June 15, 2011, 09:52 AM | #1 |
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Defense of Others
We often discuss about whether it is wise to intervene in a third-party conflict. Over at THR, I came across this real-world example of how that can go wrong:
http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/c...f98f01edf.html As a nightclub in Missouri was closing, shots rang out. Asif Blake, an Iraq veteran with the Missorui National Guard was firing a weapon outside in the parking lot. Officer Daryl Hall, an off-duty police officer who frequented the clun, rushed outside and confronted Blake, ordering him to drop his weapon. When Blake refused, Hall began firing. At this point, the club's bouncer, Will Spencer, a sergeant with the 375th Civil Engineer Squadron working a second job, arrived at the parking lot and saw Hall shooting Blake. Not recognizing Hall, who was an acquaintance, Spencer fired two shots*, killing Hall. Both the police officer and Blake died at the scene. *Spencer was apparently not licensed to work as a bouncer in Missouri. According to the news article, bouncers must be licensed and are not authorized to carry firearms. I thought the story was interesting because it demonstrated a number of factors we discuss here often. 1. Looks can be deceiving. Spencer apparently was acquainted with Hall. However, in the early morning light, he didn't recognize Hall and didn't hear Hall announce himself as a police officer. What looked like a case of one man shooting another down in cold blood in a bar parking lot, turned out to be more complex. 2. Unless you saw the whole scenario from beginning to end and were close enough to hear everything that transpired, it would be very easy to get the wrong idea about what was happening here. |
June 15, 2011, 10:57 AM | #2 |
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I dont know what I would do in that situation. My first reaction would be call the police. Second idea is to get out of there as fast as possible, but thats just me. If I was equipped to handle a situation like that though, maybe I would have found cover and asked whats going on.
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June 15, 2011, 12:02 PM | #3 |
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The clearest thing about this story is that there are no "good guys" here.
As you noted, BR, Mr. Spencer was working illegally as a bouncer, given that he had no license for such work -- and even if he'd had the license, he should not have had a gun: bouncers in St. Louis are not permitted to carry weapons. (And it's not known if he had a carry permit, in any case.) He's not exactly a poster child for responsible citizenship. Mr. Hall, the off-duty officer who was killed after leaving the bar and opening fire on the suspect, had a blood alcohol level of 0.047%. That's under the legal limit for driving -- but would any of us want to go shooting with someone with that much alcohol on board? I think not. Another non-poster-child... There are way too many things wrong with this picture... What, by the way, are the laws in MO about carry in bars? Drinking while doing so? This case doesn't provide much support for loosening restrictions on such...
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June 15, 2011, 02:20 PM | #4 |
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Just one more reason to stay the heck out of bars.
We had 2 bars, one night some folks came in guns drawn and shooting. Almost every person in the bart pulled a gun and commenced to shooting the place up. One gal had a 41 mag. I dug over 40 slugs out of the walls and found a slide blew off someones gun behind a cooler. You just never know who has a gun, this was long before ccw was allowed in that state. I took a sawed off 12 ga off a guy one time. |
June 15, 2011, 02:32 PM | #5 |
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Kind of an easy answer ... if you don't know what's going on, don't shoot ... period ... how could you possibly know who's right and who's wrong with two guys shooting at each other? call 9-1-1 and duck ...
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June 15, 2011, 02:59 PM | #6 | |
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There are lots and lots of unanswered questions with this story.
From another story on the incident Quote:
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June 15, 2011, 04:24 PM | #7 |
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As CCW citizens we are not law enforcers and my thought process is, if my life, a friend and relative are not in immediate danger, I refuse to personally get involved in any situation that does not relate to me.
Because if you end up shooting the wrong person, you can put yourself in a lot trouble. In this instance, I will leave the area and call the police. My CCW is not for the protection of others who have refused to take their own safety seriously. I will only get involve if I know the whole story other than that; the police will have to handle it. Not interested in playing a hero!
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June 15, 2011, 04:41 PM | #8 |
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I know exactly what I'd do in that situation - call the police, and that's all. I am not a police officer, not trained to be one, don't have the immunity an officer has, and certainly not paid to be one. I will risk my life and freedom to protect myself and my immediate family, with very few exceptions. I suppose if I heard someone screaming rape in a close proximity where it is clear that a much stronger person is basically torturing a weaker person, I might intervene if I have the ability to do so effectively. Otherwise, I'd call "911". That's what its for.
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June 15, 2011, 05:31 PM | #9 | |
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June 15, 2011, 05:50 PM | #10 | |
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June 15, 2011, 06:03 PM | #11 | |
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June 15, 2011, 06:53 PM | #12 |
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Patience is a virtue. The bouncer 'jumped the gun." This is hardly the first time a cop out of uniform has been shot by mistake. Apparently undercover cops have it the worst. Here is a Baltimore incident involving an on duty cop in civilian clothes that closely parallels the St. Louis shooting in that uniformed officers didn't know what was going down when they first arrived on the scene. Unfortunately, these things are over in seconds, and nobody gets their money back.
http://www.wbaltv.com/r/26427374/detail.html |
June 15, 2011, 06:55 PM | #13 | |
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If a person intervened in their 'play', it wouldn't surprise me at all if that person got his clock cleaned by the both of them. Certainly, if that person intervened with deadly force, the supposed 'victim' would be the star witness against him at trial for his unwarranted attack on the injured/deceased spouse. Not all is as it seems. |
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June 15, 2011, 08:34 PM | #14 | |
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What if it was your wife, daughter, sister, or mother being hurt? Would you want someone with the ability to help them to stand around and let it happen? It is a bad situation and one that each person has to judge for themselves and decide the best way to handle it. |
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June 15, 2011, 09:28 PM | #15 |
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I think we can all agree that drinking while carrying is a bad idea. I'd be willing to bet that most departments prohibit it. Dunno about other states but in Texas using lethal force in defense of others is legal....but I'm very unlikely to intervene in a situation that I don't understand.
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June 16, 2011, 10:11 AM | #16 |
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I think it a valid point that we should not assume that all females are innocent because of their sex. Men sometimes have to defend themselves against women. And as has been posted on TFL many times, women who are victims of domestic abuse often paradoxically attack their defender, in defense of their own attacker/husband/boyfriend. It makes for a very difficult and volatile situations in which LE professionals tread quite carefully.
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June 16, 2011, 10:28 AM | #17 | |
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Simple as ABC . . . Always Be Carrying |
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June 16, 2011, 11:31 AM | #18 |
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I want to say that in some states, an LEO's police powers are suspended when they reach a certain level of intoxication, but I may be just reaching.
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June 16, 2011, 01:16 PM | #19 | |
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Last edited by SRH78; June 16, 2011 at 01:49 PM. |
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June 16, 2011, 01:30 PM | #20 | |
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That is ludicrous, blowing a .04 at the end of the evening is not impaired, it is half the ludicrously low .08 threshold for DUI |
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June 16, 2011, 01:34 PM | #21 | |
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June 16, 2011, 01:37 PM | #22 | |
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The Minnesota standard for intoxication around firearms, which is the one I'm familiar with, is 0.04, or half the legal limit for driving, so he would have been illegal by that metric; I don't know whether MO has a comparable standard. But was there enough alcohol in his system to impair his judgment? Probably. Did that contribute to his death? Hard to say. But it's irresponsible for anyone, police officer or not, to drink that much while carrying, and it sure didn't help.
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June 16, 2011, 01:49 PM | #23 | |
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Fyi, there have been a lot of people get out of DWI's because their bac wasn't checked until much later at the station. The prosecutors are well aware their bac was above the limit when they were stopped but that doesn't matter in court because all that matters is what it was when checked. I think it is safe to assume that the individuals responding were more concerned with trying to save his life, as they should have been, than checking his bac. |
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June 16, 2011, 01:53 PM | #24 | |
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June 16, 2011, 03:53 PM | #25 |
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Defense of others is one thing, but coming to the aid of another and using lethal force would, at least on my part, require myself to be in danger as well. Fistfights are one thing, but running in to the middle of two armed individuals who have had a bit to drink? No thanks.
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