"Get your hands up!" he yelled.
Anaya's passenger said she put the car in reverse to get away.
Toxicology reports show Anaya had cocaine in her system.
Posted on 01/17/2014 9:12:59 AM PST by CedarDave
Dash-cam video released Thursday shows a State Police officer running toward and alongside the car driven by Jeanette Anaya and firing multiple times into the Honda sedan as he screams expletives and for the occupants to get their hands up.
Anaya’s car did back into officer Oliver Wilson’s cruiser, apparently narrowly missing Wilson himself, but the video shows that the Honda was moving away from Wilson as most of his 16 shots were fired.
Anaya, 39, was hit and killed by two of Wilson’s shots, following a vehicle chase that started when Wilson tried to pull her over for a traffic stop after midnight on Nov. 7.
When the shooting took place, Wilson was outside his patrol car. He had used a bumping maneuver to force her car to stop on Camino Carlos Rey. All within just a few seconds, Wilson gets out of his car, Anaya backs into the cruiser, and Wilson starts shooting at Anaya’s Honda. A passenger in Anaya’s car, Jeremy Munoz, 34, was not injured.
Earlier this week, a Santa Fe County grand jury ruled that Wilson was justified in firing at Anaya and that he will face no criminal charges. Wilson testified he feared for his life when Anaya backed into his police car, according to District Attorney Angela “Spence” Pacheco.
But Tom Clark, attorney for Anaya’s parents, said Thursday that Anaya should have stopped during the car chase but that if Wilson wasn’t wearing a police uniform, he’d be facing a first-degree murder charge now.
Clark said he was “shocked and dismayed” after viewing the video.
“I had no idea it was going to be as bad as it was,” he said. “I didn’t think it would be so dramatic with the officer running alongside shooting point-blank into the car.”
(Excerpt) Read more at abqjournal.com ...
Nobody can obey all laws all the time. It is impossible.
He was (allegedly) in fear for his life... so he is justified in chasing and firing until she is dead, rather than until the threat of injury is gone. Interesting.
He did his job. He did what he was supposed to do. He protected the citizens from a violent felon. That is what he was trained to do and the job he swore to do.
She chose to run when she was required by law to stop. She chose to drive at dangerous and excessive speeds in a residential area putting many lives at risk. She chose to assault him with a deadly weapon. She chose to continue to put lives at risk by not stopping. She made the choices that caused her death.
The LEO was reacting to her choices and doing what he was trained and required to do. He was protecting other citizens from her out of control, dangerous and immediate potentially lethal, ongoing actions.
It is his job to pursue and stop her in that situation, and she was required, by law and common sense, to stop in that situation. There is no equality of required responsibility of actions in this situation.
"Get your hands up!" he yelled.
Anaya's passenger said she put the car in reverse to get away.
Toxicology reports show Anaya had cocaine in her system.
Cases like this are why more and more places are putting tight restraints on pursuit policies.
They have guns to shoot people, running or not. The important distinction is whether using the deadly force is justified. In the case of one who is running, IF it is a violent felon who is fleeing, AND is an immediate danger to others, THEN the shooting MIGHT be justified. Those circumstances do not seem to be the case in that video.
“Toxicology reports show Anaya had cocaine in her system. “
Same could be said for about 7% of the total population.
Actually, that may not be the case here in NM. Just because his are red, doesn't mean hers weren't either. If you look to the left side of the video as his are red and she makes the turn (without coming to a stop), you can clearly see that the lights in her direction are not green. More than likely, the opposing direction to the officer had a Green/Green turn and the officer's lights were red, along with the perpendicular direction being red. Now, some intersections have a green right-turn arrow that allows perpendicular traffic to turn right, when the traffic opposing you has the green turn to turn left. I saw no green lights for her. If that's the case, then she ran the turn on red with no stop.
You and I both know that law enforcement has no obligation to protect any person.
;]
Well if there were no cops there’d be more dogs and less corruption.
In the early days of our country there were no cops. Nearly everyone was armed though. Fewer cameras too I bet.
I get it. You believe that the LEO was just supposed to follow her around and call in the reports as she ran down innocent citizens because of her excessive speed and reckless driving in the residential areas. She would have had to of stopped either when her car became inoperable because of these collisions or it ran out of gas.
The LEO did not execute anyone. He stopped a known violent, out of control felon from injuring or killing other citizens. He used the only option that she left him.
That first car full of innocent victims could not have been far off. Or maybe her first victims would have been the two working moms who were jogging just around the next corner and past the next stop sign she ignored. Sure he could have chased her all night and just added up the bodies she left in her wake.
We can all be sure that after the final list of victims, dead and injured was made official that you would be right there telling everyone that he did exactly the right thing by just letting her go.
“She was driving erratically and the officer was right to maneuver her over as he did. However erratic driving is not a capital offense and she was driving away when he shot at her. That in my opinion was not justified.”
Exactly. He was in no immediate danger anymore. This guy is obviously a hothead and has no business with a badge and gun.
What the hell is wrong with New Mexico nowadays?
It was 1:30 am, there weren’t a lot of citizens out and about.
If you’re going to start making up stuff perhaps you should help the officer with his creative report writing.
And yes, I think that cops should not kill people unless absolutely necessary.
“I also don’t believe he was shooting to kill. I believe he was shooting to get her to stop - at the subconscious level.”
You know, that is just an enormously stupid statement. Anytime you point a gun at someone, that is a death threat, much less actually pulling the trigger and shooting. This isn’t TV, and you don’t shoot at someone as a warning or just to wound them. Shooting at someone is attempting to kill them, no exceptions.
And of all people, LEO know this. It is part of their training. There is no excuse for this action, none at all.
Hey ambulance chaser, it ended properly. That slob driving was endangering all the other people on the road. She tried backing into him. He responded in a way I think all officers should. The driver never dreamed he would shoot her. He did. Now she will not kill some innocent person. Where are lawyers like you when these drivers kill innocents?
There are not usually a lot of people on the road that time of night but some traffic should be expected. Those leaving a bar a bit early, a shift worker at a local plant or mini mart headed home or to work, a waitress who just picked up her kids from the babysitter on her way home or even the babysitter on the way home from the waitresses house.
It is surly not illegal to be driving in a residential area at that time. In most cities it is not considered illadvisable to be driving to or from work or an outing with friends at that time of night. If this would have continued she would have found other people on the streets.
So she should be shot because she might hurt someone else?
got it.
You know, that is just an enormously stupid statement.
But I suppose I have an inside track here since I’ve actually found myself in situations kinda like what happened here. Not so dramatic, of course. This began with a long chase and, just before he shot, she tried to kill him with her car (at least it could be interpretted that way by a reasonable human being in the heat of the moment).
He then was still as compelled, on foot, as he was in his car, to stop her. And he was successful. Now, after the fact he may have said, “Oh my God, what have I done.” It is, sadly, the human condition. We all make mistakes even though we mean well - or at least think we do.
His training should have prevented this, but human beings are not machines. Training is not guaranteed to work. It just reduces the risk of this sort of thing happening.
It is very sad that this happened, but lessons can be taken away, both from what the cop did and what the woman did. Both drivers and cops can learn from this tragedy. But if it went down as it appears to have on the video, I’d relieve the cop of duty permanently and send him on his way.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.