Baltimore cops seem like a friendly bunch

[clyde]

Originally Posted by Sharp11

I guess we have to accept the fact that certain people will see this video and not see a cop acting inappropriately and out of act rage. I don't understand it, but that's life.

It's the same sort of thing that happens when witnesses are interviewed after a car accident - several different recollections are often presented

Ed

Ed,

I think you touched on the key question: Did the cop act appropriately?

I think we can probably all agree that any given situation would call for an appropriate response and that something exceeding that level of response would be inappropriate.

As a hypothetical, we probably all believe that a cop was acting appropriately if he shot someone that was shooting at him.

I think that we'd all also probably agree that a cop was acting inappropriately if he shot someone that was naked and lying face down on the ground, spread eagle style if that person refused a command to stand up.

Somewhere in between those two extremes, shooting goes from being an inappropriate to appropriate response. We all probbaly have our own ideas of where the line between the two is, and most of us would probably agree that the line may not be absolutely black and white and well deinfed in all cases...but again, the gray area is probably different for each of us.

Bringing it back to the skateboarder incident, the question is whether the cops actions were appropriate for the situation.

Kinda like a BMW not really being great at any one thing, but pretty frigging good on the whole, I thought the cop wasn't really out of line on any one thing (other than the implied threat re: the camera at the end), but on the whole acted pretty uprofessionally and his response was inappropriate for the circumstances of the situation.