The fact that she was there to cause trouble is very relevant to the politics but irrelevant to the legality of the shooting. She deserves extraordinary condemnation for creating the situation, in part because of the other bad behavior inspired, but we should set that aside in evaluating her fate.
All of the parsing of the video is also overwhelmingly irrelevant, for the same reason that it is irrelevant whether the guy who reaches into his jacket after being told to put his hands in the air actually has a gun in there. Law enforcement can't exist if it takes that chance, because cops would die too often. Their threshold for lethal force has to be very different than a civilian's, and it is. That an officer had the option of declining to shoot or not being in front of the vehicle doesn't create an obligation, any more than a fat, female DEI officer clumsily getting her gun stolen by a perp means that other officers can't then shoot that perp before he fires the gun. For all the rhetoric about her "not deserving to die", officers don't deserve to die over slight missteps, either.
A good point that I saw today: If no shots were fired and she drove away, her actions easily met the standard for an "assault with a deadly weapon" charge, which can be levied over vehicular offenses even when nobody is actually hit. It's hard to argue that one can be guilty of "assault with a deadly weapon" but not have met the threshold for police to fire.
She didn't create the situation, the agent did. He decided to step in front of the vehicle, where and when he shouldn't have. He decided to then stop in front of the vehicle, where he shouldn't have. He then decided to go for his gun, which he shouldn't have. He then persisted in pushing it up towards the driver after she was obviously turning, which he shouldn't have. He then decided to pull the trigger when he shouldn't have.
There is simply no reasonable hypothetical where him drawing his gun and firing it would save his life, or anyone else's life, but he intended to both kill her, and knowingly put the lives of everyone else around him in danger, for no benefit to anyone. The only reason she is dead and he is alive is because she hadn't been trying to run him over, if she had, he would have already been under the car and would have been, if still alive, possibly shooting his buddies.
These situations are, fortunately, not common enough that law enforcement would be "totally depleted" (not even close), and considering the vast chain of mistakes that the trained law enforcement made leading up to this scenario, it is more than reasonable to hold them criminally responsible for the situation. The whole point of law enforcement is for them to try and act ideally in situations when working with the public, not for us to just say that random members of the public should all conform to ideal expectations of behavior, by that reasoning we should just not have law enforcement at all, since everyone should just follow the law.
It seems unclear if this would qualify as assault as the harm inflicted was minimal (and not impacted by the agent's decision to use lethal force), and the intent seems impossible to prove, given she was obviously turning away from the officer, and plausibly could have not even seen him.
It seems incredibly hard to argue that this was self-defense in any way when the reasonable expectation is that it would, if implemented as he intended, save -1 lives. Indeed, one would argue that makes it de facto aggression and murder, rather than self-defense, and an act of revenge against a potential killer rather than of protection of the self.
Everything you say he created is true in my mind. I agree with that. But to say she didn't create the situation as well is like saying the woman wasn't half responsible in creating a pregnancy.
I think we're using "situation" somewhat differently.
You're using it in the sense that anyone who is not literally doing nothing is technically taking actions that change the environment.
I mean in terms of that the LEOs chose the time, place, and manner in which they approached this encounter, and in which she was clearly reacting to them in a reasonably predictable way (people do try to drive away from the cops regularly). For lack of a better term, they are "dealing the cards" the way they want.
This is fundamentally different than say, a situation where a cop is called to a scene with an active shooter, where the cops have to react to choices the shooter has proactively made (time, place, hostages, .etc). Or less dramatically, if someone is speeding, they choose the speed they are driving at independent of if a cop catches them speeding or not.
It clearly wasn't obvious she was turning away from the officer, some of the footage shows the wheels pointed straight ahead when the engine revved and the tires spun on the ice. Regardless, the officer wasn't in a position to see the direction of the wheels. He was in front of a 5000lb vehicle that suddenly got very loud, and did, ultimately, strike him, despite his best efforts.
He -was- in the position to see her turning the steering wheel from lock to lock. He probably also could see the expression on her face when she realized he was pointing the gun at her, which, I am guessing, was probably rather alarmed. Most people absolutely shit themselves when they're staring down the barrel, especially hoplophobic liberals. Obviously he reacted with a split-second decision probably made with the amygdala rather than the pre-frontal cortex, but.... HE SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN STANDING IN FRONT OF THE CAR IN THE FIRST PLACE. He put himself there. And this is a huge procedural violation, for reasons which should now be abundantly clear to even the layest of laypeople. Cops are trained specifically not to stand in front of a stopped vehicle while questioning or attempting to apprehend suspects, because it creates the situation where they might be subject to being struck or run over. Competent officers/agents will have received sufficient training to make this a habitual, even instinctual practice. Unfortuntately, ICE, like just about everything else this administration has been doing for the last year, has had its competency go right into the shit-tank.
EDIT: Well, now that footage recorded by the badge who fired is out there, it looks like this all happened a lot faster even than I initially assumed. The car starts moving forward, and he reacts, draws, and domes her, all in like 1.5-2 seconds tops. That's impressive, justification (or lack of) notwithstanding. Also she clearly was not in a state of panic or alarm, at least at the last moment her expression is visible in the footage. It is clear that the vehicle did in fact strike him, but it (still) is not clear whether it would have done so had he not taken a tentative step forward just as she began to accelerate, or whether she intended to hit him with it. "OBVIOUSLY this was justified," a lot of people (even people I like and respect) are now saying. Well, maybe, and I am in fact more inclined to agree that it probably was... but it's not a slam dunk.
You're confusing the timing of when he started going for his pistol versus when he actually fired the first shot. When the car starts accelerating, assuming (as Helms correctly points out) he didn't already see the woman turning the wheel to the right, he is barely in front of the front-left wheel after he came to a stop there (which is definitely not "best efforts").
Following this, as the car starts to make noise, the agent moves to brace himself, moving his foot backwards and he starts leaning forward. As he does so, the car is already, from a distant perspective (and would be more evident to him than to the camera) moving towards the right and away from him.
It is unclear if, had he not been leaning into it, the car would have entirely cleared him without contact at this point, but at the very least a substantial portion of the contact is a result of the officer actively leaning forward in this way (as he will continue to do).
As the car continues to move forward, the agent moves his foot backwards and his arms forward, such that his upper body is out leaning over the hood and pointed towards the driver, while his lower body is clear of the vehicle.
At this point in time, it is incredibly obvious the car isn't going to hit him, and that there is no need to shoot.
Given that he had enough time to adjust his lower body in response to the car turning, it is hard to argue that he wasn't aware of this change in circumstance and lacked sufficient time to change his plan to shoot.
As he starts opening fire, he continues to lean towards the driver, with the car continuing to move further away from him. This is why he loses balance as the car careens down the street. (EDIT: To be slightly more specific, it is why he "spins", since his legs are planted, but his upper body is being forced forward as it is extended over the car and comes up on the windshield and driver's side panels.
While "strike" has certain connotations, the agent clearly didn't take every possible effort to avoid being struck (if we call it that), but rather incontrovertibly took up a stance that directly lead to an increased amount of collision with the car in the actual circumstances, and no decrease in the hypothetical where the car had been pointed at him. No action he took following the acceleration resulted in a decrease of the amount of collision he had with the car. It is well understood that shooting the driver of a car, does not cause it to come to a stop, and even if he'd been quicker on the draw, he would not have stopped any amount of contact between him and the car.
There are conflicting accounts on if she had previously followed him around, but it seems less and less likely as more info comes out.
In the footage that includes before the agents leave the truck, it can be clearly seen she is waving them past and the road is not blocked.
The officer came to a sudden stop in front of a car that was actively being driven. She had substantially less time to react to that than he did to her acceleration prior to shooting her. What she did should have been completely safe for him, if he had practiced even basic common sense, let alone basic LEO training.
Had the agents approached the situation with calm, but firm professionalism, literally none of this would have happened. Making loud, angry demands, while closing the gap and putting your arm into someone's personal space is likely to spook them and unlikely to obtain compliance.
Sometimes I think we'd solve a lot of issues if we allowed for a gray zone of "Being a cop is a tough job, so we're not sending you to jail, but you're permanently banned from being a cop anywhere in this country"
We are still inside the 48 to 72-hour rule of not commenting on the actual shooting. So I'm not going to. However, is your thinking is in alignment with mine regarding bigger macro long-term issues.
I mean ultimately the victim and the person who pulled the trigger are the main actors in this play.
But in some respects, Biden shares the blame because he could have worked hard to secure the borders, get rid of people who had been here illegally for a short-term. And it worked really hard to create a path to citizenship for people who had planted Roots here. None of that happened during his administration and instead we got MASS illegal immigration. So now the pendulum swings during Trump administration and we have the mess that we have. Add to that the escalating hostilities between Trump and Governor walz.
Since I live in Minneapolis, I feel free to also blame our mayor, our city council, and the sanctuary City policies that meant no police officers could be on hand to help control crowds or to help protect them or to help protect ice officers for that matter . Instead, we get the constant drumbeat rhetoric from far left flank of the progressives....
As I think about it, I could also blame every Federal administration since the 90s because we have had no substantial immigration policy reform in decades.
Anyway, thank you for your post and your thinking on this issue.
"That's the part that gets to me. Why is it that the people who are in charge are allowed to immediately put forward an uncomplicated narrative, and have no repercussions, and we who just have regular jobs—just doing 9 to 5—we're afraid for our livelihood if we speak incorrectly?" — Esau McCaulley
I don't like cops and I am fed up with protest wokery.
With that out of the way, If the car's wheels hadn't spun on the ice, we'd be talking about how an ICE officer got run over yesterday and if he deserved it or not.
So interesting, I just reread that SSC post and blasted it out on Notes a few hours ago. I kinda hoped i might have inspired you, but you probably read it in 2018, same as me and were floored by its insight.
Something I missed (or forgot) on the first read is how angry the narrator remains whenever he thinks about the initial argument that destroyed his company. He casually discusses the effects on politics and global affairs, but carries rage for Shiri in his heart years after the event.
I think this is poignant. The events, the scissor statements themselves are ludicrous to anyone without a personal stake in the outcome, but once you’re in, it’s as if the entire world has moved.
We’re right back at George Floyd where no one will move an inch once they’ve decided what their position is. Understanding the problem doesn’t seem to give us any defense against it. Pernicious!
"Deportation is a fundamental feature of all modern nation states, and anyone who says that “deportation is fascism” is saying “every nation on Earth is fascist” by proxy."
I doubt this argument would convince any of the anti-ICE protesters. They'd just say "nobody is illegal on stolen land". America must always be held to a higher standard.
There are a lot of American government practices that I don't like, but I don't assault law enforcement when it enforces them. If I encouraged others to do so or organized a movement to thwart law enforcement, I would think I'd be in actual rebellion against my government and face "enemy of the state"-level prosecution.
If a right-coded person protesting an ATF enforcement action did the same as this woman, the result would likely be the same, and the people currently most outraged on the left would be positively ecstatic.
Something I've been bringing up elsewhere, that I think needs to be brought up more - shooting into a moving vehicle with a handgun (really any small arm) is vanishingly unlikely to stop that vehicle from moving. In fact, it did not stop the vehicle from moving in this case - after the driver was killed, the SUV kept cruising along at a pretty good clip, until it ran into that parked car down the street.
Was the ICE agent legally justified in firing his weapon? Maybe.
Did the ICE agent firing his weapon, as opposed to focusing on getting the fuck out of the way, improve his own safety, or that of the public at large? I doubt it, especially considering the other ICE agent and uninvolved bystander who were directly in his background.
This may not have been a *bad* shoot, but it was without question an *extremely sloppy* shoot.
Shooting the driver will keep them from backing up and trying to finish the job if they didn't kill you with the first attempt.
“You're not allowed the shoot the person who is trying to kill you unless you are 100% certain that killing them would definitely stop their attempt to kill you” is such an absurd standard that it should not be surprising that there is no legal system anywhere that imposes it.
It really is baffling how little thought these people seem to have given to the fact that they are attempting to interfere with armed jackasses of questionable competency. Like, as inept as it is, this is the closest we've ever actually been to living in that police state they've been screaming about--utterly without consequence, of course--for years. But they seem to have picked the dumbest fucking hobby possible in light of that. Let's get in the faces of a bunch of dudes that we are 150% convinced are all racist nootzi assholes and who also have guns, because what could possibly go wrong?
They are "on the right side of history". And "main character". The notion that they could ever die - or even be harmed - is outside their Overton Windows.
Not that generations of absurd tolerance for incivility among left-wing activists only hasn't helped enable that mindset.
Yeah, I thought this - if you actually think ICE is just a new iteration of Einsatzgruppen goons, why are you bumbling around getting in their way in a minivan being obnoxious whilst your buddy films you for clout?
That doesn’t justify you getting shot, but if you really believed these guys were big bad Nazi boys shouldn’t you be observing and following them covertly, with escape plans in place in case you are spotted?
Her actual behaviour - again, whilst deeply annoying; is not justification for her being killed - kind of reads as LARPing. She didn’t really believe these guys were villains.
This was something edgy to do for bragging rights at the Antifa crochet group or whatever
This one feels like it could end up being a big deal, we’ll see how hard the liberals coopt it. It could be just another Wednesday by next week, you can never truly tell beforehand what will set people off. This one gave me a weird feeling though, maybe just how close it is to the Venezuela bullshit.
In a different country, cops would not fire their guns so easily. In this country, around 7% of police homicides involve a moving vehicle (roughly 100 per year).
I have seen much worse shootings, in blue states for that matter, where the cops were not charged. Here is an example where they actually shot at the car from the side: https://youtu.be/XZvSVLSUcz4
So, your take reveals whether you like cops or not,-:).
When the cops enforce laws you like, they’re brave and selfless public servants. When they enforce laws you don’t like, they’re jackbooted thugs. In a rational world, we’d just have less laws. But the only rational world we have is the one you dream of in your own mind.
My reaction to that first sentence is generally "Does the other country have anything like American gangs in it?" Because it's not terribly apples-to-apples if nobody ever assaults police in your country.
Depends. I was dating a Vietnamese lady in 2020 and she was VERY confused why the cops didn't just shoot the protesters. She viewed our system as very inefficient. So she is a data point in your favor.
I do disagree, but it's because you lack some additional information and context. This is either because you didn't see, chose not to see it, didn't see it as relevant, or didn't look closely enough; it is NOT marginal. I will explain. First, a law enforcement officer can fire on a fleeing subject, if the officer has belief that more people or other officers will be put in harms way if the suspect is allowed to flee away. This is tantamount to your opinion that the follow-on shots may not be warranted, "some might say". Frankly, the opinions of generally uninformed people on important details relevant to very consequential outcomes (death or criminal prosecution for manslaughter), shouldn't matter to anyone that doesn't have a brain without wrinkles/ridges. So, why even consider them?
Secondly, when the driver (suspect) puts the vehicle in drive and accelerates, the wheels are aimed left. Before anyone addresses the position of the shooting officer, he was moving from the front passenger side of the vehicle towards the drivers side, likely to aid his fellow officer in extricating the non-compliant (and hindering/impeding) driver. The officer hears the engine rev, and draws his service pistol. If I'm being honest, and I'm passing in front of a vehicle on slippery road and I hear the engine revving up as it would when accelerating and I'm on precarious footing and may not be able to get out of the way, I'm going to shoot too. A vehicle is a deadly weapon when driven at someone, this is established. The driver, not really moving, since the wheels are spinning (Honda Pilots are AWD) and she doesn't have the typical immediate acceleration response, turns the steering wheel to the right. This is when the tires gain traction, moving now forward (but there's no direction change yet, because slippery conditions) and hits the officer while he now discharges his first shot (I've seen the opposite angle video, that you couldn't find). She continues moving forward and now the vehicle is starting to turn towards the right, the officer now fires additional shots at a non-compliant driver that is refusing lawful orders to exit the vehicle, the same driver that's been following them and heckling them all day, and now struck an officer in front of her vehicle. This officer, now believes that not only his life is in danger but others are as well if she eludes arrest, as evidenced by drawing his pistol and firing the first time, so he continues to fire in accordance with SCOTUS decision Tennessee v. Garner. As for the officers being able to move out of the way, this is easily disproven by the fact that the roads still have snow/ice on them, they are slick, as evidenced by the vehicle not accelerating immediately (wheels spinning, the Pilot is an AWD vehicle), and the officers slipping on the roadway.
It's not as middle of the road or "marginal" as you make it out to be, there are informed opinions and uninformed opinions. Let's focus on eliminating the uninformed opinions instead of declaring this Shiri’s Police Shooting or both good/bad or light/dark or whatever middle of the road euphemism we can apply. This was a good shoot.
My take. I try to exercise my Root Cause Analysis and Human & Organizational Performance analytical skills. People are part of a system; for tbe reasons BJ describes, the system is wrecked.
Recently, the news cycle has been flooded with the tragedy in Minneapolis where a Federal LEO shot a middle-aged female protestor as she was participating in a demonstration against ICE activity. I have some opinions on that.
The officer involved may have been legally justified in using deadly force. The officer was participating in an enforcement activity regarding locating and detaining persons of questionable immigration status in the US, those persons having allegedly committed criminal acts. That is what Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel do. That is a task that carries some level of risk; they are supposedly properly trained and equipped to mitigate the risk to themselves and the public when engaged in that activity.
It seems that the woman operating the vehicle was attempting to interfere with the ICE operations. She apparently made the attempt to block their vehicle on a public street. That is interference with law enforcement actions, a criminal act; a rather poor choice of actions on hers. When officers approached her vehicle to make an arrest, she resisted arrest and attempted to flee the scene in that vehicle, striking an officer in the process. A human struck by a 3000 lb. vehicle can be severely injured or killed. The officer responded with proportional deadly force.
Did the officer use poor judgement at the time? This is what will be investigated as the facts seem to be well detailed in the videos of this event circulating on the Internet. My only comment is that if I were in that situation, I would not be standing in front of a vehicle with someone at the controls who has indicated any level of hostility toward what I was doing. Other than that, the action would be considered justified. Any moral human being would not wish this outcome.
We need to remember there are 2 victims here. One is the woman; she has children, family and friends who are terribly affected. The other is the ICE officer; that person is now living with the thought they took a life and surely there are family and friends of theirs affected as well.
What disgusts me is the system that permitted this to happen as well as perpetuates the actions.
Politicians have risen to condemn the actions of ICE; the same ones who have justified poorly controlled (some say uncontrolled) immigration policies that did not vet the people coming across our borders. Consequently, criminals from foreign countries as well as those who sought to exploit our social welfare systems have become integrated in our society and prey on each other as well as American Citizens. ICE is making the attempt to remove these individuals, some with seriously dangerous behavior. In addition, those same politicians are encouraging protest using language that could be considered seditious; close to inciting treasonous behavior on the part of protestors. Did they not take an oath of office to uphold our American Constitutional Republic? More importantly, are they willing to accept the consequences of their actions? Just as importantly, the unintended consequences?
As a student of history, I am fascinated by wars, insurrections and the social/political conditions that have led up to them. History has proven time again that once the violence starts, it usually runs a destructive and bloody course before coming to an end. And that end is not what people always want to happen. Therefore, when I see video clips of politicians like the Governor of Minnesota announce to the world that “Our” National Guard troops are on standby, along with civilian LEO’s, against violent protestors (?) or additional intervention by Federal LEO’s (?) I am reminded of those times when Insurrection took place.
Yet, what politicians must remember is this. Unintended Consequences. Those same Guard personnel and LEO’s have also been exposed to the news regarding the actions of criminal invaders and fraudsters. Will they intervene at risk of injury or death to defend criminals? What is the possibility that “peaceful protests” will turn violent and provide cover for those aggrieved citizens to exact retribution against the criminals and fraudsters? Will there be intervention in those circumstances? Remember, Minneapolis PD abandoned police stations during the 2020 George Floyd riots, only to watch them get burned down (fortunately, weapons and communications equipment were removed prior).
Deescalation is the best policy. Back off now. We don’t need to find out what the unintended consequences are.
There is a case for the officer defending himself against perceived deadly force, just like any muggle not in law enforcement can do by right, but it's not the strongest given all of the circumstances. Of course, there is a strong subjectivity factor here.
There is a slightly stronger case that the officer had to neutralize what could have been a threat to others (LE or otherwise), but that's not airtight, either.
If she had driven away, she could have done one of two things:
1) Tried to harm someone with her vehicle, which would have justified deadly force
2) Flee, in which case the "you can't outrun a Motorola" principle applies.
And there's no way to know in advance.
Law enforcement can of course issue lawful orders in the course of detention and/or arrest, a privilege that muggles don't have, but if LE regards noncompliance or imperfect compliance as a deadly threat as a matter of course, especially without meaningful accountability, then that is a recipe for obvious trouble due to the incentives involved.
Of course, one thing to keep in mind is that the purpose of authority is to maintain order (after self-preservation), not to protect individuals except as incidental to the above directives. Does that color matters? Should that color matters?
His fire was perfectly justified. The real questions are whether or not ice should have been there. But once she acted a fool, she was ripe for being shot.
I've seen that view. The fact that two reasonable people can have such diametrically opposite views of the same videos is QED that this is the Shiri's Scissor of police shootings.
The scissor part of this feels like we're debating whether the wide receiver completed the act of the catch even though he was tackled in-bounds at the 20 as time expired.
People are bringing their own biases into the viewing. They’re not reaching a conclusion based on the video evidence. They’re reaching a conclusion based on what they knew to be true before seeing the video.
I expect YOU to examine the events that led up to the shooting not the actual shooting.
We know he’ll get off if charged by the state. Just like with Vickie weaver, the Feds will remand it to fed court and dismiss it.
So take the bigger view and question what led up to it. Fo the bj thing and step away from what everone else is doing.
Yes, we all probably would have shot. What we wouldn't have done is stand directly in front of or behind the vehicle, knowing that people may panic or deliberately flee, thus negating the danger to ourselves before it even started.
You can say that *in the specific circumstances* at least the cop's initial shot was justified while still recognizing that he could have avoided this by standing to the side of the vehicle.
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But your post (and others) illustrate why this is 'Shiri's Shooting' - Either the cop did nothing wrong or the driver did nothing wrong, no room for 'everyone made mistakes that pushed this event forward'.
The biggest mistake was why either of them were there in the first place, instead of both of them standing in the taco truck line talking about Vikings football.
I'd say the biggest *immediate* mistake was failing to comply with a lawful order to exit the vehicle. Doing so by hitting the gas when there's a cop in front of the car absolutely compounded that error.
The fact that she was there to cause trouble is very relevant to the politics but irrelevant to the legality of the shooting. She deserves extraordinary condemnation for creating the situation, in part because of the other bad behavior inspired, but we should set that aside in evaluating her fate.
All of the parsing of the video is also overwhelmingly irrelevant, for the same reason that it is irrelevant whether the guy who reaches into his jacket after being told to put his hands in the air actually has a gun in there. Law enforcement can't exist if it takes that chance, because cops would die too often. Their threshold for lethal force has to be very different than a civilian's, and it is. That an officer had the option of declining to shoot or not being in front of the vehicle doesn't create an obligation, any more than a fat, female DEI officer clumsily getting her gun stolen by a perp means that other officers can't then shoot that perp before he fires the gun. For all the rhetoric about her "not deserving to die", officers don't deserve to die over slight missteps, either.
A good point that I saw today: If no shots were fired and she drove away, her actions easily met the standard for an "assault with a deadly weapon" charge, which can be levied over vehicular offenses even when nobody is actually hit. It's hard to argue that one can be guilty of "assault with a deadly weapon" but not have met the threshold for police to fire.
She didn't create the situation, the agent did. He decided to step in front of the vehicle, where and when he shouldn't have. He decided to then stop in front of the vehicle, where he shouldn't have. He then decided to go for his gun, which he shouldn't have. He then persisted in pushing it up towards the driver after she was obviously turning, which he shouldn't have. He then decided to pull the trigger when he shouldn't have.
There is simply no reasonable hypothetical where him drawing his gun and firing it would save his life, or anyone else's life, but he intended to both kill her, and knowingly put the lives of everyone else around him in danger, for no benefit to anyone. The only reason she is dead and he is alive is because she hadn't been trying to run him over, if she had, he would have already been under the car and would have been, if still alive, possibly shooting his buddies.
These situations are, fortunately, not common enough that law enforcement would be "totally depleted" (not even close), and considering the vast chain of mistakes that the trained law enforcement made leading up to this scenario, it is more than reasonable to hold them criminally responsible for the situation. The whole point of law enforcement is for them to try and act ideally in situations when working with the public, not for us to just say that random members of the public should all conform to ideal expectations of behavior, by that reasoning we should just not have law enforcement at all, since everyone should just follow the law.
It seems unclear if this would qualify as assault as the harm inflicted was minimal (and not impacted by the agent's decision to use lethal force), and the intent seems impossible to prove, given she was obviously turning away from the officer, and plausibly could have not even seen him.
It seems incredibly hard to argue that this was self-defense in any way when the reasonable expectation is that it would, if implemented as he intended, save -1 lives. Indeed, one would argue that makes it de facto aggression and murder, rather than self-defense, and an act of revenge against a potential killer rather than of protection of the self.
Everything you say he created is true in my mind. I agree with that. But to say she didn't create the situation as well is like saying the woman wasn't half responsible in creating a pregnancy.
I think we're using "situation" somewhat differently.
You're using it in the sense that anyone who is not literally doing nothing is technically taking actions that change the environment.
I mean in terms of that the LEOs chose the time, place, and manner in which they approached this encounter, and in which she was clearly reacting to them in a reasonably predictable way (people do try to drive away from the cops regularly). For lack of a better term, they are "dealing the cards" the way they want.
This is fundamentally different than say, a situation where a cop is called to a scene with an active shooter, where the cops have to react to choices the shooter has proactively made (time, place, hostages, .etc). Or less dramatically, if someone is speeding, they choose the speed they are driving at independent of if a cop catches them speeding or not.
It clearly wasn't obvious she was turning away from the officer, some of the footage shows the wheels pointed straight ahead when the engine revved and the tires spun on the ice. Regardless, the officer wasn't in a position to see the direction of the wheels. He was in front of a 5000lb vehicle that suddenly got very loud, and did, ultimately, strike him, despite his best efforts.
He -was- in the position to see her turning the steering wheel from lock to lock. He probably also could see the expression on her face when she realized he was pointing the gun at her, which, I am guessing, was probably rather alarmed. Most people absolutely shit themselves when they're staring down the barrel, especially hoplophobic liberals. Obviously he reacted with a split-second decision probably made with the amygdala rather than the pre-frontal cortex, but.... HE SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN STANDING IN FRONT OF THE CAR IN THE FIRST PLACE. He put himself there. And this is a huge procedural violation, for reasons which should now be abundantly clear to even the layest of laypeople. Cops are trained specifically not to stand in front of a stopped vehicle while questioning or attempting to apprehend suspects, because it creates the situation where they might be subject to being struck or run over. Competent officers/agents will have received sufficient training to make this a habitual, even instinctual practice. Unfortuntately, ICE, like just about everything else this administration has been doing for the last year, has had its competency go right into the shit-tank.
EDIT: Well, now that footage recorded by the badge who fired is out there, it looks like this all happened a lot faster even than I initially assumed. The car starts moving forward, and he reacts, draws, and domes her, all in like 1.5-2 seconds tops. That's impressive, justification (or lack of) notwithstanding. Also she clearly was not in a state of panic or alarm, at least at the last moment her expression is visible in the footage. It is clear that the vehicle did in fact strike him, but it (still) is not clear whether it would have done so had he not taken a tentative step forward just as she began to accelerate, or whether she intended to hit him with it. "OBVIOUSLY this was justified," a lot of people (even people I like and respect) are now saying. Well, maybe, and I am in fact more inclined to agree that it probably was... but it's not a slam dunk.
You're confusing the timing of when he started going for his pistol versus when he actually fired the first shot. When the car starts accelerating, assuming (as Helms correctly points out) he didn't already see the woman turning the wheel to the right, he is barely in front of the front-left wheel after he came to a stop there (which is definitely not "best efforts").
Following this, as the car starts to make noise, the agent moves to brace himself, moving his foot backwards and he starts leaning forward. As he does so, the car is already, from a distant perspective (and would be more evident to him than to the camera) moving towards the right and away from him.
It is unclear if, had he not been leaning into it, the car would have entirely cleared him without contact at this point, but at the very least a substantial portion of the contact is a result of the officer actively leaning forward in this way (as he will continue to do).
As the car continues to move forward, the agent moves his foot backwards and his arms forward, such that his upper body is out leaning over the hood and pointed towards the driver, while his lower body is clear of the vehicle.
At this point in time, it is incredibly obvious the car isn't going to hit him, and that there is no need to shoot.
Given that he had enough time to adjust his lower body in response to the car turning, it is hard to argue that he wasn't aware of this change in circumstance and lacked sufficient time to change his plan to shoot.
As he starts opening fire, he continues to lean towards the driver, with the car continuing to move further away from him. This is why he loses balance as the car careens down the street. (EDIT: To be slightly more specific, it is why he "spins", since his legs are planted, but his upper body is being forced forward as it is extended over the car and comes up on the windshield and driver's side panels.
While "strike" has certain connotations, the agent clearly didn't take every possible effort to avoid being struck (if we call it that), but rather incontrovertibly took up a stance that directly lead to an increased amount of collision with the car in the actual circumstances, and no decrease in the hypothetical where the car had been pointed at him. No action he took following the acceleration resulted in a decrease of the amount of collision he had with the car. It is well understood that shooting the driver of a car, does not cause it to come to a stop, and even if he'd been quicker on the draw, he would not have stopped any amount of contact between him and the car.
I'm confused
Did the police officer force her to spend her day following him around?
Did the police officer force her to barricade the road with her car?
Did the police officer force her to step on the gas?
On what planet is the police officer responsible for her behavior here?
There are conflicting accounts on if she had previously followed him around, but it seems less and less likely as more info comes out.
In the footage that includes before the agents leave the truck, it can be clearly seen she is waving them past and the road is not blocked.
The officer came to a sudden stop in front of a car that was actively being driven. She had substantially less time to react to that than he did to her acceleration prior to shooting her. What she did should have been completely safe for him, if he had practiced even basic common sense, let alone basic LEO training.
Had the agents approached the situation with calm, but firm professionalism, literally none of this would have happened. Making loud, angry demands, while closing the gap and putting your arm into someone's personal space is likely to spook them and unlikely to obtain compliance.
"If no shots were fired and she drove away, her actions easily met the standard for an "assault with a deadly weapon" charge"
Could you provide some examples or elaborate?
It's like saying that if you unholster a gun, and then out it back, that's assault.
Sometimes I think we'd solve a lot of issues if we allowed for a gray zone of "Being a cop is a tough job, so we're not sending you to jail, but you're permanently banned from being a cop anywhere in this country"
In essence, accountability.
Too many people think that the "he's just doing his job" card is trump.
‘Lack of accountability’ sums up the reason I don’t like cops, or doctors, or women, or the government, or humanity in general…
We are still inside the 48 to 72-hour rule of not commenting on the actual shooting. So I'm not going to. However, is your thinking is in alignment with mine regarding bigger macro long-term issues.
I mean ultimately the victim and the person who pulled the trigger are the main actors in this play.
But in some respects, Biden shares the blame because he could have worked hard to secure the borders, get rid of people who had been here illegally for a short-term. And it worked really hard to create a path to citizenship for people who had planted Roots here. None of that happened during his administration and instead we got MASS illegal immigration. So now the pendulum swings during Trump administration and we have the mess that we have. Add to that the escalating hostilities between Trump and Governor walz.
Since I live in Minneapolis, I feel free to also blame our mayor, our city council, and the sanctuary City policies that meant no police officers could be on hand to help control crowds or to help protect them or to help protect ice officers for that matter . Instead, we get the constant drumbeat rhetoric from far left flank of the progressives....
As I think about it, I could also blame every Federal administration since the 90s because we have had no substantial immigration policy reform in decades.
Anyway, thank you for your post and your thinking on this issue.
"That's the part that gets to me. Why is it that the people who are in charge are allowed to immediately put forward an uncomplicated narrative, and have no repercussions, and we who just have regular jobs—just doing 9 to 5—we're afraid for our livelihood if we speak incorrectly?" — Esau McCaulley
https://youtu.be/IOI_ypUDLGc?si=z2OdqJ9etP5sEFsV
I don't like cops and I am fed up with protest wokery.
With that out of the way, If the car's wheels hadn't spun on the ice, we'd be talking about how an ICE officer got run over yesterday and if he deserved it or not.
So interesting, I just reread that SSC post and blasted it out on Notes a few hours ago. I kinda hoped i might have inspired you, but you probably read it in 2018, same as me and were floored by its insight.
Something I missed (or forgot) on the first read is how angry the narrator remains whenever he thinks about the initial argument that destroyed his company. He casually discusses the effects on politics and global affairs, but carries rage for Shiri in his heart years after the event.
I think this is poignant. The events, the scissor statements themselves are ludicrous to anyone without a personal stake in the outcome, but once you’re in, it’s as if the entire world has moved.
We’re right back at George Floyd where no one will move an inch once they’ve decided what their position is. Understanding the problem doesn’t seem to give us any defense against it. Pernicious!
Unfortunately not Seth, I wrote most of this last night. :)
Yeah, great minds and all that. Some of Scott’s older essays should be required reading in school.
I've read a couple of the classics, like the Moloch one, specifically because they've been mentioned here
"Deportation is a fundamental feature of all modern nation states, and anyone who says that “deportation is fascism” is saying “every nation on Earth is fascist” by proxy."
I doubt this argument would convince any of the anti-ICE protesters. They'd just say "nobody is illegal on stolen land". America must always be held to a higher standard.
There are a lot of American government practices that I don't like, but I don't assault law enforcement when it enforces them. If I encouraged others to do so or organized a movement to thwart law enforcement, I would think I'd be in actual rebellion against my government and face "enemy of the state"-level prosecution.
This seems like it ought to be obvious.
I do not argue with the right to armed revolt. I would choose my motivation for such a revolt very carefully.
If a right-coded person protesting an ATF enforcement action did the same as this woman, the result would likely be the same, and the people currently most outraged on the left would be positively ecstatic.
Exactly. “Now do Ruby Ridge.”
Even if in a particular scenario that, in principle, you would have been on the right side of right and wrong, it still would be a suicide mission.
Imposing accountability doesn't have to be immediate to be effective. Live to fight another day.
Of course, accountability does have to exist. But a suicide mission is not very effective to get it.
"Forget it, Jake. It's Chinatown."
Minneapolis. Rabid leftists. Complicit local leadership. Zealous law enforcement. It had to happen, it was practically ordained.
Something I've been bringing up elsewhere, that I think needs to be brought up more - shooting into a moving vehicle with a handgun (really any small arm) is vanishingly unlikely to stop that vehicle from moving. In fact, it did not stop the vehicle from moving in this case - after the driver was killed, the SUV kept cruising along at a pretty good clip, until it ran into that parked car down the street.
Was the ICE agent legally justified in firing his weapon? Maybe.
Did the ICE agent firing his weapon, as opposed to focusing on getting the fuck out of the way, improve his own safety, or that of the public at large? I doubt it, especially considering the other ICE agent and uninvolved bystander who were directly in his background.
This may not have been a *bad* shoot, but it was without question an *extremely sloppy* shoot.
Rob Pincus, friend of the publication, made a similar comment on Instagram a few hours ago.
Shooting the driver will keep them from backing up and trying to finish the job if they didn't kill you with the first attempt.
“You're not allowed the shoot the person who is trying to kill you unless you are 100% certain that killing them would definitely stop their attempt to kill you” is such an absurd standard that it should not be surprising that there is no legal system anywhere that imposes it.
It really is baffling how little thought these people seem to have given to the fact that they are attempting to interfere with armed jackasses of questionable competency. Like, as inept as it is, this is the closest we've ever actually been to living in that police state they've been screaming about--utterly without consequence, of course--for years. But they seem to have picked the dumbest fucking hobby possible in light of that. Let's get in the faces of a bunch of dudes that we are 150% convinced are all racist nootzi assholes and who also have guns, because what could possibly go wrong?
They are "on the right side of history". And "main character". The notion that they could ever die - or even be harmed - is outside their Overton Windows.
Not that generations of absurd tolerance for incivility among left-wing activists only hasn't helped enable that mindset.
Yeah, I thought this - if you actually think ICE is just a new iteration of Einsatzgruppen goons, why are you bumbling around getting in their way in a minivan being obnoxious whilst your buddy films you for clout?
That doesn’t justify you getting shot, but if you really believed these guys were big bad Nazi boys shouldn’t you be observing and following them covertly, with escape plans in place in case you are spotted?
Her actual behaviour - again, whilst deeply annoying; is not justification for her being killed - kind of reads as LARPing. She didn’t really believe these guys were villains.
This was something edgy to do for bragging rights at the Antifa crochet group or whatever
Thank you from Minnesota, land of 10,000 government fraudsters, er, I mean lakes.
This one feels like it could end up being a big deal, we’ll see how hard the liberals coopt it. It could be just another Wednesday by next week, you can never truly tell beforehand what will set people off. This one gave me a weird feeling though, maybe just how close it is to the Venezuela bullshit.
It feels like a perfect opportunity for the Talkinghead class to ignore what’s starting to look more and more like a revolution happening in Iran.
In a different country, cops would not fire their guns so easily. In this country, around 7% of police homicides involve a moving vehicle (roughly 100 per year).
I have seen much worse shootings, in blue states for that matter, where the cops were not charged. Here is an example where they actually shot at the car from the side: https://youtu.be/XZvSVLSUcz4
So, your take reveals whether you like cops or not,-:).
Guilty. I do not, in fact, like cops. Anyone should have been able to infer that from the context clues of my analysis.
When the cops enforce laws you like, they’re brave and selfless public servants. When they enforce laws you don’t like, they’re jackbooted thugs. In a rational world, we’d just have less laws. But the only rational world we have is the one you dream of in your own mind.
My reaction to that first sentence is generally "Does the other country have anything like American gangs in it?" Because it's not terribly apples-to-apples if nobody ever assaults police in your country.
In most other countries she would have been shot out of hand.
Depends. I was dating a Vietnamese lady in 2020 and she was VERY confused why the cops didn't just shoot the protesters. She viewed our system as very inefficient. So she is a data point in your favor.
I do disagree, but it's because you lack some additional information and context. This is either because you didn't see, chose not to see it, didn't see it as relevant, or didn't look closely enough; it is NOT marginal. I will explain. First, a law enforcement officer can fire on a fleeing subject, if the officer has belief that more people or other officers will be put in harms way if the suspect is allowed to flee away. This is tantamount to your opinion that the follow-on shots may not be warranted, "some might say". Frankly, the opinions of generally uninformed people on important details relevant to very consequential outcomes (death or criminal prosecution for manslaughter), shouldn't matter to anyone that doesn't have a brain without wrinkles/ridges. So, why even consider them?
Secondly, when the driver (suspect) puts the vehicle in drive and accelerates, the wheels are aimed left. Before anyone addresses the position of the shooting officer, he was moving from the front passenger side of the vehicle towards the drivers side, likely to aid his fellow officer in extricating the non-compliant (and hindering/impeding) driver. The officer hears the engine rev, and draws his service pistol. If I'm being honest, and I'm passing in front of a vehicle on slippery road and I hear the engine revving up as it would when accelerating and I'm on precarious footing and may not be able to get out of the way, I'm going to shoot too. A vehicle is a deadly weapon when driven at someone, this is established. The driver, not really moving, since the wheels are spinning (Honda Pilots are AWD) and she doesn't have the typical immediate acceleration response, turns the steering wheel to the right. This is when the tires gain traction, moving now forward (but there's no direction change yet, because slippery conditions) and hits the officer while he now discharges his first shot (I've seen the opposite angle video, that you couldn't find). She continues moving forward and now the vehicle is starting to turn towards the right, the officer now fires additional shots at a non-compliant driver that is refusing lawful orders to exit the vehicle, the same driver that's been following them and heckling them all day, and now struck an officer in front of her vehicle. This officer, now believes that not only his life is in danger but others are as well if she eludes arrest, as evidenced by drawing his pistol and firing the first time, so he continues to fire in accordance with SCOTUS decision Tennessee v. Garner. As for the officers being able to move out of the way, this is easily disproven by the fact that the roads still have snow/ice on them, they are slick, as evidenced by the vehicle not accelerating immediately (wheels spinning, the Pilot is an AWD vehicle), and the officers slipping on the roadway.
It's not as middle of the road or "marginal" as you make it out to be, there are informed opinions and uninformed opinions. Let's focus on eliminating the uninformed opinions instead of declaring this Shiri’s Police Shooting or both good/bad or light/dark or whatever middle of the road euphemism we can apply. This was a good shoot.
Oh, and you misspelled John's last name.
To be fair his last name is kinda weird
My take. I try to exercise my Root Cause Analysis and Human & Organizational Performance analytical skills. People are part of a system; for tbe reasons BJ describes, the system is wrecked.
Recently, the news cycle has been flooded with the tragedy in Minneapolis where a Federal LEO shot a middle-aged female protestor as she was participating in a demonstration against ICE activity. I have some opinions on that.
The officer involved may have been legally justified in using deadly force. The officer was participating in an enforcement activity regarding locating and detaining persons of questionable immigration status in the US, those persons having allegedly committed criminal acts. That is what Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel do. That is a task that carries some level of risk; they are supposedly properly trained and equipped to mitigate the risk to themselves and the public when engaged in that activity.
It seems that the woman operating the vehicle was attempting to interfere with the ICE operations. She apparently made the attempt to block their vehicle on a public street. That is interference with law enforcement actions, a criminal act; a rather poor choice of actions on hers. When officers approached her vehicle to make an arrest, she resisted arrest and attempted to flee the scene in that vehicle, striking an officer in the process. A human struck by a 3000 lb. vehicle can be severely injured or killed. The officer responded with proportional deadly force.
Did the officer use poor judgement at the time? This is what will be investigated as the facts seem to be well detailed in the videos of this event circulating on the Internet. My only comment is that if I were in that situation, I would not be standing in front of a vehicle with someone at the controls who has indicated any level of hostility toward what I was doing. Other than that, the action would be considered justified. Any moral human being would not wish this outcome.
We need to remember there are 2 victims here. One is the woman; she has children, family and friends who are terribly affected. The other is the ICE officer; that person is now living with the thought they took a life and surely there are family and friends of theirs affected as well.
What disgusts me is the system that permitted this to happen as well as perpetuates the actions.
Politicians have risen to condemn the actions of ICE; the same ones who have justified poorly controlled (some say uncontrolled) immigration policies that did not vet the people coming across our borders. Consequently, criminals from foreign countries as well as those who sought to exploit our social welfare systems have become integrated in our society and prey on each other as well as American Citizens. ICE is making the attempt to remove these individuals, some with seriously dangerous behavior. In addition, those same politicians are encouraging protest using language that could be considered seditious; close to inciting treasonous behavior on the part of protestors. Did they not take an oath of office to uphold our American Constitutional Republic? More importantly, are they willing to accept the consequences of their actions? Just as importantly, the unintended consequences?
As a student of history, I am fascinated by wars, insurrections and the social/political conditions that have led up to them. History has proven time again that once the violence starts, it usually runs a destructive and bloody course before coming to an end. And that end is not what people always want to happen. Therefore, when I see video clips of politicians like the Governor of Minnesota announce to the world that “Our” National Guard troops are on standby, along with civilian LEO’s, against violent protestors (?) or additional intervention by Federal LEO’s (?) I am reminded of those times when Insurrection took place.
Yet, what politicians must remember is this. Unintended Consequences. Those same Guard personnel and LEO’s have also been exposed to the news regarding the actions of criminal invaders and fraudsters. Will they intervene at risk of injury or death to defend criminals? What is the possibility that “peaceful protests” will turn violent and provide cover for those aggrieved citizens to exact retribution against the criminals and fraudsters? Will there be intervention in those circumstances? Remember, Minneapolis PD abandoned police stations during the 2020 George Floyd riots, only to watch them get burned down (fortunately, weapons and communications equipment were removed prior).
Deescalation is the best policy. Back off now. We don’t need to find out what the unintended consequences are.
There is a case for the officer defending himself against perceived deadly force, just like any muggle not in law enforcement can do by right, but it's not the strongest given all of the circumstances. Of course, there is a strong subjectivity factor here.
There is a slightly stronger case that the officer had to neutralize what could have been a threat to others (LE or otherwise), but that's not airtight, either.
If she had driven away, she could have done one of two things:
1) Tried to harm someone with her vehicle, which would have justified deadly force
2) Flee, in which case the "you can't outrun a Motorola" principle applies.
And there's no way to know in advance.
Law enforcement can of course issue lawful orders in the course of detention and/or arrest, a privilege that muggles don't have, but if LE regards noncompliance or imperfect compliance as a deadly threat as a matter of course, especially without meaningful accountability, then that is a recipe for obvious trouble due to the incentives involved.
Of course, one thing to keep in mind is that the purpose of authority is to maintain order (after self-preservation), not to protect individuals except as incidental to the above directives. Does that color matters? Should that color matters?
not manslaughter. https://x.com/Chesschick01/status/2009038930075677153
Do better BJ.
His fire was perfectly justified. The real questions are whether or not ice should have been there. But once she acted a fool, she was ripe for being shot.
If you were in his place you'd have fired too.
I've seen that view. The fact that two reasonable people can have such diametrically opposite views of the same videos is QED that this is the Shiri's Scissor of police shootings.
https://slatestarcodex.com/2018/10/30/sort-by-controversial/
The scissor part of this feels like we're debating whether the wide receiver completed the act of the catch even though he was tackled in-bounds at the 20 as time expired.
It doesn't matter!
From a culture war perspective this is probably true, in so much as truth really doesn't matter that much.
People are bringing their own biases into the viewing. They’re not reaching a conclusion based on the video evidence. They’re reaching a conclusion based on what they knew to be true before seeing the video.
I expect YOU to examine the events that led up to the shooting not the actual shooting.
We know he’ll get off if charged by the state. Just like with Vickie weaver, the Feds will remand it to fed court and dismiss it.
So take the bigger view and question what led up to it. Fo the bj thing and step away from what everone else is doing.
Going all the way back to Ross Perot in my "events that led to the shooting" stack wasn't enough? 😁 I thought I did an okay job.
I was thinking more like “why the hell did he walk in front of the car?” Or “is it ice policy to body block cars?”
What about this one? Still think he’s up for manslaughter?
There is justified and there is justified.
Yes, we all probably would have shot. What we wouldn't have done is stand directly in front of or behind the vehicle, knowing that people may panic or deliberately flee, thus negating the danger to ourselves before it even started.
You can say that *in the specific circumstances* at least the cop's initial shot was justified while still recognizing that he could have avoided this by standing to the side of the vehicle.
-------------
But your post (and others) illustrate why this is 'Shiri's Shooting' - Either the cop did nothing wrong or the driver did nothing wrong, no room for 'everyone made mistakes that pushed this event forward'.
'everyone made mistakes that pushed this event forward'
I can get behind that, though I'd say the biggest mistake is hitting the gas with someone in front of the vehicle.
The biggest mistake was why either of them were there in the first place, instead of both of them standing in the taco truck line talking about Vikings football.
Rooting for the Vikings would drive anyone to start shooting!
I'd say the biggest *immediate* mistake was failing to comply with a lawful order to exit the vehicle. Doing so by hitting the gas when there's a cop in front of the car absolutely compounded that error.