From: Steve Grammont (islander@midmaine.com)
Date: Wed Jan 08 2003 - 08:48:09 PST
Ryan,
>One of the most interesting things I've heard in the news recently is
>that an officer here in DFW, burst into a convenience store with a
>balaclava/mask on and in plain clothes with a gun drawn. She was
>trying to arrest a drug suspect. Guess what, the store's owner shot
>her. Go figure. I'd have done the same thing.
You know... I think about this every time I see a cop movie with the good
guys (almost always plain clothes) with guns drawn running down the
street yelling for people to "get down". Only a handful of movies ever
show said cop being intercepted by uniformed police "concerned" about a
"citizen" running around with a drawn weapon yelling at people. The only
one I can think of off the top of my head was James Cahn in "Alien
Nation". I have to figure that a lot more of this would happen in real
life than in all those cop movies we see. Police have an obligation to
make their identification clearly evident for a reason.
This also gets back to a very old thread on this list where I pointed out
that I had the "right" to walk down a street in full camo gear with frag
vest, Kevlar helmet, full ammo pouches, pistol on side, and a legally
owned class III slung on my shoulder. All 100% legal. If a cop did not
approach me with gun drawn or hand on gun... well... that would be one
place I would never ever want to live in because the police were either
incompetent or the population so paranoid that walking around in gear
only suited for open warfare was "normal".
The sad thing is the same people that would strongly argue that I should
be able to do the above because it is "my legal right to do so" and if I
"don't exercise my rights I will lose them" would probably also shoot me
dead without warning if I walked into their shop.
Steve
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