Teen Shot In Melbourne Was A Good Family Friend

[brettprevans]

feeling pretty low. The teenager shot in Melbourne last night was a very good family friend. for those who dont know anything about it, this is just one of many stories in papers.

He wasnt a bad kid. not on drugs. a little messed up. His dad died of bone cancer 4 years ago last week. I babysat him and his brother for 5 years when the were younger. they were all at my wedding. He was atacked on the trains last night and came up so upset and aggitated that something went off inside him and he just wanted it all to be over i think. Well i guess the cops helped him out there. bastards.

Its a terrible terrible thing. And worst of all it stinks to high heaven of cop BS. 4 cops with guns against a scrawny 15 yr old. they dont deserve to be cops if they cant handle that situation. Ive worked for the Federal Police. I know BS when i see and hear it. anyway I didnt want to start a debate about that.

I would encourage anyone who reads tis to consider the situation and give their support to non lethal weapons for police such as tasars. this would never have turned out this way if they had tasars.

My thoughts an wishes go to his famil and families of anyone else who experianced a similar situation.

 

[Katherine]

I thought police were trained to handle situations like that with out a gun. crazy!

 

[raven19]

My commiserations to his family and friends. It is trajic to see any person (particularly so young) taken.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

Sorry to hear Citymorgue



Looks like the Vic police are upholding their reputation of shoot first, then work out their story.


I have always been wary of the Vic police, you just dont know when your going to get shot...


At least in QLD and NSW they would rough you up a bit with a phone book. h34r:

 

[Pollux]

Always sad to hear of things like this...

Now excuse me for being Captain Smegging Obvious here, but wouldn't shooting someone in the knee to incapacitate them make a wiser choice...

That said, people shot in the knee can give evidence, those shot to the point of death can not.....

 

[buttersd70]

Always sad to hear of things like this...

Now excuse me for being Captain Smegging Obvious here, but wouldn't shooting someone in the knee to incapacitate them make a wiser choice...

That said, people shot in the knee can give evidence, those shot to the point of death can not.....

Not wanting to sound like I'm defending the police....which pretty much goes against everything I hold dear..... but police (or anyone trained to use firearms against other people) always fire at the centre of body mass, as (correctly) stated by the police spokesman in the article. 'Shoot to wound' is pure hollywood. Which is why there is such a strong call for non-lethal alternatives (tasers, etc). The issue (as I see it) is not the lethal grouping of the shots; rather, it's whether the shots were justified under the circumstances in the first place. The thing that nags at the back of my mind is the range, stated as 14m, considering that the only weapon (allegedly) in evidence was a knife....makes the condition of "immediate threat to life", required to justify the use of firearms, questionable.

Hopefully the inquest will not be a whitewash, and will reveal the facts as they occured.

Commiserations to the family.

 

[Pollux]

Butters, yes, I know that is police and military training, which is sad...

And as said, one 15 yr old 'kid' against 4 armed officers, lethal force just doesn't seem needed in my mind. I have friends who have previously performed alot of work in PMCs, they could have thought of at least 4-5 different non-lethal ways to have diffused the situation.

 

[buttersd70]

I certainly don't disagree with you Pollux. Not at all. There are many ways, as you said, that the situation could have been brought to a non lethal resolution, at least from the information available at this point in time.

 

[Leigh]

Commisserations Brett. Please pass on our thoughts to the family.

I was disgusted when I heard this report. I know many police, but when the kid is only armed with knives, a few cuts on the arms will heal versus a dead child who will never see another day...(I know that is not how they are trained though )

The police cornered him...four cops versus one child, he was always going to go for them. At least two of them should have fallen back and this may have ended a lot differently!

 

[MVZOOM]

Can't comment on the circumstance as I wasn't there, but my commiserations to the family and his freinds. 15 Y/O is too young to go, it's not fair really.

Cheers - Mike

 

[jonocarroll]

I figure you've either posted this as a focus point for sympathy towards the victim's family, or for debate/discussion. I will assume the latter, though my condolences to the family, the officers involved, and the families of those officers. This is certainly a situation that no one would choose to be involved in, and will remain in the minds of the above for the remainder of their lives.

I will pretext this post with a caveat that I am not a law official, I have no legal or officer training, and I am not a witness to any of the events mentioned. I merely wish to add some information with regard to some previous posts.

<snip>
The thing that nags at the back of my mind is the range, stated as 14m, considering that the only weapon (allegedly) in evidence was a knife....makes the condition of "immediate threat to life", required to justify the use of firearms, questionable.

I doubt that any of us can put ourselves in the mental state that the officers were in at the time due to the circumstances, but officers are trained to deal with situations similar to this. To quote ('The Tactical Edge - Surviving High-Risk Patrol');

Empty-hand techniques are NOT the preferred force against knives. In skilled hands, knives can inflict as much or more damage than a bullet, and many officers fail to appreciate how very dangerous they are. If you see a knife and have time and distance, your sidearm should be out; you are facing deadly force. ... Unless your sidearm is already out and ready, you'll first have to block or evade the suspect's threatening move in order to buy yourself time to then get your sidearm in hand and get on target. Even if your hand is on your holstered sidearm, trying to get it out at close range without first interrupting the assault is a good way to get yourself killed or seriously injured.

In the very least, active sidearms would be permitted in this scenario.

The police cornered him...

According to the article posted above (subject to witnesses of course) the officer was the one who was cornered. The victim supposedly had knive[s] and was making verbal threats to the officers' lives. Once again, we cannot know or presumably even imagine how this scenario appeared to the officer in question. The article claims that a warning shot was fired.

I don't wish to sound biased towards a particular side. I'm not. I cannot say whether or not this situation would have turned out different if tasers had been used. I am a supporter of neutrality in these difficult situations, something very difficult to achieve when you are connected to those involved somehow, but it is the only way that truth can be discovered. At the end of this, I think we should all remember two truths about a good and decent society;

- The taking of a life by another person is never justified.
- Threatening to take a life of another person with means and intent is tantamount to the act itself, and is never justified.

In a perfect world, this situation would never have occurred - neither parties would have been in the situations they found themselves in. Since this is not a perfect world, and this event has transpired, I can only hope that others are able to learn from this and make a conscious effort to not end up in these situations. Once again, my condolences to all involved.

 

[buttersd70]

To clarify my prior post; I did not state that empty handed techniques were a valid option, I did not question the appropriateness of the officers having their sidearms in an instant condition, nor did I intend to imply that there was no threat to life (I only meant to query the immediacy of that threat) ...my concern is, in a nutshell, did the officers fire to early?

 

[glenos]

is it that hard to say, "DROP THE KNIFE"

I have a few friends who are cops down here, I was talking to one recently and he said it is a hard thankless job, but when you do get thanks its like gold. He went on to ell me about a situation, they were called to a domestic, kid on ice gone troppo in the house, threatening his family.

2 cops arrive draw batten and spray, approaching the house the see a blood trail out the door, replace batten and spray draw handgun. As any one would.
Find the kid (16 yo) with Dads rifle, off his nut, aim at kid and shout, surrender or I'll shoot. the kid surrendered.
Situation over and no one got hurt.

Cops returned the next day to issue a summons on the dad for not securing his firearms. And the mum thanked them for not shooting her son, my friend went on to say that had it been Vic the kid would be dead.

 

[Adamt]

is it that hard to say, "DROP THE KNIFE"

From the article: "Tyler had been brandishing knives and had told one officer "'kill me, I'm going to kill you'.''

I'm not sure he would've dropped the knife with a simple verbal request.

 

[brettprevans]

thanks to all those for the thoughts.

no i didnt want to start a debate as theres no happy ending and no simple solution.

Yes I have my feelings about this but theres no point airing them in a public forum. I have worked in the military and with Federal Police and undergrads in justice. This stinks of BS. I even been confronted by druggos with knvives back in my uni days whilst working in bottlos (in the northcote area by coincidence). I nebver shot any of them and there was only one of me. Yes I gave a few of those druggos a beating but if I could do it as a uni student then 4 cops can also also. again not laying blame or wanting a debate. my intention was to share my grief and try and make some good out of this situation (ie support for tasers).

As a side point - I have personally had a blast from a tasar (by choice - a few mates have them). Whilst not the most comfortable experiance going around, i would shure as hell prefer to be given multiple blasts from that than be dead.

again thanks for the support.

PS yes my thoughts have turned to the officers involved because unless their complete ***** ups this will affect them also and it will be hard for them. As im not a one eyed dumbarse myself I can at least see this side and hope that the officers involved can move past this and learn from the experiance in a way that may prevent this from happening again if they are faced with th same siutation

 

[Jase71]

Spiderman would have handled it better. Shoot a web from his finger and all would have been fine.

Look, I know the media reports are always fucked up, but it really did sound like this young guy has some psychological issues that weren't addressed. To be honest, it reads like he was an ice-head (of which I have seen several very ugly situations involving law enforcement & out of control meth users), but to read citymorgue's comment that he didn't do drugs, well that's enough for me to dismiss that, coming from a family friend. But outside of losing his dad four years ago, just maybe there were untreated symptoms of mental illness. We live in a society where such matters are often frowned upon, and people don't feel they can seek the treatment/counselling they deserve. Harder to for a guy, and moreso for a young guy to put his hand up and say 'ok, I think I might have some personal problems'.

I've tried to word this as best as I can without wanting to offend, so if I have failed in doing so, please accept my apologies. My thoughts goes out to the family & close friends at this difficult time. It makes it that little bit closer to home when we hear a side of the story from one of the AHB community, and not just twisted & skewed media projections.

 

[Steve]

Sorry to here about your family friend being killed CM. When I first heard it on the news I immediately thought where were the tazers? Its a shame.
Steve

 

[brettprevans]

no worries Jase. no offense taken at all.

media does f*ck things up. they keep reporting that his dad died 2 yrs ago. it was 4. apparently his stepfather visited the skatepark. he didnt have a stepfather as his mum hasnt remarried and isnt in a serios or longterm relationship. they always screw things up.

Its jut a completely screwed up situation, with no easy or good answers.

 

[Leigh]

According to the article posted above (subject to witnesses of course) the officer was the one who was cornered. The victim supposedly had knive[s] and was making verbal threats to the officers' lives. Once again, we cannot know or presumably even imagine how this scenario appeared to the officer in question. The article claims that a warning shot was fired.

I don't wish to sound biased towards a particular side. I'm not. I cannot say whether or not this situation would have turned out different if tasers had been used. I am a supporter of neutrality in these difficult situations, something very difficult to achieve when you are connected to those involved somehow, but it is the only way that truth can be discovered. At the end of this, I think we should all remember two truths about a good and decent society;

- The taking of a life by another person is never justified.
- Threatening to take a life of another person with means and intent is tantamount to the act itself, and is never justified.

In a perfect world, this situation would never have occurred - neither parties would have been in the situations they found themselves in. Since this is not a perfect world, and this event has transpired, I can only hope that others are able to learn from this and make a conscious effort to not end up in these situations. Once again, my condolences to all involved.

Just wanted to clarify my position Quantum...four cops, one kid, that's what I called cornered. From a psychological viewpoint, when you are outnumbered and there is no way out you go into fight mode.

The kid then managed to corner one of the cops, that, I believe was due to my above statement...

Sad really.

 

[samhighley]

This is indeed a sucky situation, and having lost a brother at a young age I feel for both the parents and his siblings.

At this point I don't feel comfortable pointing any blame towards the officers involved, because they are trained to deal with a situation in a particular way, and having used the only non-lethal option available to them (CS spray), they were forced to use their firearms. Their firearms training teaches them to aim for the central body mass, so if anything is to blame, it is the training available to them.

On the face of it, the availability of tazers may well have changed the outcome of this situation. The main objective of a tazer is to remove muscle control from the target, which causes them to do things such as collapse and drop any weapons they may be brandishing.

Sure, their is the possibility of death when a tazer is deployed, but the potential for lethality is surely far less than a bullet (or bullets) to the central body mass.