)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 09:30:33 AM EST
    They're maybe somewhat more dangerous than the plastic suction-cup guns you see in the grovery store checkout line. I've never seen a toygun in the supermarket that shot suctioncup darts at anywhere near 265 feet per second (180 mph). And that's assuming it was the cheapest, spring powered model.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#10)
    by Sailor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 09:34:38 AM EST
    Actually we don't know that the kid pointed the gun at the cop, we only have the cop's word for it. (When did newspapers stop using the word 'allegedly'?)

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#11)
    by swingvote on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 10:22:05 AM EST
    deleted

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#12)
    by kdog on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 10:34:36 AM EST
    Obviously this was one whacked out kid. He started the turn of events. However, police shootings are always troubling, since they are never fully and honestly investigated. We will never know if killing the kid was avoidable. The cover-up begins before the smoke clears the chamber.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#13)
    by jen on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 11:01:35 AM EST
    leaving aside the question of whether the shooting was justified. The kid did not deserve to be killed. even if he brought it on himself, he did not deserve it. There is a difference.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#14)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 12:46:05 PM EST
    I don't know if the cops were right or wrong to shoot the boy. I do know that airsoft was egregiously wrong for making a toy look that much like the real thing. Take a look at their line of replicas. About the only visial difference between them and the real thing is maybe a red piece of plastic on the tip. One article I read was that the boy was shouting statements to the effects that someone was going to die, and maybe him. It sounds like suicide by cop. If so, then should Airsoft be permitted to manufacture such toys? Perhaps. Should Airsoft be held criminally or civilly liable for their toys being used by minors in crimes? Definitely.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#15)
    by roger on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 01:45:56 PM EST
    While this was still recent, google linked to a story on cop.com, or something similar. The story stated that the kid shot himself! I'm not holding my breath for a retraction.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#16)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 02:53:14 PM EST
    It's a tough one for the police. It's hard to tell from media reports whether the cops jumped the gun. Only time will tell. Poor kid.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#17)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 02:54:56 PM EST
    I meant to add: However, if the officers were told ahead of time re: the pellet gun, it's certainly a relevant consideration when analyzing their actions.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#18)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 06:59:29 PM EST
    To those who are asking why cops don't shoot to disable any more - My understanding is that cops are never taught to shoot for the leg or the arm - always for the center of the body. The reason for that is that trying to disable the attacker vastly increases the odds of missing altogether, which increases the odds of a dead cop. Thus, the cops are taught to only shoot to kill, and to only draw their weapons if absolutely necessary. Sad, but true. Hell. I'm not fond of gun control, but I'm very glad I refused my son's request for one of these thing. Hard to believe my grandfather's stories of taking his .22 rifle on the trolley to ride out to the city limits and go hunting.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#19)
    by jimcee on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 07:01:17 PM EST
    TChris wrote about a similar incident near my home in Utica NY. The fellow was shot dead by the police after he waved around what appeared to be a real gun. It ended up being a pellet gun but at the time was indistinguishable from a 9mm auto to the police at the scene. His brothers demanded an independent investigation and the Rev. Fred Daley worked as a liason between the family and the police. There was a heated meeting between the DA and the family/community but in the end the investigation determined that it was in fact a sad case. The fellow was intoxicated and threatening his ex and kids with a gun when the police arrived. He repeatedly pointed his gun at the police before he was shot and killed. His brothers protested. His ex-wife and her kids didn't. TChris never followed up on the story here at TL and that is too bad. Overall it was a sad ordeal. For the brothers and for the cops who shot him. The police don't go to work thinking that they want to kill someone but sometimes circumstances are unavoidable. I can't blame the SWAT people for what they did in the death of this young man. It is a tragedy for all involved excepting those who would make political hay of it. To them it is something to celebrate and that is sad.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#20)
    by jimakaPPJ on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 07:35:24 PM EST
    et al - To those who called for the police to shoot him in the leg, or something. Please understand that shooting a hand gun is very difficult. Wounding, etc., is almost impossible to do with any degree of reliability. So they do as trained. They don't pull their weapon until they think the person has a lethal weapon and will use it. They then shoot for the "body cavity," which will either kill or disable. Sorry, but it isn't the movies. Cops are killed regularly because they hesitate a second too long.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#21)
    by Sailor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 07:54:28 PM EST
    Cops are killed regularly because they hesitate a second too long.
    1) Cops aren't killed regularly. 2) Instead of making such an inaccurate sweeping statement please provide links. BTW, anybody know where the kid was hit?

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#22)
    by jimakaPPJ on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 08:04:11 PM EST
    Sailor - Define "regularly" and show a database.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#23)
    by jimcee on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 08:08:48 PM EST
    Sailor, You might refer to the NYC papers, not the NYT but the NY Daily News or the NYPost to learn about how many police have died recently. Two in less than two months. (As I have said before I am link challenged). Just remember cops aren't the enemy unless you make them so. I live in a rather rough neighborhood and my neighbors and I have a good relationship with the police as well as with each other. With a neighborhood watch and police confidence we have managed to drive out crack dealers and a dog fighting ring. Without a good relationsship with the local police we would be at the mercy of cracked-out, dog fighting as*h*les with guns. So explain why the cops are so evil, rationally.... please.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#24)
    by Sailor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 08:33:00 PM EST
    jimcee, I never claimed they were evil. I do believe in questioning authority.
    Just remember cops aren't the enemy unless you make them so.
    My experience is very different, and I have lived in some pretty bad neighborhoods too. When I lived in Koreatown we used to joke about the 3 worst LA gangs; the crips, the bloods and the LAPD. Jim, you stated it, now back it up.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#25)
    by Johnny on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 09:05:59 PM EST
    Just remember cops aren't the enemy unless you make them so.
    Worth a chuckle.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#26)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 09:20:23 PM EST
    Sailor, here are your stats: http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/abstract/ph98.htm It shows cops "justifiably" kill about 400 felons per year and the felons kill about 100 cops per year.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#27)
    by jimcee on Sun Jan 15, 2006 at 09:23:38 PM EST
    Sailor, I'm not sure I'm the Jim to reply but mostly the police are pretty cool in my community. I live in a small (40,000 pop.) rust belt community. There is a big prison resettlement community here as well. Families tend to follow thier fathers into a rather, eh-hem, liberal county with generous public assistance subsidies for the local 'residents'. We also have the most per capita sex offender population in all of NYS. Out of the 195 identified sex- offenders in our town 55 are level 3 offenders. They are the worst. So perhaps your ideas of a soft and earnest police and judiciary is founded on some fantasy that you have the ability to project on those of us who live in real places with real examples. Quite frankly I have a hard time dealing with people who feign thier interactions with the police when they live where your worst fear is you might have to show your ID. At least in my community the police are on my side. Funny how that works.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#28)
    by cpinva on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 12:10:39 AM EST
    interesting comments guys. first, to the issue of "shoot to kill" vs "shoot to wound/immobilise". not an issue for discussion, because there is not now, nor has there ever been, firearms training in "shoot to wound/immobilise". this is true whether it's the military, police or civilian. guns are made to kill, period. that's their job. i, and everyone else i know, that received any kind of firearms training, was taught to shoot to kill. if a gun is drawn, it is assumed to be used for that purpose. otherwise, don't draw it. a wounded person can still kill/wound you, why take the chance? shot to the largest part of the body has the highest hit probability, few of us are expert marksman. an issue not raised, by anyone, is, why didn't the police have non-lethal weapons available for use? no mention anywhere of tasers, etc. in their arsenal. with all the recent stories, i would have expected that. but no, no mention at all. any thoughts on that TC? it does sound like suicide by police, but we only have one version of the story, the other version died.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#29)
    by Johnny on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 03:44:02 AM EST
    You know, jimcee, as much time as you spend complaining incessently about the people you live around, it's a wonder you havn't moved south yet...

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#30)
    by roger on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 05:54:11 AM EST
    Jimcee, Sounds like you live in Auburn NY. The cops there are pretty good. Go 8 miles away, things are much different. Skaneateles cops are as incompetant as they get.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#31)
    by jimakaPPJ on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 06:31:51 AM EST
    sailor - Would one dead cop evey 3.65 days qualify as "regularly?" cpinva - How close do you have to get to fire a taser?

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#32)
    by Johnny on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 06:35:51 AM EST
    "We've had hands-on deployment with the tazer before, but this is the first time that the air cartridge had been utilized where the officer didn't have to be physically holding on to the subject. You can actually deploy it at up to 21 feet," Engler said.
    From here

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#33)
    by pigwiggle on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 07:23:07 AM EST
    I think it’s entirely unreasonable to ask police officers to risk their lives on second hand information regarding some high-school kids judgment about the authenticity of the firearm. That is, unless we all are willing to pay them more than $55k/yr.
    “And yeah... why not a leg shot or an arm shot or a kneecap or whatever? Why shoot dead?â€
    I often hear this from folks who have never handled or fired a firearm. It is difficult enough to hit a large target while calm in a controlled environment. It simply isn’t possible for even a practiced marksman to shoot with disabling accuracy in such a high stress situation. Try this; take your handgun to the range and set a human silhouette target at 10 feet. Fire the entire capacity of your gun in a slow controlled manner. Refresh the target and now repeat, but fire the entire capacity as quickly as possible. This should give you some perspective. If you don’t need to kill someone you don’t shoot them; if you need to kill them, you shoot at the center of mass until they are dead. Intentionally disabling someone is ridiculous Hollywood garbage.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#34)
    by roy on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 08:16:09 AM EST
    According to this article, Penley was shot in the head. Just the one article I've found says so, but if it's correct it means the cop probably wasn't shooting for "center of mass". Maybe he was, and missed, but I'd expect a SWAT member to be a good enough shot not to have that problem. It still sounds legit to me, but it won't to others.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#35)
    by Sailor on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 09:12:38 AM EST
    The stats sited actually said "On average 373 felons were lawfully killed by police each year." and "an average of 79 police officers have been murdered each year in the line of duty." So rather than the 4:1 ration someone fanasized about it is closer to 40:1, and that is about 1 every 40 days. You guys should really read the links you post. And still no indication that hesitation is what got them killed.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#36)
    by swingvote on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 10:22:17 AM EST
    MH's link re-provided here so that it will be available after it is deleted for skewing the site. Beyond that: Sailor: How do you get a 40:1 ratio out of 373 and 79? Or how about "one every 40 days" if 79 are killed each year? How many days do you think are in a year?

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#37)
    by Patrick on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 10:36:53 AM EST
    The reason for that is that trying to disable the attacker vastly increases the odds of missing altogether, which increases the odds of a dead cop.
    And more importantly, leaves a deadly projectile traveling down range. I have never been trained to shoot to disable, rather the common training is shoot to stop the threat and aim for the center of mass of the target presented. Sometimes that's a head, sometimes a shoulder and sometimes it's the chest. In any case, taking a well aimed shot in the midst of a life threatening situation is difficult at best. Unlike many here, my default position in this instance is that the cops did what they had to do, tragic and horrible but necessary. My sympathies to the officer who was forced to shoot and his family as well as the family of that troubled boy.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#38)
    by Sailor on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 10:58:05 AM EST
    justpaul, thanks for the corrections; that's what I get for doing data entry one handed while eating a sandwich and running a matrix convolution. Silly me;-)

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#39)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 12:26:23 PM EST
    Johnny... And yeah... why not a leg shot or an arm shot or a kneecap or whatever? Why shoot dead? If you shoot me in the kneecap I can still shoot you...and I will. Sailor... So rather than the 4:1 ration someone fanasized about it is closer to 40:1, and that is about 1 every 40 days. So..that sounds ecceptable to you? Better a cop should die (most likely with a family) then a crazed kid bent on suicide?

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#40)
    by Johnny on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 03:11:46 PM EST
    Ever been shot BB?

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#41)
    by Patrick on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 05:09:49 PM EST
    Shot at multiple times on 3 different ocassions, but they didn't hit me. Came close.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#42)
    by jimcee on Mon Jan 16, 2006 at 07:53:45 PM EST
    Roger, Yeah as you get into the land of higher housing prices, the suburbs, the cops tend to become rather Barney Fife-ish. As the citizenry are more well-off they tend to dwell in the world of a fantasy where 'The Man' is keeping those inner-city (read: minority) folks down. But what ever you do don't suggest that someone might build a 'halfway house' or drug rehab place amongst thier shady lanes because they'll show up to vent at the council meetings to whine about thier property values and the safety of thier kids. No, that stuff should built in the less affluent areas. They are hypocrites for the most part. Johnny, I complain about the neighbors that have been problematic. I like my area a lot and have taken much ribbing on where I live from my friends. I'm a Yank, born and bred and I like the cold winters. I've lived down south, NYC and London, UK but it just didn't feel like home so here I am. The police have been very good here in Utica. It is a city with a lot of problems and the police almost always are reasonable. The influx of the prison related population has been somewhat of a problem but the prisons also provide much needed employment so it is a tough choice between the two. There is an emerging inner-city movement going on here and I feel privileged to be part of it but it is going to take a long time,as it took a long time for the city to decay and it is not for everybody. I do like it though.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#43)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Jan 17, 2006 at 10:57:12 AM EST
    I spent 16 years on active duty in the army in the infantry and I am aware of a few special forces type units thru out the military,are we saying that there's not one special police unit trained to take down one 15 year old without killing him,even if he has a real hand-gun,so what's special about S.W.A.T,any police officer can kill a 15 year old.

    Re: Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting (none / 0) (#44)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Jan 17, 2006 at 03:11:12 PM EST
    I think it's absolutely outragious that a 15 year old was shot dead in the head by an adult. it seems from what i've been reading from the news comments that he was a loner,therefore, he deserved to die. yes, an unpopular adolescent is of no use to anybody, let's kill him! Here in Rhode island we haven't even seen it in the news since it happened. i mean is this normal now that the swat teams can just come in and ransack a classroom and shoot anybody they want? i mean 40 officers for one 15 year old with a pellet gun? Florida is not exactely Iraq. I can't wait until my kids start going to school!!!

    Police Were Told Gun Was Fake Before Shooting | 44 comments (44 topical)