This is the kind of thing that the liberal left is going to point to and say "See! Conceal/Carry laws are dangerous and must be repealed!"
No, STUPID old STILL power hungry EX-COPS are dangerous and must be repealed.
Good Lord, My Uncle has to be spinning in His grave.
If this idiot had been on His PD even retired he would have still gotten an earful from My Uncle.
Thowing stuff at a victim is sometimes a technique to distract the victim's attention long enough for you to hit the victim with your fist or a weapon.
That popcorn may just save the cop.
Throwing the popcorn at the cop could have been the precursor from an attack by the rude moviegoer.
In the movies, sand is often used as well as countless other objects.
Was it buttered popcorn?
At least you have the decency to suggest that it might have been the thrown popcorn and not the texting to which the defendant was responding. People have been arrested for barking at police dogs. If you throw popcorn or anything else at a cop, you are going to jail. The same should apply to movie patrons assaulting other movie patrons.
I would like to hear more about the seating arrangements in this theater.
If, for example, the defendant returned to the theater and DID choose to sit somewhere more distant from the texter, and the texter is the one who sought out the defendant for a second confrontation, and if the texter outweighs the defendant by 100 pounds, and if the texter is accompanied by an accomplice, and if the texter closes the distance to the defendant to an intimidating degree, and if the popcorn was deliberately thrown into the face of the defendant in a possible attempt to temporarily blind him, then there might be more to "self-defense" than otherwise appears.
For those who think that there was time for the defendant to assess the situation while drawing his gun, I can assure you that I can draw my .380 from a pocket holster and fire in just over one second. Not much is going to change in that one second and the justification for shooting is unlikely to disappear if it did, in fact, exist.
Also, I was taught in my self-defense classes that one shoots to stop an attack by firing two shots to center-of-mass of the attacker and then assess the situation. Any situation that justifies one shot should be able to justify a double-tap. Guns are not magic wands. It's very possible to be killed by a wounded attacker.
As others have pointed out, this is probably a lose-lose situation not only for the actors in the drama, but for the entire nation. Concealed carry takes a hit. Cops take a hit. Even texting and movie-going take a hit.