Discussion for article #243321
I applaud this investigation and the firing of the police chief – as a Chicagoan, I’m not sure I would have wanted to continue to live in a city where I’d have to risk my life every time I wanted to run around in the middle of a busy street wielding a knife while high on PCP. It will be nice to have a city where we can once again swing weapons at crowded intersections and in fast-food parking lots while whacked-out on hallucinogens without fear of being hassled by the man. Kudos, Rahm and Madigan! I feel safer already.
Now that’s some high-octane snark right there, brother.
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Gosh! I missed all that on the video. I never saw this kid once swing his weapon at an intersection…maybe that was on the Burger King video (that the police deleted). The video that I saw showed a kid running straight down the center of the street, and considering the police cars around him, I honestly have to think that only a sniveling coward could have “feared for his life” from him.
I also didn’t see a coroners report, so I don’t know about PCP being found. Could you please provide a link to that? Or could you maybe be making this all up?
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Yes, he had an open knife in his hand, and yes, he was on PCP. Chicago has many fine newspapers and news stations, and through the magic of this series of tubes called the Internet, they are all available at the click of a mouse! Voila! It’s magic!`
By the way, not sure why you sound a little bent out of shape – all I’m saying is that when I get all jacked up higher than a kite on angel dust, and feel the unquenchable, irresistible urge to wander the streets looking for something to cut, I don’t want to have to be worried about the po-po raining on my parade. Can you dig it?
Apparently, reggid is really into the smell of shiny boots in the morning.
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Then he could have and perhaps should have been arrested. 16 shots was a bit much, no? Or does anything go for the police?
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Anything goes? That’s a mighty fine strawman you have there – does it sing and dance, too? Never said anything goes or even remotely like it – I’m saying in THIS case, under the circumstances of the incident, the primary duty of the police was not to protect Laquon, but was instead to protect the rest of the public FROM Laquon. Just out if curiosity, do you know how long it takes to shoot that many times with a gun like the one the officer used? 3 seconds. 3 seconds of squeezing the trigger, and the hopped-up perp is down. At a fundamental level, I think it’s a pretty simple equation: Get high on PCP + walk down the middle of one of the busiest streets on the West Side + wield a knife + refuse repeated orders to drop the knife + make sudden, jerking movement with arm =
suicide by cop. Take out any of those steps, and Laquon would be alive. I’m just thankful Laquon was not able to kill anyone.
So, you think the kid deserved to be shot (again and again and again and . . .) and killed? No chance for a kid like that to mature and grow up? No room for error-- just kill 'em. Some utopia you got there.
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Judge and jury. Case closed. Due process a mirage.
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Yes, McDonald had a small (3 inch) knife and some PCP. The officer was on the scene for no more than 30 seconds before firing; the other at least 8 other cops had who been on the scene longer did not see fit to fire. McDonald did not seem to be as dangerous as this guy. The difference? The perp was white and the cops were British.
Police work is dangerous. There are techniques for dealing with the dangers. Sometimes they work and all is good. Sometimes they fail and the perp ends up dead. Sometimes they fail and a cop ends up dead. And sometimes, like here, something snaps: a cop abandons his training and goes postal.
The officer in the McDonald case had a history of discipline problems (I’m sorry, I don’t have a link.) Apparently, his precinct captain didn’t know this because she had no access to the data. That seems like something worth fixing.
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So, to ignore the troll, how is it that it took this long for the AG to suddenly come to the realization that a federal probes was needed?
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The officer may have been a bad cop; he may have been a horrible person; he may have even been a racist. Or maybe none of that is true. Either way, none of that has jack to do with THIS instance, any more than Laquon’s high-school graduation has to do with his actions on the night in question. Or are you saying any and all Laquon’s prior bad acts are relevant, too? Me, I think all of that is irrelevant to the incident in question – in THAT instance, by getting high, wielding a knife, and refusing to obey police, he got himself killed. Is excessive force a problem among police? Sure it is, but usually NOT in these high-profile cases. Invariably, the cases that all the protesters latch onto involve perps being violent or threatening criminals while high, and either refusing to obey or outright fighting with the police. Not hard to guess how that’s going to end.
reggid’s very public boner for summary execution is deeply icky.
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The cover up here is a big deal. Heads need to roll, as high up as required. This means the mayor. And this means the AG too. Everyone who saw that video, and worked to conceal it, needs to be in prison.
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Spot on, ealleniii. Spot on.
The big deal here is not just the murder of a kid high on PCP. It is the fact that the city covered it up. I’m with you on thinking that a kid on PCP acting crazy with a knife is not someone who is a sympathetic victim. But he was murdered. And it was covered up.
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“Error”? Disagree with me all you want, but please, can we stop sanitizing and minimizing Laquon’s actions by calling them an “error” or a “mistake”? Getting high on PCP and running down the middle of a busy street and in busy parking lots wielding a knife in his hand is not an “error” or a “mistake” – that’s called being a dangerous criminal and a clear and imminent threat to the public.
Stop. Fucking. Lying.
NYT: In all, Mr. McDonald was hit 16 times in 14 or 15 seconds, prosecutors say, and for 13 of those seconds he was on the ground. Of eight officers on the scene, Officer Van Dyke was the only one to fire his gun, prosecutors said.
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The Tribune reported a different analysis, including the 3 seconds I cited. And watch the video – the shooting doesn’t seem to last anywhere near as long as you claim. So stop casting personal aspersions like a dickhead, okay?