When is it legal for me to kill someone? The answers are readily available from numerous sources.
When is it legal for me to kill a policeman? Superficially, the circumstances where I can shoot Joe Nobody are the same, and the rules apply to shooting cops too. That is not how it works in practice. In practice, it is never legal to shoot a cop, ever.
When is it legal for a policeman to kill someone? Again, the police seem to be held to the same standards that I am. Once again, the practice is different from the theory. The police can shoot anyone they like and not be punished in a meaningful way. Being sent home for three months with pay is not a punishment.
I'm a person who feels that us common citizens have the right to own guns so that we may shoot the agents of the state should all other forms of redress fail. With that in mind, the circumstances where I, a common citizen, may begin shooting should be clearly defined. This serves two purposes, it lets me know when to start shooting, and it lets them know where the lines are.
I also have another radical reform idea. The standards where the police are allowed to use lethal force should be set a lot higher than the common person. As an agent of the state, the policeman can call more resources to bear than I can. And the loss of an individual officer is nowhere near as devastating to the state as the loss of an individual to a family. Currently the system is backwards, the state can kill someone because an individual officer "felt" threatened. If a common citizen should attempt this argument and the corpse has no weapon on it, common man becomes common convict.
Remember, it is not an individual shooting when a cop shoots. It. Is. The. State.
Yes, I know what I propose will make it more dangerous to be a policeman. Tough. There are many other fields hiring. The state MUST use more restraint than the individual and MUST use due process when meting out justice.
Alternatively, make the rules in practice be the same for both a private citizen and an officer of the law. Make it easier for me to shoot and harder for him. One little caveat, if the cop shoots and is justified, he is not a cop ANYWHERE for a year. And he is not paid by any government agency for that year either. He will be just like me, for a year. That lets him defend himself if he needs to, and forces him to think very hard about pulling the trigger because the consequences are extreme.
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As you've heard me say before, I think that one problem is that the police see themselves as something apart from the citizens. They refer to non-police as "civilians." When I hear them talking like that, I want to know "when did you join the military, Herr Gruppenfuhrer?" Not that I say that out loud...ticking off people who have guns and de facto licenses to kill is not wise.
ReplyDeleteHaving everybody serve a turn as street cops and forbidding career cops would be better. It would eliminate the "blue wall of silence," and if everybody had to take a turn, they might appreciate what the police go through better. It's pure hell out there...stale donuts, crappy coffee...nothing but suffering, I tell you!