Quote:
Originally Posted by petegz28
Put it in context of what will probably take place in court..
Defense Attorney: Officer why did you discharge your firearm?
Officer: The suspect posessed a knife and made a move towards another officer I thought the need to incapacitate the suspect by all means was the appropriate action.
Defense Attorney: Officer, given your training would you consider a suspect whois not in possesion of a firearm and who has been shot multiple time and is laying on the ground a threat to you or others?
Officer: No, at that point the suspect would no longer be an immediate threat.
Defense Attorney: Officer, why did you continue to discharge your firearm multiple times after the suspect was clearly incapacitated?
Officer: It was the adrenaline
Defense Attorney: Isn't it part of your training to only discharge your weapon when there is an immediate threat to you or others?
Officer: Yes, that is correct
Defense Attorney: Officer, again, why did you continue to discharge your firearm multiple times after the suspect was clearly incapacited
Officer: Adrenaline
Defense Attorney: The Defense rests your Honor.
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I....uh....assume you mean prosecuting attorney? If the officer's defense attorney is asking him those questions, he's doing a pretty poor job.
But again, you're pretty good at this law thing.
Let me tell you how that
actually goes. How it actually goes is that the officers probably don't take the stand at all - because why would you allow them as their defense counsel? There's nothing gained by it.
Then what happens is that the prosecutors have really nothing to go by other than the video - so they play it. And for 10 minutes the jury is pretty shocked by it.
Defense counsel then puts up an expert that has years of training in the effects of adrenaline on officers and the physiological impact on life/death stressors on the human body. You probably go ahead an introduce service records (though the prosecutors may object to relevance or improper bolstering, but they'll probably get in).
And all that is assuming that the prosecutors survived the Mx for directed verdict. Afterall, in order to have excessive force you'd have to establish that any of those shots actually
impacted and that but/for those shots, the man would've survived.
But yeah - you're really good at this lawyerin' thing.
These folks aren't going to jail.