The media is once again counting on ignorance to incite people to protest and riot, or at the very least to misinform the public and cause divisiveness and hatred of police. A recent incident of law enforcement response to the threat of deadly force involved a known violent offender, with a history of firearm related violence, who appears to have been armed with a knife. The officers did not seek a violent encounter. They were called to respond to the location.
The subject failed to comply, even after two attempts were made to subdue him with a Taser. These are facts which are objectively clear from video evidence. Subjectively, there is preliminary evidence, from witness statements, as well as video, and audio recordings, that the subject was armed with a knife. The video is grainy but even the biased fact-checkers have concluded that there was a knife found in the car, if not actually in his hand (it may have been.) Review the video https://youtu.be/JgxvwfO13PI to educate yourself on the hazard to officers from a knife wielding subject.
The concept that a subject with a knife, or reaching into his vehicle for a knife or gun is not a threat is simply ignorant. Educate yourself and if you aren’t an expert or a professional, perhaps you should wait for investigations and potential trial where all of the available evidence is gathered, and considered.
You will note the lack of names and location of the incident in this post. The post does not justify a specific use of deadly force. That is intentional. The incident behind this post is still under investigation and it is impossible without clear evidence to declare the use of force as apparently lawful or unlawful at this point. That is for the agency of the officer involved, the investigative bodies responsible for that jurisdictions, and the courts to determine.
As a side note, PoliticFact, the purported “fact-checker” proclaimed “No, Jacob Blake did not “brandish” a knife, get a gun before police shooting in Kenosha.” They did not conclude that he didn’t have a knife in his hand, nor that officers didn’t order him to drop the knife, nor that it was a threat of serious physical harm to the officers, just that the way he held it didn’t meet the first Merriam-Webster definition of brandish:1: to shake or wave (something, such as a weapon) menacingly brandished a knife at them.
That is misleading, and disingenuous. What is clear that the officers made numerous attempts to avoid shooting the subject. A thoughtful critique of a scenario with a non-compliant subject with a knife would likely involved training officers warning the officers to shoot a subject armed with a knife instead of closing the distance.
Officers shoot to stop a threat, not to shoot knives out of a person’s hand or after waiting until they are stabbed before responding. They have a right to react to the threat of serious bodily harm without waiting for the attempt to harm or actual attack to begin. That is a fact, and the law. Facts matter.
