Posted on 03/22/2017 3:48:56 PM PDT by naturalman1975
Foreign Office Minister Tobias Ellwood is being hailed as a hero after trying to save the life of the police officer stabbed in the Westminster terror attack.
Mr Ellwood, a former soldier, ran to the officer when he was stabbed just inside the gates of Parliament.
He gave him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and stemmed the blood flow, before waiting with him until the air ambulance landed in Parliament Square.
The police officer sadly died at the scene.
He was later pictured with blood on his face as he spoke to emergency services.
Mr Ellwood has been a Minister in the Foreign Office since July 2014. He is the MP for Bournemouth East.
His brother was killed in the Bali bombings in 2002.
Unfortunately in this case, the police officer still died. Sometimes the best training in the world isn't going to be enough.
Wonder if Mayor Khan of London, who said that if you live in a big city you must accept the fact that terrorist incidents are likely to happen, will be attending the officer’s funeral.
BBC is still using quotes: “Terrorist Incident”
I have the save-the-wounded training, although not much trauma in my town.
I wish I had the respond-violent-threat training.
Delusional political correctness on full display. Sadly there is a terrible price real people pay for the fantasies of others.
I certainly hope not.
Having worked in a big city ER for decades (Brits call them "A&E"...don't know what Aussies call them) I can attest to the fact that when a stab wound or gunshot wound is involved the best way to help the person is to get him/her to an operating room.
Good point, one which I make often, especially regarding young men from families such as Romney, Burr, Sununu, Kasich, etc.
Do we even know the name and religion of the terrorist?
(of course they do, but we don’t want to offend the muslims)
Having initially named the wrong person, the media are likely to be very cautious about releasing any other name or details until they’ve been confirmed by multiple sources.
(Fortunately the person they mistakenly named is a scumbag who has done plenty of other horrible things, so no great harm done).
Was the officer armed?
Almost certainly not (a constable doing the job he was doing normally wouldn’t be, and there’s no reason to think he was) but there were armed police nearby.
He should have voted to let the officer carry a gun.
British police have been asked time and time again if they wanted to be armed, and have, in general consistently rejected the idea. If they wanted to be armed, the Home Secretary would also immediately allow it - it doesn’t even require a vote in Parliament. In most cases, the local police command could make the decision, so not even politicians are involved.
The unarmed nature of the average police officer in the UK is not some sort of gun control idea. It’s based on what the police want and what they feel best allows them to do their job. It is very rare for a British police officer to suffer a violent death in the line of duty - until today, the last time it happened in London was over three years ago, and across the entire country, it only happens once or twice a year.
There are plenty of officers who are armed - exactly how many is not publically released, but it’s a substantial minority. The relative compact area of the UK means when an armed response is needed, one is normally available very quickly. That changes the dynamic considerably from a large country like the United States.
London is the most surveilled city int the world, with cameras everywhere. There is NO DOUBT that this crime was caught on video by multiple cameras. I call on England to release these videos so the world can clearly see what radical Islam in the EU looks like.
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The USA is not unique in being plagued with dumb@$$3d, incompetent "journalists" -- and editors...
There are some really outstanding British, and Minister Ellwood is one of them.
Decisions have consequences. In this case, the decision to not carry resulted in the death of the officer.
We live in a dangerous world. Entering unarmed into a confrontation with a murderous Muslim is suicide.
The absence of a decision to carry is not the same as a decision not to carry.
There's a lot of history behind this. When establishing the world's first modern police force from the 1840s, Peel and his successors were always insistent on the distinction from the armed police forces of the European continent. Those were organised along military lines - indeed were often part of the formal military structure - and were unmistakably instruments of State control. The British police, by contrast, were to be a civilian force, accountable not to the state but to the local community through 'Watch committees'. The absence of arms was in part a symbol of this civilian status. The police could always call on the armed services - the local Yeomanry - for support when necessary, which it rarely was.
Despite all the fundamental social changes since that time, something of that ethos still survives, particularly in the attitude of the police themselves to the armed/unarmed dilemma. And it has to be said that armed attacks on police officers in Britain are still extremely rare. This was only the fourth such fatality in the last seven years.
Death is such an abstract construct when it happens to someone else.
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