Ship of Fools: Boston Bombing - Would you shoot if you could here?

Thread: Boston Bombing - Would you shoot if you could here? Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by TomOfTarsus (# 3053) on :

I spotted this incredible set of pictures of the Watertown shootout that left the older of the Boston Marathon bombers dead.

Of course in the comments the ITG's* show up, saying if this guy's phone was a gun, etc. But they have a point. I've thought it over, and I must admit that had I a suitable weapon at hand, while I may have been nervous as all get-out, I think I could have been steady enough to get a shot or two off, and at that range, to good effect. By shooting down with a shotgun or small rifle, danger to others from ricochet, etc would have been somewhat less. There's no way I'd try it with a handgun.

Keep in mind, too, that only about 4 minutes pass over that series of pictures. So... (1) you have to assess the situation (2) decide you need to do something (3) get your weapon, load it, conceal yourself, unsafe it, steady up and fire. That's a lot in the heat of such a wild & unexpected scenario. A bullet went through this guy's second floor room, so there is every good reason to go to the basement.

I've never been in a tactical situation, and the thought that my first shot would alert them to my presence and invite return fire is no small thing- so a careful aim is doubly important, but that's what's up for discussion. What would YOU do?

* ITG's - Internet Tough Guys

Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on :

There's also the question of being able to convince the police on the scene that you're a citizen-vigilante, not an accomplice-sniper. Not wanting to get targeted by the police seems a very good reason not to open fire.

Posted by TomOfTarsus (# 3053) on :

Very true.

I think I left something out of my original question, almost as though it were an assumption: we could discuss, should you shoot as well, and as you note, from either a practical or moral perspective.

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

I think there would be three initial points that would (or should) go through my mind:

First, do I have a gun? (I don't in real life.)

Secondly, can I take a good shot? This depends partly on how far away the bombers are and the gun one's using but also on one's own ability. In reality I don't think I can shoot straight to save my life (I never won a goldfish at the fair ground) but if one were trying to a shoot terrorist I think one needs to make some kind of assessment (even a snap one) about whether one can hit the target. If not, then there seems to be little point engaging.

Thirdly (assuming the answer to the second point is 'yes') it seems to me that to be successful here one needs to fire two accurate rounds in quick succession. Shooting Terrorist No. 1 will alert Terrorist No. 2 to your position who will then (quite possibly) start shooting at you.

On a not entirely unrelated note, I was rather shocked by the photos of the bullet that penetrated the wall of the house and a chair. Most houses in the UK are made out of brick and I've always assumed that they would stop a bullet from a handgun (I don't know whether this has been put to the test). Brick-built houses appear to be less common in the United States. Whereas I'd probably feel comfortable firing out of a house made out of bricks, I'd feel much less comfortable firing out of a wooden house.

So all in all, the answer's 'no' I think. And that's before I wet myself out of fear of what's going on outside.

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

And I think the guy showed some guts in peeking out of his window to take the photographs. That's more than a lot of people would do (probably me included).

Posted by Freddy (# 365) on :

Laurel Street is not a dead-end street. Why didn't the brothers drive away in the opposite direction after blowing up the bomb?

Why didn't the police surround them? Or maybe they were in the process of surrounding them, noting that these incredible pictures are mostly taken in the span of a few minutes.

It seems like a lousy place to take a stand.

As to whether I would shoot, my experience is that it takes a long time to decide what it is exactly you are seeing. Having never done it before, I doubt that I would have had the confidence that I was in fact looking at the bombers themselves in time to take such a momentous action.

But if I did, I doubt that the police would ever know - since there was so much gunfire going on.

Posted by Gramps49 (# 16378) on :

As I recall within seconds of the first explosion there were a number of law enforcement officers who had their weapons drawn; but, obviously they did not have a target. Besides with all the pandemonium after the first blast I do not think there would have been a safe way to neutralize a target if they had one.

In my experience often times law enforcement officers do not realize what is happening before them until after the fact. There were many individuals with backpacks there, and there were many other backpacks that were there at the finish line waiting for their owners who were in the race.

It is only after the fact when law enforcement officers can review the videos, stills, and security tapes along with other forms of evidence and witnesses that they can identify who, what and when of the incident.

Posted by Gramps49 (# 16378) on :

My apologies. After posting my missive, I reread the OP and realized it was about the incident on Watertown, not necessarily about the bombing in Boston.

That said, I know of an incident that happened in a neighboring town where a sniper sitting in the belfry of the Presbyterian church across the street shot up a sheriff's office. A civilian tired to "assist," getting his rifle out and returning fire. The sniper easily shot and wounded him. This caused confusion among the police responding. They were not sure if there were two snipers, so they treated the wounded civilian as a hostile, nor were they able to get to the civilian to render aid quickly. Fortunately the civilian survived, the sniper did not, but the civilian was charged with interfering with the police--a charge that was later dropped.

No, let the law enforcement do their job.

Posted by TomOfTarsus (# 3053) on :

Well, some good thoughts here and a sobering cautionary tale (Gramps49). Yeah, "fog of war" things would be happening. As the guy noted, he was incredulous that he recognized the two bombers, and 4 minutes later, it was over.

In this case he had a distinct tactical advantage - for indeed to open fire is to invite return fire. But here he would be opening a "second front" as it were - and as others have noted, with all the gunfire and their attention focused on the police up the street, a single pop in all that melee might not catch there attention, and being wounded by anything, even a .22 at this range, is going to put a crimp in their style quickly. A semi-auto shotgun would have ended the standoff in quick fashion, I think.

Yet my point here is distinctly ANTI-ITG. It's bloody easy to sit back after the fact and point out how you'd have popped'em with your AR-15, but it's very different when confronted with a quick-moving, uncertain and dangerous scene.

Yet I feel that, if I could have, I should have, and let the cops figure it out afterwards. And in this particular case (as opposed to the sniper situation above), I'd have been at a distinct tactical advantage, with concealment, surprise, cover of darkness, and the "second front" aspect on my side. I think in terms of my little .22 rifle, as I said, and I know the shot itself isn't very difficult - the situation is. The good thing, I thought, about my little .22 is that it would probably wound sufficiently, but it would have to be a very well placed shot to kill.

But then again, I wouldn't have been properly sworn and deputized (think Wild West movies here [Biased]

), and perhaps there would have been interference charges, etc. Still, bottom line, I think that in this case, if I could have, I should have.

[ 25. April 2013, 17:00: Message edited by: TomOfTarsus ]

Posted by chive (# 208) on :

Would I shoot? No. No. And thrice no. I cannot conceive of a situation where I would shoot someone no matter what they've done. But then I come from a very different cultural context.

Posted by TomOfTarsus (# 3053) on :

But the police would. They were trying to. Are you saying that the police shouldn't, nobody should, or only you shouldn't?

Posted by Mere Nick (# 11827) on :

It would be hard to be sure who to shoot at. Maybe it would help if bad guys all dressed like Black Bart and his henchmen. Other than that it would probably take a bit to figure out who is shooting at who and to make sure someone with the bad guys isn't a hostage.

Posted by the giant cheeseburger (# 10942) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Crœsos:
There's also the question of being able to convince the police on the scene that you're a citizen-vigilante, not an accomplice-sniper.

Or a Jack Ruby for that matter. If there's a larger organisation involved, killing a suspect is not going to help you find out more about them.

quote:
Originally posted by TomOfTarsus:
Well, some good thoughts here and a sobering cautionary tale (Gramps49). Yeah, "fog of war" things would be happening. As the guy noted, he was incredulous that he recognized the two bombers, and 4 minutes later, it was over.

In this case he had a distinct tactical advantage - for indeed to open fire is to invite return fire. But here he would be opening a "second front" as it were - and as others have noted, with all the gunfire and their attention focused on the police up the street, a single pop in all that melee might not catch there attention, and being wounded by anything, even a .22 at this range, is going to put a crimp in their style quickly. A semi-auto shotgun would have ended the standoff in quick fashion, I think.

Yet my point here is distinctly ANTI-ITG. It's bloody easy to sit back after the fact and point out how you'd have popped'em with your AR-15, but it's very different when confronted with a quick-moving, uncertain and dangerous scene.

I agree about the "second front" point, with the Tsarnaev brothers focusing on the police in front, a shot from a window with the lights turned off inside would be impossible to trace.

But would those four minutes have been enough time for the average ITG to do anything useful? They would have to
1. work out what was going on.
2. choose what to do.
3. go and unlock the secure storage where they, as a responsible gun owner of course, keep their guns.
4. get ammunition which they, as a responsible gun owner of course, keep locked away in a separate location.
5. return to the window, get lined up and shoot.

Might be possible to load a mission and get firing inside four minutes on COD, but in the real world?

Regardless of whether it would have been possible, I'm leaning towards the "should not" answer to the OP, because of the bigger implications around what would have happened if both suspects were dead and the whole trail went cold without any answers. Pissing off the organisations represented in the "High Value Detainee Interrogation Group" wouldn't have been a good idea.

quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
Laurel Street is not a dead-end street. Why didn't the brothers drive away in the opposite direction after blowing up the bomb?

Why didn't the police surround them? Or maybe they were in the process of surrounding them, noting that these incredible pictures are mostly taken in the span of a few minutes.

It seems like a lousy place to take a stand.

I agree, it does seem like a lousy place for a stand, but I doubt they intended to have a shootout there and it was just a result of stupid tactics (the Mercedes being tracked by its owner's phone) catching up with them and leading the police to catch them there. There's plenty of other stupid things they did which suggest they were not quite up to Al Qaeda grade.

As for the police tactics, I've seen a siege unfold here in Adelaide before. The movement was very deliberate, the police took their time making the right moves instead of rushing at any point, the textbook suggests slow and steady is the way to get the job done right without making hasty moves which could make for a very leaky cordon or police being exposed to unsafe positions.

In this Laurel Street case, it could well have been that there were moves being made to establish a cordon around the opposite side but that it was progressing very deliberately in the light of explosives being involved rather than rushing in to "surround" the shootout spot. What made things complicated here (as opposed to a 'proper' siege situation) was that the Tsarnaev brothers were making panicked moves that were not predictable and the situation was very fluid, moving very quickly from a manhunt to a convergence on a shootout and then to another manhunt.

Whatever happened or didn't happen or was in the process of happening is sure to be reviewed and the tactics updated if improvements are identified. What happened on Laurel Street looks reasonably okay to me, although the large number of rounds fired should be investigated to see if there's a need for better firearm discipline training for the police. The biggest cause for concern would have to be the escape of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev from Laurel Street, and that it took over twelve hours to locate him after that. The prolific variety of different police agencies involved should also be concerning, if merging some of them together is not possible then there could always be improvements made in communication and cooperation.

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

Three things to think about.
1. Muzzle Flash
2. The curious mix of ballistics and biology
3. The Harlem Globetrotters do not play in the NBA

Posted by Jay-Emm (# 11411) on :

It's pretty much the 'ideal' situation.
But even there their must be so much uncertainty, sods law if I'd tried I'd have shot the bystander cowering in photo4* or one of the police.

But it's the closest call, I'm not sure what I'd have done (probably cowered) and whether it would have helped (probably not). And I also suspect that camera makes it look deceptively easy. No need to open a window, no need even to be in the window, a much wider shot.

In general, with the number of people in Greater Boston, you need to be more than 99.99% certain or you'll be more harmful than the attack.**

*made you look (or maybe you could extract the details in less than 4 minutes) [Smile]

**That's being crudely simple (and vastly erring on the side of vigilantism)

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jay-Emm:
It's pretty much the 'ideal' situation.

No. It. Is. NOT.

Posted by Jay-Emm (# 11411) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:
Originally posted by Jay-Emm:
It's pretty much the 'ideal' situation.
No. It. Is. NOT.

How could you make it any nearer? You can't really get much [proximate], more obvious bad guys, more...

Hmm, just wondering 1, 'ideal' was in terms of the OP question being most possible for heroic gun action (i.e. if you were writing a railway track morality puzzle). Of course if we're talking about what I want then the ideal would be them deciding to confess to the police and the iman about 3 weeks ago.
And (as partly in the rest of the post) it's still got high risks. I probably have still underestimated them though (being naturally in favour of gun control, that's normally the side to err on).

[ 25. April 2013, 18:39: Message edited by: Jay-Emm ]

Posted by TomOfTarsus (# 3053) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Three things to think about.
1. Muzzle Flash
2. The curious mix of ballistics and biology
3. The Harlem Globetrotters do not play in the NBA

Yes, I certainly thought about muzzle flash, as I noted, and I get a kick out of #3 - certainly true & applicable. But with #2 I'm not as sure as to your point. To be certain, bullets can deflect off bone (the lighter the more likely), fragment, etc. which adds yet another degree of uncertainty to be considered. Was that it?

But another aspect to this - the police fire. If they were firing back (instead of, as the giant cheeseburger noted, moving slowly & deliberately), wow, when you think about it, .38's, 9mm or .44' or shotgun pellets straight down a residential street with no "backdrop" - at least my hypothetical shot would have been low caliber and into the ground. And the observer did seem to indicate that the police were firing. Maybe I, oir he, was wrong about that, but at some point they shot the older brother, at much closer range. Wild scene...

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
3. The Harlem Globetrotters do not play in the NBA

I might just be having a dumb Limey moment here, but can you explain what you mean by this? (I know what both the Harlem Globetrotters and the NBA are.)

Posted by Leorning Cniht (# 17564) on :

quote:
Originally posted by the giant cheeseburger:

3. go and unlock the secure storage where they, as a responsible gun owner of course, keep their guns.
4. get ammunition which they, as a responsible gun owner of course, keep locked away in a separate location.

If we're talking about a home defense weapon here, then it is stored loaded and reasonably accessible - 'cause when the bad guys are breaking your door down is a really poor time to have to go to two different locations to get your weapon and ammunition...

quote:

Regardless of whether it would have been possible, I'm leaning towards the "should not" answer to the OP, because of the bigger implications around what would have happened if both suspects were dead and the whole trail went cold without any answers.

I think I agree. I suppose one could dial 911, and ask to be connected to the incident commander so he can make the call, but in practice it would probably be over too quickly.

Change the circumstances (make it a traffic stop, where the stoppee pulls a gun and starts firing at the traffic cop, say) and I'd be more inclined to take the shot.

All with my ITG Monday morning quarterback hat on, naturally.

[ 25. April 2013, 19:18: Message edited by: Leorning Cniht ]

Posted by the giant cheeseburger (# 10942) on :

quote:
Originally posted by TomOfTarsus:

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Three things to think about.
1. Muzzle Flash
2. The curious mix of ballistics and biology
3. The Harlem Globetrotters do not play in the NBA
Yes, I certainly thought about muzzle flash, as I noted, and I get a kick out of #3 - certainly true & applicable. But with #2 I'm not as sure as to your point. To be certain, bullets can deflect off bone (the lighter the more likely), fragment, etc. which adds yet another degree of uncertainty to be considered. Was that it?

I'm not so concerned about muzzle flash - at least for the first shot. Being a very linear shootout down a street would tend towards the suspects having some degree of tunnel vision and not being able to get more of a clue than which side of the street it came from.

That tends towards the best form of action from the upstairs window being a single shot (or short burst?) and then drop the gun and move back into the house away from the street, the aim being more to cause a distraction and maybe a hit.

quote:
But another aspect to this - the police fire. If they were firing back (instead of, as the giant cheeseburger noted, moving slowly & deliberately), wow, when you think about it, .38's, 9mm or .44' or shotgun pellets straight down a residential street with no "backdrop" - at least my hypothetical shot would have been low caliber and into the ground. And the observer did seem to indicate that the police were firing.

I was talking about what other police were doing to set up positions in unseen locations off beyond the left of picture, not those noticeably on the scene over on the right hand side of the pictures.

The number of police bullets flying in one direction along a straight street counts against any aggressive move in from the left, their actions would be limited to setting up a position with cover from friendly fire coming back at them off to the sides at the next intersection. If it were a trained tactical response group on both ends of the street (not possible with the fluidity of the situation) and not a bunch of regular cops then they could have coordinated moving in from both ends of the street, with each group of police being able to trust the other to shoot carefully.

It's worthy to note that the bullet which came into the house came in through the western wall, the direction the cops were shooting from.

quote:
Maybe I, oir he, was wrong about that, but at some point they shot the older brother, at much closer range. Wild scene...

It does not yet seem to have been confirmed whether the older brother was tackled to the ground, shot, run over by the younger brother escaping in the SUV or some combination of the above.

Posted by the giant cheeseburger (# 10942) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
3. The Harlem Globetrotters do not play in the NBA
I might just be having a dumb Limey moment here, but can you explain what you mean by this? (I know what both the Harlem Globetrotters and the NBA are.)

They look cool, but they are all about showing off cool moves in a controlled situation and not playing in a real basketball match.

Translated, a person might be able to hit a paper target from an oblique angle out of the east-facing window if they were given the ideal conditions to line up the shot, but probably not when trying to do it in the middle of a real incident at night.

Posted by Leorning Cniht (# 17564) on :

quote:
Originally posted by the giant cheeseburger:

It's worthy to note that the bullet which came into the house came in through the western wall, the direction the cops were shooting from.

Standards of marksmanship among "random cops" varies a lot. Some shoot as a hobby, and are pretty good. Some barely qualify once or twice a year on their service weapon and that's that.

Assuming that most of those cops had their carry handguns, and given that they were under fire at the time, I'd be surprised if there was only one round in someone's house.

Posted by TomOfTarsus (# 3053) on :

Well, one thing as to the "both suspects dead" issue, getting shot does not always equal dying.

Anglican't, not to speak for another, but I took lilBuddah to mean that the Globetrotters pull off fantastic trick shots, but their antics wouldn't come close to "working" in the NBA, much as most of our vigilante tough guy fanatasies would go by the wayside in an actual tactical situation - I agree by the way.

I thought that a good discussion of this situation, with a couple of bumblers distracted by police closing in on them, and a hypothetical citizen-shooter in an almost perfect situation (as compared to most) would point out some of the difficulties of the tactical use of your typical around-the-house firearm. Like I said, I'd never even try it with a handgun.

Good discussion here.

eta: Cp'd with others, TGCB's explanation of the Globetrotters' illustration was better than mine!

[ 25. April 2013, 19:30: Message edited by: TomOfTarsus ]

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

Thanks, that makes sense.

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jay-Emm:

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:
Originally posted by Jay-Emm:
It's pretty much the 'ideal' situation.
No. It. Is. NOT.
How could you make it any nearer? You can't really get much [proximate], more obvious bad guys, more...

Not ideal parts.
Night, angle, training, time, police do not know who you are. You become a target, add to the confusion and possibly injure/kill a bystander.

quote:
Originally posted by TomOfTarsus:

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Three things to think about.
1. Muzzle Flash
2. The curious mix of ballistics and biology
3. The Harlem Globetrotters do not play in the NBA
Yes, I certainly thought about muzzle flash, as I noted, and I get a kick out of #3 - certainly true & applicable. But with #2 I'm not as sure as to your point. To be certain, bullets can deflect off bone (the lighter the more likely), fragment, etc. which adds yet another degree of uncertainty to be considered. Was that it?

Part of it. The exact result of a round fired into a body is more highly variable than simple entry point.
Another point.
Your .22 has a rise above aim-point at less than 50m, but must be aimed lower on a steep inclined or declined shot than when fired at level. Have you practiced this scenario? Do you know the distance between your second story room and the point of the street where the brothers were standing? Have you shot moving targets in this situation?
And, had you, are you Magic Johnson or Meadowlark Lemon?

Posted by TomOfTarsus (# 3053) on :

Lil Buddah:

I agree with a lot of what you are saying. It just so happens that my little .22 is sighted in for just about that distance. I hit a ground hog last year within an inch of my crosshairs at just about that distance. And yes, the drop angle, the movement, all play into it.

As I said, this points out that, in an almost perfect situation to intervene, it's still a difficult and precarious thing to do.

And maybe I just can't suppress my inner ITG, but I still feel that if I had my rifle handy (big "if" with overtones of irresponsibility), I could have made the shot (unless they were just jumping around too much). I know the view thought that scope pretty well, and I'm actually a pretty good shot - the first time I'd ever picked up a live rifle, I shot the 3 positions, and I was invited to join the university rifle team. Still , as you note - still paper targets, level, well lit, safe... Big difference.

Posted by Jay-Emm (# 11411) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:
Originally posted by Jay-Emm:

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:
Originally posted by Jay-Emm:
[qb] It's pretty much the 'ideal' situation.
No. It. Is. NOT.
How could you make it any nearer? You can't really get much [proximate], more obvious bad guys, more...
Not ideal parts.
Night, angle, training, time, police do not know who you are. You become a target, add to the confusion and possibly injure/kill a bystander.

Oh very good point about the night (it shows how good phones are, I expected an unclear picture).
And the angle (actually 3rd floor is very high, I was trying to picture scale from 2nd window, and even that, I bet most people wouldn't know if and how to compensate).
And the time I'd definitely idealised as well (again I partially blame the 'nice' photo's, and partially seeing what would be make me think the most*, I took it into account later).

In short I can see your point, thanks.

*probably the technical term is wish fulfilment, but given the context I don't want to use that here.

Posted by Ikkyu (# 15207) on :

I am surprised no one has pointed out the following: By shooting I would be appointing myself judge,jury and executioner, without any access to the real evidence about the case.
Would you shoot someone after trial by media only?
The police present were under orders given by people with access to the real evidence and who are at least in principle accountable for their actions and one assumes trained to evaluate such evidence.
Everyone else should stay out of it. Except of course to demand due process.

Posted by W Hyatt (# 14250) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Gramps49:
No, let the law enforcement do their job.

I agree. Unless some official spokesperson for law enforcement were to present a very persuasive counter argument (and how likely is that?), I would say no, absolutely not. There is just no way a private citizen can join a shoot-out in which law enforcement officials are already engaged and do anything at all to help the situation (even if one were to first tune in to police frequencies to be able to know what was going on in real time). And even if one were to do the impossible and actually help somehow (as opposed to making everyone else in the same house as you a potential target), it would still be a very bad public precedent.

(And what Ikkyu said).

Posted by Leorning Cniht (# 17564) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Ikkyu:
I am surprised no one has pointed out the following: By shooting I would be appointing myself judge,jury and executioner, without any access to the real evidence about the case.

No, not at all. By shooting, you would be acting to prevent an immediate threat to life - in this case, the life of the cops who were being shot at. This has nothing at all to do with the appropriate punishment for any crimes that the two men might have committed.

Posted by W Hyatt (# 14250) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Gramps49:
No, let the law enforcement do their job.

Posted by TomOfTarsus (# 3053) on :

Fair question, and one of the moral issues I'd hoped we'd get onto.

In this case they are shooting at police, and recognized as wanted. In the best of all scenarios, I'd only wound, not kill. But your question points out more general "rules of engagement" issues. Perhaps if there were some issue of who was the "good guys" and "bad guys" it would present more of a dilemma to me. But I'd think people shooting at police can reasonably be assumed to need arrested.

Cp'd with LC and WH, LC made a better point than I...

[ 25. April 2013, 20:37: Message edited by: TomOfTarsus ]

Posted by W Hyatt (# 14250) on :

Do you think there is any scenario where police would be present and capable of firing their own weapons, and still want you to help, without your being able to communicate with them?

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:

quote:
Originally posted by Ikkyu:
I am surprised no one has pointed out the following: By shooting I would be appointing myself judge,jury and executioner, without any access to the real evidence about the case.
No, not at all. By shooting, you would be acting to prevent an immediate threat to life - in this case, the life of the cops who were being shot at. This has nothing at all to do with the appropriate punishment for any crimes that the two men might have committed.

Ikkyu is still correct. In the cold light of several days after, you know who they were and what the situation is. At the moment of the encounter, it is all supposition.

quote:
Originally posted by TomOfTarsus:
In the best of all scenarios, I'd only wound, not kill.

Been reading scripts then, have we?

Posted by TomOfTarsus (# 3053) on :

lilBuddha:

Yeah, I know... that bullet writes ts own script.

Posted by Leorning Cniht (# 17564) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Ikkyu is still correct. In the cold light of several days after, you know who they were and what the situation is. At the moment of the encounter, it is all supposition.

Well, not quite. You can presumably tell that one of the parties in the encounter has red and blue flashing lights and sirens, and one doesn't, which might give you a fairly shrewd guess as to who is assaulting who.

You're right that if you can't tell who you're protecting from who, then you have no grounds for getting involved, but that's not what Ikkyu was saying.

Ikkyu's comment "judge, jury and executioner" views shooting the men as a punishment for some crime that they have committed, and that thought is wrong. The only reason you would have grounds to shoot them is in the process of protecting life.

Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
In the cold light of several days after, you know who they were and what the situation is. At the moment of the encounter, it is all supposition.

Yep. This person wasn't looking out his window thinking "Oh, right! It's the Tsarnaev brothers! Now's my chance."

Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on :

quote:
Originally posted by TomOfTarsus:
In the best of all scenarios, I'd only wound, not kill.

My understanding is that law enforcement officers are instructed to shoot to kill*. Shoot to wound is basically impossible because a.) there is no part of the body where you can guarantee a hit won't be fatal, b.) even if such a body part existed, the chance of hitting it would be negligible, c.) a wounded gunman can still use the gun to kill people and may be so psyched up with adrenaline that they don't even notice the injury.

* Technically 'shoot to incapacitate', which means put them in a position where they can't do any more damage. In practice this means 'dead'.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

This is a truly weird thread. I guess it excites Americans!

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :

"What can make a shoot-out in the street, where everything is confusing and badly-lit, more compelling?"

"More guns?"

"Yay!"

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Keep movin', movin', movin', Though they're disapprovin', Keep them doggies movin' Rawhide! Don't try to understand 'em ...

Posted by tclune (# 7959) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
This is a truly weird thread. I guess it excites Americans!

Not all...

--Tom Clune

Posted by Bostonman (# 17108) on :

Sure, you can "try" to only wound someone. But if we ended up with TWO dead Tsarnaevs, can you guess who'd be sitting there getting interrogated? You!

Actually, I take that back...they'd want to bring you in anyway, just for trying.

Posted by Lyda*Rose (# 4544) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
This is a truly weird thread. I guess it excites Americans!

It seems to excite others, too. [Razz]

Posted by Firenze (# 619) on :

Life is not an episode of Law & Order, with all the right camera angles, identified characters and a clear plot.

Any unscripted interventions in RL would most likely get you shot by both sides.

I can't imagine an actual situation - as opposed to the choreographed version of film/TV/game - where you could have sufficient information from the fragment that you are seeing (what else is happening? Are there police in concealment? Are there other people on the firing line?) to be sure you weren't doing more harm than good by causing even more lethal bits of metal to fly about.

Posted by Gwai (# 11076) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
This is a truly weird thread. I guess it excites Americans!

You have noticed that not all Americans are the same, I hope?

Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Firenze:
Life is not an episode of Law & Order, with all the right camera angles, identified characters and a clear plot.

Any unscripted interventions in RL would most likely get you shot by both sides.

I can't imagine an actual situation - as opposed to the choreographed version of film/TV/game - where you could have sufficient information from the fragment that you are seeing (what else is happening? Are there police in concealment? Are there other people on the firing line?) to be sure you weren't doing more harm than good by causing even more lethal bits of metal to fly about.

We've been through exactly these points on several gun control threads. Arguments justifying the general public carrying more guns are always constructed either in the abstract, with a precisely constructed scenario, or in hindsight with lots of nice established facts.

Neither of which corresponds to real life.

One need only see the avalanche of wrong information pouring out of the media over the course of the Boston bombing, investigation and capture of one suspect to see what real life is like.

Posted by Grammatica (# 13248) on :

I'm finding it hard to understand why this question is even up for discussion. The police are trained in the use of firearms and trained to deal with situations like the Watertown shootout. They do as well as they can manage to do in the concrete situations they encounter. Sometimes they make mistakes; every once in a while they make catastrophic mistakes. But they do much better than any of us untrained civilians would do in the circumstances.

They don't need our help in shootouts. They need our help in exactly the ways they ask for it. We are useful if we phone them when we've sighted suspects but they will not thank us for mixing in when suspects are firing at them. They really don't want civilians in the way.

[tangent] I don't remember anyone mentioning this upthread, so I will: (Episcopal)Bishop Jon Bruno of Los Angeles is a veteran of the Los Angeles Police Force. As a police officer, he once killed a man in the line of duty. Internal investigations found he had acted within regulations, but it affected him, and he resigned, becoming a priest and later bishop. It is not that easy a thing to take a human life. There are times when people have to, but no one should look forward to it. [/tangent]

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Gwai:

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
This is a truly weird thread. I guess it excites Americans!
You have noticed that not all Americans are the same, I hope?

I have indeed. I actually married one many years ago, so long ago, that now no doubt, our respective memories of it are like the old tracks of tears, hardly visible. And she hated guns, so there we are, empiricism rules, OK.

Posted by Doublethink (# 1984) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:

quote:
Originally posted by Ikkyu:
I am surprised no one has pointed out the following: By shooting I would be appointing myself judge,jury and executioner, without any access to the real evidence about the case.
No, not at all. By shooting, you would be acting to prevent an immediate threat to life - in this case, the life of the cops who were being shot at. This has nothing at all to do with the appropriate punishment for any crimes that the two men might have committed.

Except that you can't absolutely know that it isn't a Rodney King / Charles De Menezes situation - in which case would you shoot the police ? (I suspect not.) You know there has been a bombing and you know that the police are in hot pursuit of someone, you just don't know if it is the right someone.

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:
It is not that easy a thing to take a human life.

You have no idea how much I wish this were true.

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:

There are times when people have to, but no one should look forward to it. [/tangent]

No one should.

[ 26. April 2013, 16:39: Message edited by: lilBuddha ]

Posted by Jay-Emm (# 11411) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink:

quote:
Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:

quote:
Originally posted by Ikkyu:
I am surprised no one has pointed out the following: By shooting I would be appointing myself judge,jury and executioner, without any access to the real evidence about the case.
No, not at all. By shooting, you would be acting to prevent an immediate threat to life - in this case, the life of the cops who were being shot at. This has nothing at all to do with the appropriate punishment for any crimes that the two men might have committed.
Except that you can't absolutely know that it isn't a Rodney King / Charles De Menezes situation - in which case would you shoot the police ? (I suspect not.) You know there has been a bombing and you know that the police are in hot pursuit of someone, you just don't know if it is the right someone.

In this (one )case you've got the indicator that they are currently firing. Which is about the only case to consider considering anything like that.

Although even then you've got to consider the possibility that they are 'self defending' in the confusion (If the Aussie paper is to be believed they weren't carrying obvious Guns of Mass Destruction, the bombs are more a giveaway but only in hindsight and believing the reports).

And even with the captions and static photos visually resolving the things takes me longer than the incident.

And as I mentioned before in a situation you might feel like 90% confidence was certain, whereas 99.99% is still worse than the thing you're preventing.

Mind you I'm slightly worried about the total 'leave it to the police' (as a general absolute rule)...it seems to be creating problems the other way.

Posted by Jay-Emm (# 11411) on :

[Previous post excluded any mention of the practical problems and risks of carrying any action out. Maybe you have jedi powers]

Posted by Freddy (# 365) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:
I'm finding it hard to understand why this question is even up for discussion.

Because it is interesting to consider questions like "what if you had just happened to be in the Book Depository in Dallas Texas on that morning in November 1963." Would you have tried to stop Lee Harvey Oswald if you saw him taking aim at John F. Kennedy?

It is so unusual to suddenly find yourself in close proximity to a dangerous and momentous incident - in a position to prevent harm if you can take advantage of it.

In this particular case, though, I agree with most posters that the chances of doing good and saving anyone here are less than the likelihood that an attempt would only make things worse.

Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :

I think it's best to avoid killing. But, sometimes, that's the only way to protect yourself and/or others. i hope I'm never in that kind of situation. No one should ever have to be.

Given that these guys had allegedly bombed the marathon (and "allegedly" is important, if you're going to appoint yourself judge, jury, and executioner!), yes, it might be self/other defense.

But there are all kinds of problems with that. Just a few:

--What if these *aren't* the bombers?

--What if your shots hit the car and set off the bombs, injuring innocent people?

--What if the cops come on the scene, see you with a gun, and assume *you're* some kind of terrorist? And arrest or shoot you? Or some freaked-out Bostoner sees you with a gun and pre-emptively shoots you?

--What if the guys have important information to give to the cops (e.g., other bombs planted, larger network, etc.), and the info isn't passed on because you killed the guys? And *more* innocent people get hurt???

After the movie theater shooting in Colorado, lots of people purchased guns. Most of the above would apply there, too. I mean, *more* people shooting up a theater in the dark???

[Paranoid]

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Note to self - material here for a black comedy sketch. Thus, Fred sees apparent terrorists in the street, in a shoot-out with cops. So Fred, being civic-minded, leans out of his window and starts shooting at terrorists. However, Jim, another even more civic-minded citizen, notices Fred shooting at people in the street, and determining to stop this at the root, leans out of his window, and starts shooting at Fred. Cops see Jim shooting, conclude he is an accomplice, and start shooting at him. At this point, in 'Law and Order', Stabler and Benson would arrive, and start kissing each other, and Benson takes her top off. Gradually, American civilization starts to collapse.

Posted by Russ (# 120) on :

You'll have heard this before, but it is said that if what you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a nail...

This situation seems more like movie-fuelled fantasy than any serious prospect of an opportunity for good citizenship.

If the reason why one might consider getting involved is to protect the lives of the police being shot at (as suggested) then it seems to me that there has to be a "real and present danger" of a policeman getting shot. Such as if you see one of the bad guys sneaking up on a policeman from behind. If that's not the case, if you have no information which the police don't, and they're acting like they know what they're doing, then presumably the danger they're in is in their view acceptably low ?

Is the possibility of non-firearm-related actions being overlooked here ? Would it help the police in this situation if you were to phone all your neighbours and ask them to turn on all the lights in the house so that the street would be better lit ?

(would time and money spent on acquiring and training with firearms be better spent on building good relations with one's neighbours in the first place ?)

I'm sympathetic to the notion that people should try to be independent and capable members of society rather than passive recipients of the protection and service of the State. But if there's no pressing imperative to get involved and the chances of screwing things up really badly are significant, that seems a good reason to stay out of it.

Best wishes,

Russ

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
Note to self - material here for a black comedy sketch. Thus, Fred sees apparent terrorists in the street, in a shoot-out with cops. So Fred, being civic-minded, leans out of his window and starts shooting at terrorists. However, Jim, another even more civic-minded citizen, notices Fred shooting at people in the street, and determining to stop this at the root, leans out of his window, and starts shooting at Fred. Cops see Jim shooting, conclude he is an accomplice, and start shooting at him. At this point, in 'Law and Order', Stabler and Benson would arrive, and start kissing each other, and Benson takes her top off. Gradually, American civilization starts to collapse.

"Grandfather, how did WW III start?" "Well, there were these suspected terrorists in America having a row with the police and....."

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Well, the world is a bit like that today, in some areas, at any rate. For example, if the West did start to do certain things in Syria, which groups would you help? Are we going to help the guys shooting the regime soldiers, or the guys who are shooting some of the first lot, or at least, those whom we don't like? Errm. I guess that's why the word 'blowback' was coined.

The war in Libya showed this - the guy who was recently head of the Tripoli Military Council was allegedly kidnapped and tortured by the Western alllies (Belhadj).

The enemy of my enemy is, well, I'm not sure, I'd better consult our Military Intelligence Sub-Committee (Pending) Forum, and I'll get back to you.

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

OKayyy. You're Jesus. What are doing with a gun?

Posted by the giant cheeseburger (# 10942) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
OKayyy. You're Jesus. What are doing with a gun?

Good point, Jesus' weapon of choice is a double-edged sword.

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

[Smile]

Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on :

quote:
Originally posted by the giant cheeseburger:

quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
OKayyy. You're Jesus. What are doing with a gun?
Good point, Jesus' weapon of choice is a double-edged sword.

Yeah, but when he was actually offered one he didn't seem too interested, and then got a bit dismissive when someone used one later.

And he will wield a five bladed sword - not two, or nine, but five, which he will use on all wretched sinners, like you over there sir...

[ 01. May 2013, 12:28: Message edited by: Karl: Liberal Backslider ]

Posted by the giant cheeseburger (# 10942) on :

Is that like one of those five-bladed razors I saw at the shops yesterday?

Posted by MrsM (# 14940) on :

I think it must be a culture difference but as a brit I can't think immediately that I'd want to enter a firefight of any kind.

Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
OKayyy. You're Jesus. What are doing with a gun?

Melting it with your hands, and shaping it into a plowshare?

(Hopefully, not shooting that poor fig tree!)

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