SC police officer charged with murder

[Gadfly]

http://abcnews.go.com/US/video-cited...ry?id=30137525

So, this is all over the news.

North Charleston Police officer charged with murder for shooting a suspect as the suspect ran away. The video is short, and there is no way to know what went on before the video started.

I am normally totally pro cop. I spend a lot of time explaing use of force to folks. But this? This looks reeeealy bad. Unless there is some serious info being left out, this cop is done. Murder? Doubtful. Voluntary manslaughter and deprivation of civil rights? Probably.

It is hard enough for officers these days. This is not going to help us in the media.

Thoughts?

[BehindBlueI's]

I am hard pressed to think of a scenario that makes that a justified shoot.

[JustOneGun]

I didn't see the video on the news page. Did I just miss it? The picture shows an officer pointing a gun at the fleeing suspect. Did he shoot him at this time as shown in the pic? If so it does look bad. Or did he shoot him during the struggle for the Taser and then watch him flee while at the ready?

[Gadfly]

The suspect is in a dead run away from the officer (as fast as a 50yr old can run). The officer fires 8 rounds scoring 4 hits. It looks there was a struggle for the taser. The officer gets the taser and the suspect turns to run. Officer drops something (possibly the Taser), draws and fires at the fleeing suspect...

Suspect is a good 10-15 yards away as shots are fired.

[Palmguy]

I didn't see the video on the news page. Did I just miss it? The picture shows an officer pointing a gun at the fleeing suspect. Did he shoot him at this time as shown in the pic? If so it does look bad. Or did he shoot him during the struggle for the Taser and then watch him flee while at the ready?

http://www.nytimes.com/video/us/1000...-shooting.html

[ssb]

After the shooting and after cuffing the guy, the officer goes back to where the altercation started, picks something up, and returns to the body and drops this. He does this right in front of another officer and with a kid with a cell phone a couple yards away. I can't tell what it is that was dropped, but WTF?

[TAZ]

Wow. That looks pretty bad. I'd like to think here is a LOT more to this than what was captured on the video. Not sure what the officer was in fear of. Didn't see anything that looked threatening in the video. Even if the guy was the biggest dealer on the planet he looked to be running away and not threatening to cause serious injury. If what happened is accurately indicated by the video the officer needs to be on death row like every other murdering POS.

[JustOneGun]

Wow, just Wow.

[LittleLebowski]

Not good. Warm weather means riots.

[ssb]

Not good. Warm weather means riots.

At the same time, it appears that the city/PD is doing everything right: the officer was fired and charged.

One of the big issues with Brown and Garner was that the police officers involved were perceived as having no consequences for their actions. That this guy was charged with murder will likely pull the rug out of a lot of that. Perhaps I'm overly optimistic, but I think it's going to be hard to fill the streets with people who are basically saying "black lives don't matter; police can gun us down with impunity" when the officer has been charged with murder.