Posted on 10/26/2013 1:04:01 AM PDT by moonshinner_09
Cops took no more than 10 seconds to fire six or seven shots into the body of dying teenager Andy Lopez after seeing him with a toy pellet gun. Mr Lopez was spotted by deputies on Tuesday afternoon in Santa Rosa, California, carrying the toy rifle, which they mistakenly thought was a real assault weapon. The time that elapsed between when officers reported the sighting to dispatch and then reported shots fired was only 10 seconds. Hundreds of local residents marched on Wednesday night to remember the popular teen and protest at the senseless shooting. They chanted 'We need justice' as they questioned how the deputies could mistake a pellet gun for an assault rifle.According to a police statement, Lopez was twice instructed to put down his weapon, officers opened fire after he failed to comply - only 10 seconds later. Sixteen seconds later, the cops radioed for medical assistance. Ethan Oliver, who lives across the street, told KTVU.com that the deputies continued to shoot at the boy, even after he had fallen to the ground. Oliver said he went outside after hearing two gun shots and by that time Lopez was already on the ground. ‘Then the cops went at it again and unloaded like six to seven shots,’ he said.When asked if he meant that the deputy shot Lopez while he was on the ground, Oliver said, ‘Yeah. Exactly what I saw.’ Authorities haven't responded to his claims, but it raises the possibility that Lopez was still alive when he hit the ground after the first two shots were fired.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
You sound like an idiot.
When I didn’t know the 10 second info I was willing to understand the cops actions now not at all.
These guys were trigger happy. Hope they get charged with manslaughter.
Geez
We still have our fair share of JBT bootlickers don’t we?
Truly sad
No excuse for shooting down a 13 year old boy less he’s firing or its imminent
The more tactical gear these jackasses get the more cowardly and panicky
A mere shadow of lawmen from youth
What if I shot them if I felt threatened
Same wankers here would be crying for gibbet for my corpse
Is Santa Rosa low on cocker spaniels for them to shoot
Why did the parents allow him a realistic toy?
Are u kidding?
How long you been a member here?
I don’t cotton to illegals either
Actually I think way too much antagonistic demographic LEGAL immigration frankly
But don’t let that cloud this major cop screw up
Murdering kids even if still wet from the river ain’t right
I have a 13 year old who walks around our property and the hills behind us with all manner of realistic looking real live guns
As did I 1960s and 70s
Does that make them a target for zealous cops?
Wannabe
Check homepage
Strip away the immunity and pensions now. Enough with the BS.
That is NOT TRUE! I was at the range in Concord, CA today. The fellow at the next bench was shooting his AK47 that he told me was made in Serbia. Bertil-Roos banned specific “assault weapons” by brand/model, but not by type. He was using 10 round mags, which make the weapon legal. Same is true for AR-15’s. BTW, Santa Rosa is not a good place to be, but the cops in this sad instance are simply killers and it will be interesting to see if and how they weasel out of their crime here.
I am very familiar with California gun laws and I am also rather familiar with military rifles in general and the many variants of Kalashnikov series of weapons.
The pellet gun looks for all the world like a short barreled rifle (SBR) “krinkov” variant which is highly illegal in California fitted with a high capacity magazine which is also illegal in California.
The 10 round magazine has a much different look than the very distinct look of the full sized 30 round banana mag.
It also is missing the orange tip of the barrel , which is put on the pellet gun to help police identify it as toy or pellet gun. It looks like it might have been sawed off. This makes it look even more like an illegal short barreled machine gun with an illegal hi cap magazine affixed.
I'm probably far more familiar with the Kalashnikov series of rifles than most California police officers, and I could have mistakenly assumed the poor kid was carrying fully loaded AK-47SU in the heat of the moment
So in your little anti-police world, would your preferred outcome have been that the kid was a gang member with a real AK-47, and he turned around and killed both of the cops? Would you prefer it if they held their fire until the bullets started flying at them? What is your solution to the situation of a teenager turning and pointing a realistic looking weapon in your direction right in the middle of gang-banger-land? Drop your duty weapon and plead for your life? Try putting your brain in gear prior to engaging your keyboard.
Objections to excessive force is not the equivalent to hating cops.
You can kill 30-40 people in 30 seconds??? You sound like the gun grabbers.
We live not far from where this happened. It’s definitely a “low rent” area, with a combination of very small board houses and open fields that used to be part of someone’s farm (and sometimes still are). But although there are some gang issues around here, I’ve never felt threatened in that neighborhood.
Just wanted to pass on what our local rag related: that the two deputies were a trainer and a trainee. The trainer did all the shooting; the trainee, none.
FWIW, I think the deputy was entirely too hasty in his actions. I hope he’s charged with manslaughter. To go from yelling instructions to drop the weapon (which may be incomprehensible to someone who at first doesn’t even realize they’re yelling at HIM) to firing in less than 10 seconds? And then to unload the whole thing into the theoretical “perp?” I think this is someone who is suffering from twitchiness and anxiety ... with undiagnosed PTSD or similar ... who is either so anxious all the time that he unloads at the slightest provocation, or else is “itching” to shoot. We don’t need people like that in our force.
Ten seconds
Would you prefer it if they held their fire until the bullets started flying at them?
* * *
Most people are crappy shots, especially if they’re moving (as in, turning around, as this boy was). I think they could have waited at least until there was a clear indicator he meant to shoot. All he actually did was (a) carry a long gun that appeared to be real, and (b) turn around, which is what most people do when you yell at them, to find out why you’re yelling at them.
The FBI are going to investigate.
I don’t care if it was real. The simple possession of a firearm is not justification for the death penalty.
Has anyone heard about a dash-cam video? I’ve not seen that addressed in the few articles I’ve read.
13-Year-Old With Pellet Gun Shot 7 Times by Police
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/marchers-protest-calif-deputys-shooting-boy-20668711
“A Sonoma County sheriff’s deputy twice told the boy to drop the weapon, but he instead raised it in the deputy’s direction, police said at a news conference Wednesday.
Police said two deputies were riding in a marked patrol vehicle and were in uniforms when they spotted Andy in a hooded sweatshirt and shorts at 3:14 p.m. Tuesday. His back was turned toward the deputies, and they did not realize he was a boy.
One of the deputies saw what appeared to be an assault rifle similar to an AK-47 in the teen’s left hand. The deputies pulled over and took cover behind one of the vehicle’s doors, according to police.
A witness reported seeing the patrol car’s overhead emergency lights turn on and hearing the chirp of a siren, police said.
One of the deputies twice ordered Andy to drop the weapon, according to a witness, police said.
The teen was about 20 or 30 feet away from the deputies with his back toward them when he began turning around with what one deputy described as the barrel of the rifle rising up and turning in his direction, police said.
One deputy then fired several rounds, striking the boy at least once, Henry said. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Investigators said they believe eight rounds were fired. The timeline released by Santa Rosa police says those shots were fired within 10 seconds of the deputies’ first report of a suspicious person.
At Wednesday’s news conference, Santa Rosa police displayed the pellet gun alongside a real AK-47. The two appeared strikingly similar.”
Thank you for posting the side-by-side. Under most circumstances most people would likely not be able to tell the difference. Key word there is “most people.” In today’s society thoroughly intimidated by the progressive anti-gun media I can very readily see where a ‘mistaken’ gun identity could happen.
The question(s) in this situation becomes:
What is the police protocol for an armed citizen open carrying? Does a child maintain that right? Toy gun or not?
I could understand the police using extreme caution on approach. Is 10 seconds enough caution to properly identify the gun? Earlier this week I took the standpoint that the kid’s parents were ultimately at fault for the tragedy. Because the kid should have been old enough to respond the police orders. Now that we see it was only 10 seconds, wow, what is a reasonable response time? Did the kid even know they were talking to him, given he knew he had a “toy?”
Again, I can see both sides here. A kid, a teenager for that matter, walking around a neighborhood with something like this...playing tough-guy, playing bad guy?
As a child, if you grew-up around guns, you learned gun safety from an adult. I recall my dad teaching us kids a good dose of gun safety around the BB and pellet guns the brother’s had. By the time we were teenagers if the cops told us to put the ‘gun down’...yeah we would have been startled, but would have complied. Would 10 seconds have been long enough for compliance? Would we have turned around in ‘surprise’ and been shot? Would we have known how to hold the gun in a non-threatening manner?
So this to a degree still comes back to the parents.
But there is now the glaring reality of a 10 second time frame for compliance. Given that the ‘toy gun’ is obviously altered and without the very identifiers that would have saved this child’s life. Which the fact the airsoft gun is devoid of the safety identifiers...leads us back to the parental control over this teenager.
The kid removed those safety identifiers, the parents were not monitoring the potential dangerous toy for such alterations and it cost this child his freakin’ life.
“These guys were trigger happy. Hope they get charged with manslaughter.”
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I agree, and as I have posted on other threads, American cops are morphing into jack-booted thugs. I noticed it before I left, even in small rural towns.
I do not know the cause. Maybe they watch too many cop movies that portray the image. Most seem to be young bucks, under 35.
I personally won't, and couldn't in fact, kill anyone unless it's in self defense as a last resort and I am in imminent fear of my life ( and possibly not even then), so It's hard to visualize a situation where I would kill 30-40 people under any circumstance.
However, an AK-47 with a 40 round capacity magazine is easily capable of 40 aimed shots in about 30 seconds. If the shooter is able to aim the rifle accurately and the targets are at close range, say between 0- 75yards, then yes - it is very possible to shoot 30-40 people in that time frame.
People shot at close range with an AK-47 can die from those wounds if they are serious enough and there is no medical care available in a sufficiently timely fashion.
These guns are not toys, they are serious weapons that arms manufactures have spent many years and many millions of development dollars to develop into the most effective weapons possible.
The fact of the matter is that well trained, serious gun owners are responsible owners and operators who respect the capabilities of these weapons and handle them accordingly in a safe, responsible fashion. These owners are also the least likely people to commit a murder or accidental killing.
In Texas, the homicide rate in general is something like 7 killings per 100,000 people.
For serious gun owners with a concealed weapons permit, the rate is 0.6 killings per 100,000 people, more than 10 times lower than the general public, even tough they are much more likely to be armed.
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