SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
from the "All-lives-matter."-President-Obama dept.
Snipers in Dallas: [5] Cops Dead; [6] More Cops Wounded
The Atlantic reports:
Two gunmen shot eleven police officers in Dallas, Texas [at 8:58 PM July 7], killing at least four of them.
[...] At a Thursday night press conference, Dallas Police Department Chief David Brown said [...] officers had one of the suspects "cornered", but did not offer further details.
"Tonight, it appears that two snipers shot ten police officers from elevated positions during the protest/rally", Brown said in an initial statement. "Three officers are deceased, two are in surgery, and three are in critical condition. An intensive search for suspect is currently underway." The police department later said an eleventh officer had also been injured and a fourth officer had been killed.
[...] The shootings occurred during a protest against police killings earlier this week in Louisiana and Minnesota. Hundreds rallied in downtown Dallas, near the corner of Main Street and Lamar Street. Local news footage captured what sounds like several gunshots being fired, and the crowd scattering.
[...] No motive has yet been established and it's unclear whether the shooting was related to the protest.
The New York Times just broke the story about the latest in the police killings of black men. It seems the tide has been turned. [Five] Dallas police officers were killed tonight at a protest in that city over these shootings.
I am not surprised, nor am I particularly shocked. No doubt there will be more to come on this topic as the evening progresses. Hopefully something good comes out of this, but I am inclined to doubt it.
takyon: Some more details: One suspect was killed by an explosion intentionally caused by a police robot. He reportedly told a negotiator that he was upset about Black Lives Matter, the recent police shootings, and wanted to kill white people, especially police officers. He said he was not affiliated with any groups and acted alone. Other suspects have been arrested, and a "person of interest" (often identified as a suspect by the news media) was arrested early in the night after he was photographed with his unloaded AR-15. He handed his weapon to an officer shortly after the shootings, and later turned himself into the police for questioning.
President Obama spoke about the shootings shortly after arriving in Poland for a NATO conference. In part, he mentioned that, "When people say 'black lives matter,' that doesn't mean blue lives don't matter, it just means all lives matter — but right now the big concern is the fact that the data shows black folks are more vulnerable to these kinds of incidents [...] This isn't a matter of us comparing the value of lives. This is recognizing that there is a particular burden that is being placed on a group of our fellow citizens. And we should care about that. And we can't dismiss it. We can't dismiss it."
(Score: 4, Interesting) by mendax on Friday July 08 2016, @04:59PM
... but I don't. I don't like cops. I can't trust them and I can't like those I can't trust. I'm not the only ones who don't trust the police. The police have lost all credibility in my view and what happened in Dallas yesterday is not that much of a surprise given the killings of black people at the hands of the police, very public ones given the fact that cameras are everywhere. I can't advocate killing cops--no one deserves a death sentence, not even bad cops--but I find it very hard to blame someone who kills cops in retaliation for their killings of innocent people.
Perhaps this catastrophe will put the police on notice that they must change. However, I seriously doubt anything good will come of this. An opportunity lost.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
(Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Friday July 08 2016, @05:37PM
Oooh, something will come of this. It just probably won't be good for the little people.
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @05:41PM
My neighbor is a cop. And you're right. He's an asshole to all the neighbors around him, even when they're nice to him. It's one thing to be tough on the job, but being a paranoid asshole when off duty to civilians is just wrong. I just ignore him now.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @06:35PM
Yeah. But anom.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @08:15PM
I know a few cops and they are OK, not likely to become good friends, but not jerks either. This could be because they are state cops, not local ones, presumably with more training? Also, this is in the 'burbs, where violent crime is rare.
On the other hand, I'm very leery of cops I don't know, do my best to avoid contact. Doubly so if I'm in the nearby city.
(Score: 2) by DutchUncle on Friday July 08 2016, @08:47PM
Lawyers and doctors have "malpractice". Engineers and others have professional liability. Humans screw up. Part of the problem is, law enforcement seems to regard any suggestion that "this particular policeman screwed up in this particular incident" as an attack on all policemen all the time, and stonewall any investigation of police error. (Admittedly it often turns out that the same individuals carry the large proportion of such complaints, but that should be even MORE reason for other policemen to want them out of the force, just as talented techies tend to want incompetents out of the way.)
There is absolutely no justification for random assassination. There is equally no justification for the deaths in either of the incidents the two days preceding (at least from the information in the news). There is no justification for policemen feeling that a 5-shot burst is the FIRST action to take when the target has not already shown a weapon, or for ignoring any first aid.
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Saturday July 09 2016, @06:28PM
> hard to blame someone who kills cops in retaliation for their killings of innocent people.
Cop A kills an innocent person, then a vigilante kills cop B, and you find the vigilante blameless? Note that cop B is also an innocent person--or at least, innocent of killing.
(Score: 2) by mendax on Sunday July 10 2016, @06:08AM
I didn't say that such behavior is justified or right, but I just have difficulty blaming someone for killing cops after what the cameras have revealed. I'm very angry at such police behavior, but I'm not going to go out and shoot cops. I can understand how someone, especially someone of color, getting so angry at what he has seen (and quite possibly experienced) at the hands of cops that he decides to do something as vicious and violent as what this guy did. Such anger creates a form of insane rage, and god knows I've felt that at times.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.