Posted on 01/04/2008 3:26:21 PM PST by NormsRevenge
PHILADELPHIA - For the second year in a row, city officials are being asked how police officers responding to celebratory New Year's Eve gunfire ended up shooting innocent bystanders.
This year, police chasing an armed reveler shot into a house filled with partygoers, leaving one man in a coma, a second wounded and a 9-year-old boy with a graze wound to the chest.
A year ago, police fatally shot a man in the back of the head as he tried to flee when neighbors started shooting guns into the air.
The latest shootings came as Police Commissioner Sylvester Johnson ends a six-year tenure marked by public concern about gun violence and the police response to it.
Johnson has repeatedly been asked to answer questions about the department's use of deadly force, including two months ago when officers killed a distraught teenager wielding a clothes iron. City police fatally shot 16 people in 2007 and 20 the previous year.
"It seems that there's too much of a policy to shoot first and worry about the outcome later," said Bruce Ginsburg, an attorney representing two of the shooting victims. "It puts everybody in the city in danger."
Johnson, who retires Friday after 43 years with the department, defended his officers while promising an investigation of the New Year's Eve shootings.
"It's hard for you to say when an officer has a gun pointed at him, is he reacting too fast? We had one (officer) killed, we had six others who were shot" this year, he said Thursday at his final news conference.
Johnson's replacement, Charles Ramsey, has pledged to address the number of police shootings. Ramsey has noted that in his tenure as police chief of Washington, the number of such shootings fell by 77 percent.
Philadelphia police acknowledged this week that they arrested an innocent partygoer early Tuesday, based on his resemblance to the suspect who they say fired shots in the air, pointed his weapon at police and ran toward the string of row homes. Authorities later charged a 21-year-old man, who was apparently shot in the arm but did not seek treatment.
The party's host, Clinton Rogers, 30, told reporters that bullets started flying through the front door at him, friends and relatives just after midnight. Parents jumped in front of their children and two men who were shot ran upstairs, trailing blood.
The spray of bullets left Abebe Isaac, 33, in a medically induced coma after he was shot in the face. Michael Johnson, 32, remains stable after being shot in the side. Nyger Page, 9, was treated and released after suffering the graze wound.
Ginsburg represents Page's family and also that of Bryan Jones, who was shot to death by police as 2007 arrived.
Jones, 20, had set out on foot in the waning moments of 2006 to retrieve a young nephew from a party and was fleeing gunfire when he was shot.
Police have said officers responding to a report of gunfire were fired at by people on a porch and that an officer fired at Jones when he saw him reaching for his waistband. Jones, however, had no weapon and no criminal history, Ginsburg said.
"Nothing was learned about the unnecessary death of a young man last year," he said.
Ginsburg plans to file a wrongful death suit on behalf of Jones' family.
“City police fatally shot 16 people in 2007 and 20 the previous year.”
“We had six others who were shot” this year, he said Thursday at his final news conference.
So that’s 16 to 1 in favor of the cops...
I’ve always said that the average law abiding citizen has more chance getting shot by a cop than by a crook.
We’re the police and we’re here to help!
six others = six officers
“Nyger Page” WTF?!!
HEADLINE
Thousands of people NOT shot last night. Women and children hardest hit!
“Thousands of people NOT shot last night. Women and children hardest hit!”
I don’t get your point...
If a legally armed civilian shot so much as one innocent person, they’d be in jail. Responsibility follows the bullet - legal, moral and financial responsibility.
What that translates into is shoot first ask Questions later.
This thinking has been pushed by the anti gunners and anti gun politician's. In the bigger the cities and more anti gun areas it is worse then places the guns are not so demonized.
Philly cops must be goin’ soft. I remember when they would bomb a house, not just shoot into it.
Were these 16 all law abiding citizens, or were they shot for some other reason?
That's just ridiculous. There were nearly 400 murders in Philly in 2007 vs. 16 fatal police shootings.
Just because these cops are incompetent doesn't change reality.
I said “law abiding”. Almost all of the 400 murdered were drug dealers, gang members etc. Very few law abiding citizens...
Philly.............a place I would not allow a loved one to venture through. Ranks high on my do not visit list.........Newark is another one of my favorite do not visit cities. I can keep on and on about decayed cities across the USA that ted kennedy would visit in a heart beat. his 1962 immigration speech on the senate floor is most adorable. a very sick person
“Philly.............a place I would not allow a loved one to venture through.”
Yea I know, I used to live there.
“I remember when they would bomb a house, not just shoot into it”
Was that mayor good?
L
“The idiot cops managed to burn down an entire neighborhood.”
There was a joke (not sure if it was true or not), after Mayor Goode got shot, the headline read:
GOOD SHOT
Philadelphia’s force seems to get into the news a lot. Do they drink a lot on the job?
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