
LAPD arrests man on suspicion of making deadly swatting call to Wichita police - mcone
http://www.kansas.com/news/local/crime/article192281169.html
======
WhatIsDukkha
What bothers me about these situations is just the entire idea of "SWAT" as
practiced.

You are a cop with 5+ other cops.

You all pull your guns.

Someone comes to the door, groggy in the middle of the night. They may or may
not understand you are police. They may or may not believe you are the police.

They are definitely confused/frightened/angry by your presence.

We now begin the dice rolling process.

Since every police officer with a gun drawn is now a DECIDER they get a dice
roll.

Every single millisecond, all these dice are rolled simultaneously for the
entire arrest process as the "suspect" is ordered around like they haven't
been since grade school gym class.

This process is designed to have a weapon be discharged.

~~~
meri_dian
SWAT is usually only involved when it's clear there is an immediate and
present danger. So of course they are going to be ready with weapons drawn. Do
you want them to just waltz into (probably) dangerous situations with their
hands in their pockets whistling a tune?

Edit: The amount of willful ignorance displayed on HN regarding law
enforcement is staggering. It's sad to see how many people here view police as
the bad guys, and refuse to take a balanced view by empathizing with them and
the danger they encounter on a daily basis.

~~~
alkonaut
There is just one way this _isn’t_ a massive police screwup, and that’s if the
person SWATed reacted in a way that was (very) threatening, such as grabbing a
gun, or something that is reasonable the police could believe was a gun.

My hunch here is that, just like you are suggesting, Swat teams are used
incorrectly as first response in unconfirmed situations. No investigation by
anyone has confirmed the threat.

At the end of the day, police officers just can’t shoot unarmed people, no
matter how stressful the situation.

~~~
oh_sigh
What kind of investigation would you suggest take place before hand about a
situation where there is supposedly a person with hostages who has already
killed one?

~~~
rbetts
A situation that doesn't include the "supposedly" qualification you make. A
single anonymous source on a non-911 number without corroborating reports of
gunfire is not sufficient cause to shoot a man on his porch.

Here's an idea -- fly a drone around the house and look in some windows. Knock
on a neighbors door and ask if they heard a gunshot. Establish the identity of
the reporter - how does the reporter know what is happening? Is the reporter
physically proximate to the area?

~~~
oh_sigh
> A single anonymous source on a non-911 number without corroborating reports
> of gunfire is not sufficient cause to shoot a man on his porch.

No one is arguing that.

> Here's an idea -- fly a drone around the house and look in some windows.
> Knock on a neighbors door and ask if they heard a gunshot.

That sounds great. Until there is an actual hostage situation, and police
waste their time doing this and a hostage is killed, at which point people
will be asking why they didn't kick the doors down if they knew someone was
being held in there.

> Establish the identity of the reporter - how does the reporter know what is
> happening? Is the reporter physically proximate to the area?

The reporter claimed to be the person who killed his father and was holding
other people hostage. How would you confirm if the reporter was physically in
the area? E911 includes location reporting, but this can be spoofed(I don't
know if it was in the situation)

~~~
valuearb
This isn't the movies, cops should never be kicking down the door in a hostage
situation. They should be guarding the perimeter and trying to talk to the
perpetrator.

~~~
oh_sigh
I'm curious - how much training do you have in SWAT tactics? Where did you get
it from?

Assuming it is zero, would you in whatever field you are in accept advice from
someone who has zero experience in the field?

~~~
valuearb
Do you think SWAT tactics are designed with minimizing civilian casualties? Or
SWAT team casualties?

------
lb1lf
Coming from a country where the police spends more time developing people
skills than doing gun practice, it never ceases to puzzle me how the solution
to any situation appears to be to shoot anything that moves on the flimsiest
of assumptions, then figure out what happened afterwards.

Now, I appreciate that the police in the US does face a population with more
guns on hand than the Norwegian police does; this surely goes some way towards
explaining their apparent eagerness to shoot first, then ask questions later.

However, what puzzles me most is this - if the police around here shot but one
innocent, there'd be cries for resignations, perhaps even going all the way to
the secretary of justice; we collectively would expect - nah, demand - that
the police come up with policies and training which would make it less likely
that another, similar incident would ever occur, &c.

So - the demonstrations following some police shootings aside, is there any
significant push in the US to drive the police towards less lethal encounters
with the public it is to serve and protect?

Say, requiring better people skills, more use of non-lethal weapons (and, if
sufficiently effective non-lethal weapons do not yet exist - to have them
developed), more passive safety for police officers (say, if you are wearing
body armour which will stop a cal. 50-round, maybe you do not have to fire the
first shot) etc?

~~~
Dove
I don't think it's reasonable or effective to entirely expect police to solve
this problem. Here is the account from the article:

    
    
        Livingston said when the door opened, officers gave Finch commands to put his hands up and walk toward them. He complied for a "very short time" and put his hands back down. He raised them again, and then lowered them for a second time, Livingston said.
    
        "The male then turned towards the officers on the east side of the residence, lowered his hands to the waistband again, then suddenly pulled them back up towards those officers at the east," he said. "The officers on the north side of the street feared the male pulled a weapon from his waistband, retrieved a gun and was in the process of pointing it at the officers to the east. Fearing for those officers’ safety, the officer on the north side fired one round."
    

From my perspective, they are describing a very threatening movement. Stuff
that looks like that is how officers die. Asking them to not react when
someone does that puts them in pretty serious danger. A sudden movement like
that is how gunfights start.

It's tragic that it's also something a panicked innocent citizen might do! But
that doesn't change the fact that it's a genuinely threatening thing to do.

I think probably the most effective way to solve the problem would be to make
people better aware of what makes you appear threatening and non-threatening
in a confrontation.

Some of us have been insulated from violence for so long that we don't know
what it looks like. We have no reason to know that innocent sudden movements
can just like dangerous sudden movements.

I'm not saying the guy's death is his fault. The whole thing is a tragic
misunderstanding between good people. But I am saying he could have been
educated to prevent it. I don't think it's realistic to ask police to solve
the problem at great risk to themselves when regular people can solve it by
learning that the best way to avoid misunderstandings and snap reactions is to
move slowly and deliberately in any confrontation.

~~~
mgkimsal
> the best way to avoid misunderstandings and snap reactions is to move slowly
> and deliberately in any confrontation.

Excellent idea. Let's train/condition 300 million people exactly how they
should behave in stressful and life-threatening situations, and put at least
part of the blame on them for any deviation from "acceptable" behaviour when
put in an unknown situations with guns pointing at them.

It would take far too much time and effort to modify police training and
expectations.

Perhaps we should cut funding for some more arts and phys-ed programs in
public schools, and start funding "police/violence readiness prep" classes in
K-12.

~~~
Dove
I really do think teaching people how to be non-threatening would be one of
the most effective methods of avoiding tragedy. I know you make light of
educating large numbers of people, but there are a lot of things we all know
about society in order to be safe. It seems to me that "sudden movements in
tense situations provoke violent reaponses" isn't that hard of a thing to
learn. Don't we teach people not to run from bears, for example?

I am not saying the guy's death is his fault. I am saying expecting policemen
not to react to certain movements just because they _can_ be innocent is not a
realistic expectation to place on them. It is safer for everyone if we all
just stay calm, de-escalate, act deliberately, sort things out. Flapping
around is a good way to look dangerous, and I just think things would be safer
if people understood this.

~~~
rojoca
What about mentally ill people? People on medication that make them groggy?
People who are drunk in their own home? People who are exhausted from a huge
week at work? Children? Elderly?

People cannot reasonably be expected to “stay calm” at a moments notice. That
is completely unreasonable.

~~~
Dove
Special cases make bad rules. Seat belts make you safer... but not if your car
gets crushed between two semis. That doesn't mean seat belts are pointless,
just that they don't work in that case.

Moving deliberately and keeping your hands visible around police, particularly
if they seem to think you're dangerous, is a good way to stay as safe as you
can, and will put them less on edge in the encounter. You want that. In a
dangerous situation, you want everyone as calm as possible.

Will it always work? Of course not. Maybe you're drunk or high. Maybe you're
insane. Maybe you panicked in spite of yourself. Whatever. Hopefully in that
situation one of the other protections will work for you.

Wear ya damn seatbelt. Not because it always works, but because sometimes it's
the only thing that saves your life.

Safety is about tradeoffs and incremental improvements, not perfect solutions.
If there really is a murderer in the house, we want police to be aggressive.
If it's a hoax, we want them to be cautious. But expecting them to magically
know which situation it is isn't a practical solution. Making it really
obvious that you aren't a tactical threat is a practical way to make the
situation saf _er_. ER!

Obviously the whole situation is super dangerous and the blame rests almost
entirely with the hoaxer.

But with that said, I think it is practical and reasonable to talk about the
best way to surrender safely and avoid a misunderstanding in a situation like
that. It won't work in every case, but it should generally work and could
improve the situation.

~~~
joe5150
why do civilians have to make those tradeoffs and not police?

------
dboreham
I don't see anyone here asking this: how many people are police killing who
are not 100% innocent bystanders like in this case, but still didn't need to
be killed? I mean, we're all outraged because they shot "some dude in his PJs"
but doesn't that imply they must be shooting 10, 100x as many folks where we'd
be thinking "well, he shouldn't have had a knife in his hand" or "he shouldn't
have been high"?

Where I live, small town in the middle of the US, to my knowledge the cops
have killed at least two people who were no real threat to them in the past
few years. If that death density is consistent across the country there must
be hundreds of events like this every year.

I get the impression somehow we've been brain washed into seeing this like
unlucky folks being hit by a drunk driver.

~~~
TillE
> "well, he shouldn't have had a knife in his hand"

Right. German cops, for example, are trained to shoot people in the leg in
that scenario. It happens quite frequently and successfully.

American cops seem like they're all on a hair trigger to kill at the slightest
hint of danger, rather than as a last resort when they're truly threatened.

~~~
cheschire
American police and military are trained to shoot for the largest target area,
center of mass, as this is the least likely area to have unintentional
results.

Some examples of unintentional results are: 1) Missing. 2) Hitting another
person. 3) Maming, or otherwise causing grievous injury such as shooting in
the leg and hitting an artery on accident when you didn't intend to kill the
target.

~~~
anigbrowl
The probability of killing someone when you hit them in the center of mass
seems a lot higher than that of accidental hits to the femoral artery.

Also, surely you've noticed that when American cops shoot someone they usually
go on to cuff them but don't make any attempt to administer first aid, so that
quite a few people die from bleeding out. At least if you get shot in the leg
you've got some chance of stemming the blood flow, plus it's a lot easier to
put a tourniquet on that.

~~~
ams6110
> The probability of killing someone when you hit them in the center of mass
> seems a lot higher than that of accidental hits to the femoral artery.

It is, but American cops are not trained to shoot to incapacitate or warn. If
they shoot it is to kill and that is why the target is the center of mass.

------
sergers
My wife's family house was mistaken for a drug house years ago, it was around
the block.

Police came in cuffing them and shot the family dog when it got aggressive
trying to protect the yard, and noone in family being able to restrain him as
they were in cuffs

This was in Canada.

This happened ~15 years ago, my wife still traumatized and never leaves pets
outdoors. Their family has quite the disdain for police overall since..

Over use of police force happens everywhere, and just more known in these
communication real-time times.

The guy who requested to take the "hit" out, definitely the guy who made the
call, and I doubt but also the officer most of all should all be charged.

Hope they make an example of the guy making the false reports as he has
history of doing it, and blew off the consequences of his joke.

I can't believe the police didn't verify the situation before escalating. Even
if it was a real situation, the guy who had his life stolen could have been
the hostage.

Police have made these mistakes without false information... I put the biggest
blame on them, also important to not label all police officers the same as
some are very upstanding citizens.

~~~
freedomben
I couldn't agree more, and I'm sorry to hear about your wife's family.

Your thesis statement:

> Police have made these mistakes without false information... I put the
> biggest blame on them, also important to not label all police officers the
> same as some are very upstanding citizens.

Is exactly what I wish more people on this forum would read. There's so many
people painting every cop with the brush of evil, or either excusing their
mistakes/transgressions. The truth is always in between, and our tendency as
humans to have knee-jerk reactions is not helpful at all to making real
progress.

I wish I had more upvotes to give you.

~~~
mmanfrin
Except that because of the 'Blue Shield', police are _rarely_ ever charged
with any misdoing. A cop is never wrong, unless there is _more_ than a
mountain of evidence against them, and that makes me see all police as
complicit.

Those 'very upstanding citizens' are the same ones who sit by silently as
_hundreds_ of unarmed Americans are shot each year by police.

~~~
freedomben
> and that makes me see all police as complicit.

It took me about 5 seconds of Googling to prove you wrong:

[http://time.com/4503030/ohio-police-chief-tulsa-
cops/](http://time.com/4503030/ohio-police-chief-tulsa-cops/)

[https://thegrapevine.theroot.com/black-female-police-
officer...](https://thegrapevine.theroot.com/black-female-police-officer-
speaks-out-against-killer-c-1790888677)

[http://www.cleveland19.com/story/36401439/retired-african-
am...](http://www.cleveland19.com/story/36401439/retired-african-american-
cops-speak-out-against-euclid-officer-involved-in-viral-arrest)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkJUVrNrV5Q](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkJUVrNrV5Q)

If I was mugged by a person of a particular race, and some people of that same
race didn't speak out, would I be justified in seeing all members of that race
as complicit?

~~~
brucephillips
He never said _all_ sit idly by. It's dangerous to assume a universal
generalization that wasn't levied.

~~~
freedomben
He did (I edited my response to clarify):

> and that makes me see all police as complicit.

~~~
brucephillips
Ah, I misread. My mistake.

~~~
freedomben
Totally fine. I sometimes do read things that aren't there (even though I try
hard not to), so it's never bad to double check

------
blhack
I always grew up thinking that police had to wait until somebody _shot at
them_ to shoot back.

It seems like "we thought he had a gun and he motioned towards his waist" has
now replaced "he shot at us".

I really wish that the police had to adhere to the same laws as anybody else
does. They are civilians after all.

If had a gun (I don't) and pointed it at somebody to intimidate them, even if
they were trying to break into my house, I could get in trouble for
"brandishing". Yet civilian police pull their guns out and point them at
people all the time.

The can't believe that we allow these people can put themselves into a
position where they're deciding if they're going to _kill you_ or not, and the
mere press of a small lever on their hand _KILLS YOU_ and that this is just
considered okay...

It's just absolutely ridiculous to me.

~~~
meri_dian
Police are not you or I in the context of social roles. They fulfill a
particular function in society while on duty that you and I don't. They tend
to deal with dangerous people.

People must do exactly as they're told when dealing with the police to
minimize uncertainty and confusion.

An officer pulling a gun on someone is not equivalent in any way to a civilian
doing the same thing. Officers are empowered by society to enforce the law so
we don't have to. That necessitates displaying - and sometimes using - force.

If it's clear that someone presents an immediate mortal danger to others and
refuses to comply with orders given to them then the police are justified in
acting with force.

~~~
FireBeyond
> If it's clear that someone presents an immediate mortal danger to others

Yeah, and that's where your argument hits a brick wall. Yes, if someone
presents an immediate mortal danger, then force can be justified. If you see
that video, he is reaching for the waistband of his pajamas and following
directions.

Even in the event that he had a pistol stashed in the elastic of his pajamas,
you have multiple officers who already are in the drawn position, ready to
fire, whereas he has to pull it out, aim, etc.

You have a far lower bar for "clear presentation of immediate mortal danger"
than most people here - and you seem to believe that's our failing, not yours.

> People must do exactly as they're told when dealing with the police to
> minimize uncertainty and confusion.

You mean like the multiple incidents where we see two police officers yelling
contradictory statements? "Hands behind your head, turn around!" "Get on your
stomach!" and one of the officers believes he is in mortal danger because the
suspect is, in effect, obeying the other officers instruction, and not his?

------
superflyguy
Is the policeman who killed an unarmed man at his house going to be charged?
Ideally this wouldn't be a rhetorical question.

How long until the police give themselves the right to kill someone annoying
by anonymously phoning in a warning then making sure they're amongst the ones
who turn up?

~~~
downandout
This was my immediate reaction. My guess is that the blame and punishment will
all be laser focused on the caller, in an attempt to avoid a public outcry for
the actual shooter’s head. That cop shouldn’t be on administrative leave, he
should be in jail for murder.

~~~
MikkoFinell
Should cops have to wait until they are actually being gunned down before they
can use force to protect themselves? What happened was an absolute tragedy,
and every measure should be taken to avoid anything like that ever happening
again. The shooting was not justified, and cops need better training, non-
lethal options must be expanded, penalties for this kind of "prank" must be
made harsher. Everyone agrees on that. But to call the cop a murderer, as if
he had executed someone he knew was innocent, just for fun, that's not right
either. Cops face actual murdering psychos on a daily basis, and must be able
to respond to how the situation looks at the time. Again, not trying to
justify the shooting, but trying to encourage a more nuanced perspective.

~~~
nazgob
Isn't it like that in many countries? Do not fire unless fired upon? It's also
a common rule of engagement for many militaries deployed in Afganistan, Iraq
or other 'dangerous places'.

------
danpalmer
Having unfortunately seen a police body cam video of an obviously unarmed man
being shot, and having read about this one, it seems to be a case of men
hitching their trousers up because they aren’t wearing a belt, being mistaken
for reaching for a gun.

This is a normal thing, it’s an unconscious thing, we do it without thinking
so can’t stop when told not to do it. People should not die because they’re
wearing loose fitting trousers.

Americans need to be doing more about their fellow citizens being murdered by
the people supposed to protect them.

~~~
solotronics
what are we supposed to do exactly?

~~~
tmnvix
Reduce the number of guns in the US.

People should still be able to own guns, but they should need a valid reason
(such as hunting or farming). Shooting people (this includes self defence)
should not qualify as a valid reason.

This is how it works in most developed nations with sometimes quite high rates
of gun ownership (0.2+ per capita) but without the endemic gun violence of the
US. It's worth noting that these sorts of restrictions effectively rule out
ownership of handguns - and concealed handguns (real or imagined) seem to play
a major role in most police shootings of innocent people in the US.

~~~
danpalmer
Agreed. If there were far fewer guns, Police wouldn't be assuming a concealed
weapon anywhere near as much as they do now.

I think Police training needs to be changed significantly as well though.
Training Police to de-escalate situations, and to deal with normal people who
are scared, in danger, and unpredictable but not malicious - this is the
significant majority.

Police in America seem to act like soldiers, and forget that the people in
front of them deserve protection as much as everyone else, not least because
they are innocent until proven guilty in a court.

------
burntwater
I'm glad this person is an adult located in the U.S. Hopefully this makes for
swift and severe justice.

I'm sad to learn the victim was the father of two children.

And I'm mad that police are shooting people, innocent or not, based on vague
gestures that sorta, maybe, if you look at it from the right angle, looks a
little threatening.

I said yesterday that, as a hearing-impaired person, if I'm ever in a position
where police are pointing guns at me and shouting instructions, I expect I
will be shot. I'm honestly not sure what I can do to prevent that.

~~~
Dove
> And I'm mad that police are shooting people, innocent or not, based on vague
> gestures that sorta, maybe, if you look at it from the right angle, looks a
> little threatening.

I can understand that, but I recommend caution when it comes to judgement.
Combat is every bit as technical as system architecture, and I think it
requires related experience to judge fairly. Movies prepare you to critique a
fighter about as well as they prepare you to critique a system security
posture. Which is to say, not at all.

The best way to understand why police react the way they do is get a little
experience with the real thing: watch footage of actual confrontations. Here
are some examples:

[https://youtu.be/uyEE_IpjstA](https://youtu.be/uyEE_IpjstA)
[https://youtu.be/2mnTE85LYFU](https://youtu.be/2mnTE85LYFU)
[https://youtu.be/p6mds5tDqDw](https://youtu.be/p6mds5tDqDw)

Combat is fast. When someone makes a sudden move, you have to react
immediately or you will lose.

I'm mad that this went down the way it did, too, but from the description, it
is very understandable. It is tragic that people with no combat background
just don't understand what looks threatening and why. You'd no doubt consider
it foolhardy to point an airsoft pistol at a policeman, but probably don't
understand that a movement that could be a fast concealed weapon draw is just
as threatening.

I do a little martial arts, and we train that if someone is hiding their hand,
assume it contains a knife or gun. If you have your hand behind you or in your
pocket and move it fast, I have to react as if it's an attack, as that's the
only way to avoid it. It takes too long to identify a weapon.

Look at some videos of knife attacks, for example:

[https://youtu.be/dqnwsljTVt8](https://youtu.be/dqnwsljTVt8)
[https://youtu.be/ts2LCbDQkeg](https://youtu.be/ts2LCbDQkeg)

They are fast and sudden. The only way you can hope to defend them is to
assume a hand you don't see is about to hit you with a knife.

Which is why police are jumpy. This is the environment they work in and what
they train for. If your day to day life involves no violence, your ideas about
what's reasonable in that context don't come from applicable experience.

> I said yesterday that, as a hearing-impaired person, if I'm ever in a
> position where police are pointing guns at me and shouting instructions, I
> expect I will be shot. I'm honestly not sure what I can do to prevent that.

Move slowly. Keep your hands very visible and very obviously empty. Even if
you can't hear the officer's commands, moving slowly and keeping your hands
visible will keep you from appearing suddenly threatening, which should let
you get the situation sorted out.

I can't help you if you run into a policeman who is a bully, but most of these
tragedies are misunderstandings between good people. The very best way to
avoid that is to do everything slowly and deliberately. Don't panic. Just move
slowly and carefully. Pretend the cop is a dinosaur or something and sudden
movement will provoke him.

~~~
tacomonstrous
>Pretend the cop is a dinosaur or something and sudden movement will provoke
him.

It's really perverse that I have to train myself to deal safely with a
purported practised officer of the law.

~~~
burntwater
This. The burden should be on the few police to be trained well enough to
recognize body language, not on the mass population to train how to avoid
being shot.

~~~
Dove
I don't entirely agree. There are lots of situations you have to learn how to
navigate safely in society. How to use a crosswalk. How to address a judge.
How to prevent house fires.

I think putting the burden of citizen safety 100% on police is like putting
the burden of pedestrian safety 100% on cars. Yeah, the driver has greater
responsibility and is held to a higher standard of caution... but this sort of
thing really is a lot more practical if people know to stay on sidewalks.

I for one want to have police in society, and I want them to be able to deal
with very dangerous and violent people as safely as they can. I think needing
to know how to safely surrender to them if they mistake me for a dangerous
person is a reasonable price to pay.

I don't understand this whole "I shouldn't need to know" perspective. Of
course you need to know. Police are part of society, and so we need to
understand how to be around them.

~~~
tacomonstrous
>I think putting the burden of citizen safety 100% on police is like putting
the burden of pedestrian safety 100% on cars. Yeah, the driver has greater
responsibility and is held to a higher standard of caution... but this sort of
thing really is a lot more practical if people know to stay on sidewalks.

This doesn't make any sense. Many pedestrians are drivers at other points in
time. They have some idea of what to expect when they're on the other side of
the coin. It's not a good analogy.

>don't understand this whole "I shouldn't need to know" perspective. Of course
you need to know. Police are part of society, and so we need to understand how
to be around them.

Of course one should know that it is a good idea to obey instructions from a
police officer. Beyond that, it is difficult for the average person to figure
out how to act appropriately in a stressful situation that could possibly end
in death if some gesture is interpreted in an unexpected fashion by a trained
officer. You cannot train the general populace to tackle something like this!
At least not at any reasonable scale, especially when different police
officers have different standards for what constitutes dangerous behavior. It
is incumbent on authorities to make sure that they train their officers
appropriately to behave in a way that deescalates interactions with the
civilian population.

------
mmjaa
At what point does the average citizen look at "SWAT death as an option for
what could happen to me today" and think, 'well .. this is okay'?

I'm not trying to be inflammatory, but there has to be real moment of respect
for the fact that Americans are living in a "dial-a-death" state of existence.

This is something that many, many social commentators have warned us of, over
the decades: the signs of a Police State.

Sure, American. Most likely you are aware of the nature of law enforcement.

But for those of us observing things from places where such actions as this
are a real, honest, facet of the past history: this shit is scary.

Like, come on. A rational society allows this?

Please fork, reboot, and continuously deploy these notions of freedom under
the protection of violent force. This is a paradox which is delivering
injustice, broad and wide, instead of narrow and thin. A moment of disgrace.

~~~
melling
In what kind of society does someone call 911, pretending to be homocidal,
telling them they are pointing a gun at their wife and child, that they poured
gasoline throughout the house, and are going to burn it down?

The fact is there are people that really do this and someone needs to respond.

The other fact is that other people think it’s funny, or a good way to get
revenge on someone, by calling in a police force to invade their home.

~~~
tacomonstrous
Every society has assholes, monsters and others with perverted senses of
humor. One very simple objective of a civilized society is to ensure that such
people cannot exploit state sponsored violence to hurt people they don't like.
The problem here is that the US system is seriously flawed.

------
clarkevans
The principal issue is: why was an unarmed man shot on his doorstep by the
police. This focus conveniently absolves the police of wrong doing; e.g. "if
someone didn't call in a problem, no one would be dead".

~~~
dekhn
Ostensibly because he reached for his waistband instead of immediately putting
up his hands.

~~~
grafporno
Having seen the video, it looked more like he was trying to shield his eyes
from the light the police was shining directly at him _from across the
street_. I don't know why this isn't reported more accurately, they shot the
guy from what looks like a good 20-30 meters away.

~~~
justherefortart
Because they're already laying the groundwork that it was his fault, not the
trigger happy cops.

~~~
dekhn
Right, I said "ostensibly" above, but the cynic in me thinks, "the police got
ahead of the narrative by saying he moved first". I don't really know what
happened (other than a person got shot by the police when they absolutely
should not have).

------
clarkevans
"When confronted by a police officer, you must keep your hands up or on the
drivers wheel at all times."

This seems to be the new reflex we must learn and practice? Perhaps the rule
should be codified so that officers know they can't ask you to do anything
else with your hands. People have been shot while complying with a request,
ie, getting car registration from the glove compartment or moving closer to
the officer by crawling. Just because one officer gives a command does not
mean that another officer heard it.

Since this is a life or death sort of reflex, perhaps we must be
teaching/practicing in elementary school and refreshers as part of drivers
training.

~~~
dopamean
You're totally right, however, things get really difficult when the police are
barking difficult to follow orders at you. Just watch the Daniel Shaver video.
The guy tried his best to comply and then was murdered for no reason.

------
znfi
One thing with all of this which puzzles me as a non-American, how does the
"acceptance" of people getting killed by the police fit together with the
whole anti-gorvernment thing which seems fairly common in the US as well?

One would think that if one does not like the government, one would be
extremely upset about the gouvernment randomly killing people. But for some
reason this does not seem to be the case.

I guess similar things could be said about gun ownership/self-defence argument
etc. I guess if one decides to shoot back at the police one is truly screwed?

~~~
mancerayder
_One thing with all of this which puzzles me as a non-American, how does the
"acceptance" of people getting killed by the police fit together with the
whole anti-gorvernment thing which seems fairly common in the US as well? One
would think that if one does not like the government, one would be extremely
upset about the gouvernment randomly killing people. But for some reason this
does not seem to be the case._

It's a good question. As a half-American with something of a background in
political science, let me offer the following.

The free market liberal ideas, mixed with a sort of pioneer spirit that
historically existed here (and still in much of the rural areas of the U.S.),
carry with it an arguably consistent ideology:

\- Independence from government in the realm of strong market regulations,
price controls and so forth, particularly property rights.

\- A government whose role is to minimize taxation but to protect said
property rights.

It's a logical fact that you can't protect property rights without violence,
due to the unequal nature of property ownership and the class system that
comes from it. Historically, police start to make an appearance in such
societies, as it makes more sense to have the State perform this activity than
have each individual hire or join their own private militias or pay protection
money to some organization.

That's the best way I can think to explain this discrepancy, which to a
European sounds totally contradictory. You say you don't like the State's
influence, but when the State does the worst it can do, kill citizens, you do
nothing?

It has to do with free market capitalism not existing without a state having
basic functions: protection from external threats at the national level, and
enforcement of property rights via a legal system and an enforcer of this
legal system. I.e. Police.

------
sverige
Most of the comments have to do with the police interaction. My question is,
what can be done to discourage swatting?

My reflex reaction is to give everyone involved long prison sentences, and
some aggressive prosecution of other incidents, so that people tempted to
engage in swatting are discouraged by some realistic chance of doing real
prison time for doing something so reckless and stupid.

The guy who made the call was fairly unconcerned about the prospect of real
punishment when he was interviewed a few hours before he was arrested.[1] His
voice tone during the call was also fairly flat.[2]

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCHOI39nJPM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCHOI39nJPM)
[2] [https://scallywagandvagabond.com/2017/12/tyler-raj-
barriss-s...](https://scallywagandvagabond.com/2017/12/tyler-raj-barriss-
swautistic-gamer-arrest-andrew-finch-swatting-prank/)

~~~
joeax
Normally I'd agree but the US already has the largest prison population in the
world. By far. We are obsessed with long and lengthy prison sentences even for
the most minuscule non-victim offenses i.e. 20 years for pot possession
(meanwhile armed robbers get 3-5 years). Terms like "mandatory minimum" and
"zero tolerance" get thrown around by politicians like it's candy to get
themselves elected, with little to no regard from the general public on the
monetary and psychological costs (although the private prison industry and the
cottage industries around it stand to make big bucks).

A solution to all of this is to eliminate victimless crimes, hold police
accountable when they mess up, and switch to more of a house arrest model for
crimes like this. Force the prankster to pay restitution to the victim's
family. Make him work it off with 1000s of hours of community service if
needed. But let's quit crowding prisons at taxpayer expense.

~~~
srj
What restitution can there be in this case? Nothing can compensate this person
for the loss of their life, or the two children who will grow up without a
father. The guy who made the false report had done so previously with a bomb
threat, and showed no remorse. How can this person ever be trusted to rejoin
society? How can the victims be restored by the justice system? Neither is
realistic. Short of a death penalty, the only outcome is to put the guy in
jail for a long time.

~~~
joeax
The point is that "jail" shouldn't be the default punishment for every
criminal act. There are lots of ways you can punish people. Take away his
ability to game for 20 years and make him pay one million to the family,
worked off over a number of years. America is locking up people at an alarming
rate, when alternative more cost-effective punishments are available.

I invite you to read about the problem of mass incarceration:
[https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2017.html](https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2017.html)

------
dopamean
I will never, ever be able to accept that it is ok for the police to shoot a
person who they do not see carrying a weapon. There is no circumstance in
which you can say you feared for your life if you did not see a weapon. And if
you legitimately did fear for your life when you didn't see a weapon then
maybe you shouldn't be a police officer.

~~~
wl
It doesn't take a weapon to kill someone. A rather infamous example in recent
years is the death of Eric Gardner. Deadly force is deadly force—regardless of
the form it comes in.

~~~
dopamean
It takes a weapon to kill someone from 30+ feet away.

~~~
wl
Well, if we're talking about this specific situation, the officer who did the
shooting mistakenly thought he saw a weapon.

------
jmartrican
Stories like this is going to make every encounter with a cop a lot more
frightening for me.

As a teenager I was once yelled out by undercover cops that came out of no
where. They yelled at me to "not put your hands in my pocket" or "put my hands
up"... I really do not recall the exact words. I instinctively put my hands in
my pocket. I couldn't help it, I do not think I even processed what they said.
Luckily they didn't shoot but they were mad and warned that I could have been
shot. I really do not understand how they expect people to understand them
when they are yelling and surprise the sh!t out of you.

~~~
c22
One of two times I've had police point their guns at me I was pulled over
while driving my father's car. I opened the glove box when asked for license
and registration and unbeknownst to me there was a Swiss army knife in there.
Both officers unholstered their guns and the one at my window told me to
slowly remove the knife from the glove box, but as soon as I touched it the
other officer on the passenger side immediately yelled at me to "drop it!"
Fortunately there were only two of them and after that they managed to get on
the same page and avoid shooting me. The other time I was smoking marijuana
from a pipe immediately after surviving a serious collision, I assume the guns
were because they were mad they wouldn't be able to prove I was high during
the accident (I wasn't).

------
gort
Since we're mostly debating the police action here, there's a short video
available now of the fatal moment:

[http://www.kansas.com/news/local/crime/article192244734.html](http://www.kansas.com/news/local/crime/article192244734.html)

The victim really does make a fairly unfortunate movement right before he's
shot. Still I'm hardly in a position to say how far this mitigates the
shooter.

~~~
Miner49er
The only thing the man could've pulled was a pistol from his waistband. The
police were across the streets behind cars already aiming guns at the guy.
They should be trained to wait until the person actually raises the pistol to
fire before discharging. At that distance and with the cover they had I don't
see how the guy could fire a shot and hit a cop before they could. I don't see
how anyone can argue the cop was in any danger even if the guy had a pistol.
Unfortunately, the cop only has to say he felt threatened and he thought the
guy had a gun and he'll get off on any charges.

------
the_chaconne
Link to video of the shooting:
[http://www.kansas.com/news/local/crime/article192244734.html](http://www.kansas.com/news/local/crime/article192244734.html)

Couple things are clear: 1\. Police took shelter behind cars, outside of
handgun range, but within the range of their own rifles. 2\. The victim
clearly didn't carry a rifle, or any weapon with a range that can threaten the
police 3\. The police didn't know if the victim, who was being shouted at and
shined at with high beam and confused, was the supposed hostage or hostage
taker, and shot him anyways.

It's a fuckup, and the police should serve better.

------
tlogan
What if person who made a call is outside of US? Or we are unable to track it?
Who are we going to blame then? The "911" seems like an open line for
terrorists or some other nation to kill anybody they want... Or terrorize
anybody they want...

------
on_and_off
The USA have a truly messed up culture.

I wonder how it can be fixed. Some things seem to be going in the right
direction, for example gun ownership is on the decline (from 47 % of
households owning gun in 1971 to 31% in 2014
[http://www.norc.org/PDFs/GSS%20Reports/GSS_Trends%20in%20Gun...](http://www.norc.org/PDFs/GSS%20Reports/GSS_Trends%20in%20Gun%20Ownership_US_1972-2014.pdf)
) . However the number of guns keeps increasing, so it looks like some people
are stockpiling. Nonetheless if gun ownership continues to decrease they will
be marginalized.

At the same time, police is very violent and its militarization is a sad,
messed up, joke.

And violent deaths in the USA are still an order of magnitude higher than
those of other developed countries.

~~~
peferron
Americans are all about freedom and equality, but having a police force who
can almost arbitrarily kill you and with little consequence sounds like
neither. In fact, it's not very different from how the Chinese government can
disappear or jail you without retribution if you criticize the CCP, although
Americans will undoubtedly loathe the comparison. The Chinese system sounds
worse because it's lawful evil if you will, but at least there's a simple if
degrading mechanism to avoid being a casualty, while the chaotic evilness of
the US system means you could be dead tomorrow by no fault of your own just
like the father of two—no, sorry, the "male", better term to convey aggression
and justify the shooting—in this story.

As you said, this is part of the American culture, and part of a circle of
violence that includes NRA lobbying, widespread gun ownership, mass
incarceration, macho cop culture, politically motivated toughness on crime,
the War on Drugs, etc. This will take decades to unravel at best, so I'm not
holding my breath, just like I'm not holding my breath for the CCP to allow
free speech anytime soon.

------
copper_think
Like Brian Krebs said yesterday on his blog -- it seems like the doctrine of
felony murder should apply here.

~~~
paganel
And what would that make the US police forces look like? To me, as an
European, it makes them look like a weapon, which you can conjure by a simple
phone-call. It doesn't have to be like this.

~~~
_wmd
(As another European) it's hard to see any alternative for regular people
whose profession just happens to put their life at almost permanent risk,
thanks to the attitude toward guns over there.

I'm not sure if in Europe we'd react any different -- if you called the police
to report an in-progress shooting, I wouldn't be surprised if a similar
trigger-happy result emerged

~~~
qaq
As a guy originally from Ukraine that as you can imagine has a fairly big
problem with availability of weapons at the moment that police officer would
go to jail. Having much stricter rules on when and how weapons can be used
looks like a good thing.

------
Steeeve
If this is a potential consequence of online gaming, then I don't want any of
my children gaming online.

We all know that the police response to this issue is going to be inadequate.
What I'm curious about is the gaming industry and community's response.

------
lend000
The SWAT team should _never_ be the first line of defense, unless pre-
authorized by a warrant. They should only be involved after escalation from a
normal police patrol, and should _never_ be involved due to an anonymous tip.

------
jeffdavis
The immediate reaction seems to be that the police are too militarized or not
disciplined enough, but it's not clear to me that these claims apply in this
situation.

Police militarization is a real problem when it happens for non-violent
crimes. But this was thought to be a serious hostage situation, and I'm not
sure there were a lot of good options here.

------
nafizh
It seems like the police is trying to shift the blame 100% on the caller. He
might be a terrible human being who deserves punishment, but indeed the sole
responsibility lies with the police who pulled the trigger.

But yeah, instead of training for more people skills, let us give them more
military-grade weapons.

------
bob_theslob646
People do realize that it was a random address, not any of the call of duty
players addresses'.

A random person was killed over this stupidity.

This is so enraging it's not even funny.

~~~
sedro
To clarify, the arrested individual sells a swatting "service" [1]. One of the
CoD players hired him to swat the other over a twitter argument. The other CoD
player taunted the swatter and gave him a random address [2]. The police
showed up at the address and killed an unrelated person.

No parties involved are without blame.

[1]
[http://archive.is/Ixezf#selection-6279.0-6288.0](http://archive.is/Ixezf#selection-6279.0-6288.0)
[2] [https://i.imgur.com/n3Q53nL.png](https://i.imgur.com/n3Q53nL.png)

~~~
astronautjones
for $10 and $20!

------
htormey
Here is an interview with the person who claims to have made the call that
prompted the swat:

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cCHOI39nJPM&feature=youtu.be](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cCHOI39nJPM&feature=youtu.be)

------
dsego
Swatting should be considered domestic terrorism and not a prank. Just
listening to the video describing the events and how many lies the caller
provided to convince the police there was a hostage situation is sickening.

~~~
tlogan
What when ISIS figure out this is the easiest way to terrorize people in US?
What are we going to do then? Luckily the ISIS followers are not so smart...
But North Korean intelligence might pull something like this on a much larger
scale. And target specific individuals.

------
Sephr
If you want to solve the issue of over-militarization of civilian police and
SWAT, replace their guns with something safer but still effective at quickly
subduing threats.

Carfentanil gas smart bullets with auto & manual per-shot dose control
(handled by the launcher/gun device) could be equally effective and slightly
less dangerous.

I imagine that the decrease in medical costs would vastly outweigh the
increase in weaponry costs.

------
menacingly
I think of a lot of the replies here miss the point of why the police are in
"such a hurry". Usually, they believe that the person has hostages that are in
imminent danger. I'm sure there is a big component of macho gun buzz, but the
fact that they're in a rush is an understandable component of the situation.
That's why they don't sit in the car and try to have a chat with the "hostage
taker".

Obviously, the fact that a random person can essentially order a taxpayer-
funded death squad to an arbitrary home is a huge problem, and the people
actually making those calls are only a small part of the problem.

The fact that these death squads are on the payroll sitting around bored
waiting for "action" is an issue too.

However, I don't think it's as clear-cut as "don't kill anyone". I'd hate to
be the guy with my life threatened while they cautiously announce their
presence to my attacker.

What's missing is some basic "is there really a hostage situation going on
here" step that I don't have the law enforcement knowledge to define.

~~~
FireBeyond
> but the fact that they're in a rush is an understandable component of the
> situation

Eh. If I'm taking my engine company to a structure fire, we walk, we don't
run. If it's a rescue situation, I still do a 360 around the structure to
identify additional hazards (while my crew is setting up). That's a situation
with people in verified imminent threat to life danger.

We work a patient in cardiac arrest. We have checklists. Even with this
imminent threat to the patient's life, we will still at pertinent times, stop,
and review those lists.

Charging in gung ho causes more problems than it solves.

If the hostage (if they existed) is going to be dead 10 seconds later, they're
probably going to be dead the first time the suspect hears SWAT enter.

Similar to a fire or MVA - "you getting there 10 seconds or 30 seconds earlier
is going to save a life on so few occasions, if ever, for a much greater
risk".

~~~
menacingly
Great take. So, I'm a relatively smart guy who tries to be fair to all
parties. I think it's unlikely that I'm the only person who has this
misunderstanding about these situations. I wonder how you make this dialog
scale?

Also, I wonder how much the "another man is the enemy" component adds to it? I
wonder if you take the type of person drawn to law enforcement (or even worse,
SWAT) and add the lizard brain fuel of "this is a life or death competition
with another man", how many of these outcomes are even the result of conscious
decisions.

How much of the wisdom from those restrictive high speed pursuit laws could be
re-applied here? They seem to have figured out that the officer will choose
the competitive course in the moment instead of the right course, at too high
a cost.

------
Tempest1981
Some interesting excerpts from
[https://newrepublic.com/article/126473/american-
cops-100-tim...](https://newrepublic.com/article/126473/american-
cops-100-times-deadlier-finnish-police)

\- By contrast (to the US), national standards in most European countries
conform to the European Convention on Human Rights, which impels its 47
signatories to permit only deadly force that is “absolutely necessary” to
achieve a lawful purpose.

\- Killings excused under America’s “reasonable belief” standards often
violate Europe’s “absolute necessity” standards.

\- In Europe, killing is considered unnecessary if alternatives exist. For
example, national guidelines in Spain would have prescribed that Wilson
incrementally pursue verbal warnings, warning shots, and shots at nonvital
parts of the body before resorting to deadly force.

\- In the US, only eight states require verbal warnings (when possible), while
warning and leg shots are typically prohibited.

------
rrauenza
This guy is part of the culture / training problem:

[https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/02/us/training-officers-
to-s...](https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/02/us/training-officers-to-shoot-
first-and-he-will-answer-questions-later.html)

 _When police officers shoot people under questionable circumstances, Dr.
Lewinski is often there to defend their actions. Among the most influential
voices on the subject, he has testified in or consulted in nearly 200 cases
over the last decade or so and has helped justify countless shootings around
the country._

 _His conclusions are consistent: The officer acted appropriately, even when
shooting an unarmed person. Even when shooting someone in the back. Even when
witness testimony, forensic evidence or video footage contradicts the
officer’s story._

------
Yizahi
What I don't understand is (or rather do understand) - I know that it is
freaking hard to hit anything with a handgun even at best conditions at 25m
range, with two hand hold, preparation etc. Here there people are hidden
behind cars, with hand rests for steady shooting, very big range for a
handgun, in a dark and suspect is blinded with torches and not even in a
shooting stance. Police of all people would know that they are 99.99% safe
from any shooting he may do. This is pure bullshit from police side and clear
abuse of power and it must be prosecuted accordingly.

PS: swatter is also an a55hole and a criminal of course (since he admitted
doing it already).

------
drtillberg
In the video, police shouted from across the street while the man peeked out
from the side of his doorway. It is unclear whether he knew the commands were
for him. And did the yeller have lawful authority to order him out of the
house?

Hope my local department is better than that.

------
mxxx
I think I posted it here the last time some poor guy got gunned down by a swat
team by mistake, but Radley Balko wrote a really good book about the history
of how this kind of thing became commonplace in the states; Rise of the
Warrior Cop. Fascinating read.

------
dsego
Do the police have to shoot to kill? Is it possible to aim somewhere else? Or
shoot into the air? Also, I think in my country they are obligated to shout
out "stop, I will shoot" or something to that effect.

~~~
tomschlick
Police don't shoot to kill. They shoot to stop the threat. That means aiming
center mass (the chest) as it is the biggest target and the easiest to hit.
Sometimes that means the person dies, but that's not the objective.

As someone who is very well versed in shooting, it would be insane to expect
someone to hit a leg or arm of a suspect; especially with a pistol. That would
lead to many stray rounds which stay lethal for up to a mile and can easily
penetrate walls killing someone you did not intend to shoot.

------
rdl
I am pretty cynical about humanity, but I don't understand why there aren't
hundreds or thousands of swatting incidents per day, given the availability of
anonymous communications, payment, and surplus of bad people in the world.

It seems like it would be trivial to set up a dark web service to SWAT on
demand. For 0.1 Monero or whatever, place a credible spoofed SWAT call. Maybe
hold payment in escrow and follow police radio or blotter to confirm they were
deployed and then release payment, or just do a reputational system.

~~~
jokoon
If terrorists were really organized, they would obviously use swatting... I
wonder if police units can even detects fake hostage alerts...

~~~
rdl
Yeah, flooding 911 with legit-seeming calls for weeks would seem to be an
effective DoS on the 911 system.

------
robotcookies
Maybe a naive question, but couldn't they just stay in armored vehicles that
are bullet proofed and agree not to fire until they are fired upon?

------
marsrover
I see a lot of idealistic opinions about how it should be in regards to police
violence but what can we actually do? Is there anything that people of this
country can do to change this or is it just a waiting game to see where it's
all headed?

Why isn't there an EFF for this sort of thing? I know there is the ACLU but at
this point I feel like we need something solely for police violence.

~~~
anigbrowl
You can join/support a radical organization (and you should) but the basic
reason there isn't something like an EFF is money. Sure, the EFF goes to bat
for consumers against government and giant corporations, but there really
aren't that many of them.

In contrast, there are a _lot_ of law enforcement agencies, because there are
300 countries, many towns, most college campuses have their own police, most
transit system s in cities have their own police, many federal agencies have
their own police. The total is estimated to be about 18,000. If you use a
narrower definition the total is still about 15,000.

That's a huge number for any single organization to keep track of or to hold
accountable. Even if you just follow up on every single death with a law
enforcement angle that's ~1000 homicides by police annually and ~4000 deaths
in jails and prisons. That's a huge amount of data to collect and organize
before you even begin to evaluate questions of avoidability or accountability.

Say it takes an hour just to receive information of a death, establish the
identity of the person involved and the data and location and create a
database record or standardized wiki page that can act as a stub for document
submission and information collection. With ~100 deaths a week that's a full-
time job for 3 people just to produce a barebones list, and I'm being really
optimistic with the time estimates. Realistically it's probably 2 or 3 times
as much.

[http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2016/jul/10/...](http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2016/jul/10/charles-
ramsey/how-many-police-departments-are-us/)

Here's the report mentioned in the article, because it's no longer available
at the original doj.gov link: [https://ric-zai-
inc.com/Publications/cops-p341-pub.pdf](https://ric-zai-
inc.com/Publications/cops-p341-pub.pdf)

------
Pica_soO
Swat teams need unarmed camera drones, who scan the situation ahead of them.
Smash some windows for god sakes, but not people.ö

~~~
sschueller
No, they need proper training.

Things like this don't occur all the time in other countries.

~~~
dredmorbius
That and consequences.

------
throw7
I'd like to know what the facts on the ground were that led to have an roe of
shoot to kill. Something did go wrong with the process leading up to this
clusterfuck. I hope it's identified and fixed. There _might_ be some change in
wichita, but I'm not hopeful nationally.

------
williamscales
What about the guy who gave the false address? It seems that he is culpable
too.

------
pimmen
When tasers were introduced, isn’t this the exact problem they were here to
solve? You use them instead of shooting to disable the suspect to de-escalate
the same situations?

------
superkuh
Swatting exists because it's common knowledge that US SWAT teams are
effectively military death squads in terms of both behavior and equipment.

------
zzzzzzzza
Why not just use a drone to investigate the situation before sending in human
police officers?

------
Abishek_Muthian
I think a machine learning assisted scene assessment could be more accurate in
this scenario.

Considering AI is better at image processing than humans, finding whether the
subject in the view point is carrying a weapon should be able to give the
officers a second opinion when needed under these circumstances.

~~~
borplk
Classic HN. Let's throw some ML & AI & DL at it. Don't forget to take your
TensorFlow with you.

~~~
Abishek_Muthian
Not trying to show any wit here. Considering that a mistake in identifying
whether a weapon is held by a person ended in tragedy and that modern force
are equipped with displays on their rifles; I asked whether ML based solutions
can help.

------
walshemj
Just hope they sent the local SWAT team to make the arrest :-)

------
grwthckrmstr
Why are cops killing innocent, unarmed people?

------
bob_theslob646
Edit: I didn't realize that it takes about 40 minutes for a tranquilizer to
take effect, if they hit the target in the right spot.

I apologize for my stupidity.

~~~
ryanwaggoner
Because life isn’t a movie and there aren’t tranquilizers that work reliably
fast enough to avoid the other party shooting back?

~~~
pavel_lishin
Not to mention that the wrong dosage, or an interaction with something else in
their system, makes a tranquilizer gun potentially as lethal as a regular
handgun or a taser.

------
exabrial
Sad to see this in my home town :(

------
borplk
It's so easy to spot American comments in this thread.

------
scotty79
I'm very sad and ashamed to voice such an evil idea but I think the only way
to change US police into something resembling first world country law
enforcement agency is to have mass anonymous random swatting campaign with
dozens, perhaps hundreds of causalities.

~~~
anigbrowl
Terrorism-as-object-lesson doesn't work and if anything is likely to have the
opposite of the intended effect. Check out Erica Chenoweth's book on the
subject (there's a link to the statistical data on this page):
[http://www.ericachenoweth.com/research/wcrw/](http://www.ericachenoweth.com/research/wcrw/)

Now I don't actually agree with her in terms of nonviolence-as-optimal-
political method because I feel it fails to account for social cost and
essentially encourages organizing around martyrdom which leads to the most
vulnerable members of society being used as a punching bag to effect political
changes whose primary benefits will flow elsewhere, but that's getting into
the weeds. It's still an important work in this field that should be studied
carefully.

------
dbg31415
> Los Angeles police have arrested a 25-year-old man on suspicion of making
> the swatting call that ended with a Wichita man being killed by police.

What crime are they charging him with? I don't think we have the right crime
on the books for this at present.

The guy who phoned this in is a scumbag, no doubt.

But Andrew Finch's death is 100% on the cops who showed up. As we've seen time
and time again, their selection process and training lead them to be hyper-
aggressive.

Look at stories from just the last year where the cops show up and shoot
someone's dog, or shoot the random lady in a nightgown, or shoot the guy
running away, or shoot the guy who says he's not armed, or shoot the guy for
not getting down on the pavement fast enough, or shoot the guy...

It's disturbing that in each of these cases the system protects the cops. At
some point, and my preference would be soon, we need to work to dismantle and
rebuild this system.

~~~
mariuolo
> What crime are they charging him with? I don't think we have the right crime
> on the books for this at present.

As I read somewhere, the worst case scenario for him is murder under the rule
of transferred intent, since making a false representation of this sort to the
police (or other relevant authority) in Kansas is a felony.

