I'm sure Slager will claim self-defence. Obviously the claim won't stand up, but in some jurisdiction, even a mistaken belief in self-defence can get murder bumped down to manslaughter:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperfect_self-defense

Obviously Officer Slager's whole persona is going to come under intense scrutiny but I must confess let us put ourselves in his or any other law enforcement officers shoes. You are trained to enforce the law. You go about your duties and given what town, city, area you work you will undoubetedely come under abuse. Being called a pig, spat at, derided, mocked can after a stressful day make you do things you would not normally do.

Unfortunately an incident like this really does not address any issues other than race.

While I type this I am listening to our TV news and no surprises, of all the major news breaking out in the world and at home the news reader reads out what is coming up in the news. Coming up she reads, "A white policeman shoots a black man in the back in USA."

Notice the emphasis on race. Why define the race of the policeman or victim if not to stoke it up.

Of course nothing on Iran, UK, or any other issue impacting or might impact on our lives on the tip of SA. It is sickening that a news agency will take an item such as this shooting in the USA and prominently give it airtime - for what? - other than we are a country still sitting on a powder keg of coming to terms with our racial past and they see this as a golden opportunity in putting the white man in the worst possible light.

No different to a movie I once watched (cannot remember the name) where a film crew from a TV station actually went out and created the news.

Premeditation isn't the only criteria for first-degree murder in all states. If the officer was in fact putting the taser near the victim's body in this instance, that amounts to attempting to cover up the crime, which makes it a first-degree murder charge regardless of whether it was planned, at least in some locations.

I beg your pardon, but 8 (eight!) shots fireing after a person running away?

(Are those cops trained in using firearms at all? I mean, seriously, at that given distance, 8 shots? )

If I was a cop and that guy were running towards me (with or without a weapon in his hands), I would feel myself in trouble and the need to stop him, not to kill him intentionally.

On a sidenote: I've been to America and I've been stopped by the police at night, while driving a car. It was a normal stop; we were eight German soldiers in a van we had rent: It is absolutely no good idea to do anything else but what the officer tells you to do. While the second officer is standing there, aiming in combat style...

I think, the footage prooves there is absolutely no justification for a deadly shot in this case. Edit: The only danger to the public seemed to be the cop fireing like an idiot.

This looks cut and dried. Cop will be in prison for the rest of his life.

This will be a capital murder trial. The action of moving the stun gun to the body is what is termed an act of knowledgeable guilt. It shows the officer knew the situation showed guilt so he attempted to modify the scene to bolster his story. That action is enough to make it a capital case.

If you look close you can see the taser leads appear to be attached to the taser unit and the victim. It is possible he may have moved it to prevent others yet to arrive on scene from getting entangled.

Watch again veeeeerrrryy carefully
 

Agree 100% One bullet should be enough but 8 could hardly be considered anything else but an attempt to kill the victim.

Maybe, but given the current political climate he might also be made an example of. At least that's the hope.

True.
Also in this case, the evidence is clearly visible.
We'll see.

NBC has a better look at the video. It looks like whatever Slager dropped near the victim, most likely the Taser, he picks up and puts back in his belt after a few seconds and before the rest of the cops arrive. I don't see how you can make a case he was trying to "plant" evidence just based on the video.

link:

http://www.nbcnews.com/watch/nbcnews...g-424905283706

Precisely! He's concerned more with the first aid to the victim,( checking pulse), and not thinking crime scene management till conducted away by a fourth officer.

Two thoughts:

1. Some states do have laws covering crimes committed under color of authority (i.e., officer in uniform, on duty, during performance of otherwise lawful duty). Often, this used to enhance whatever sentence the convicted person may receive or is treated as a separate crime. Does SC have such a law or laws?

2. The other officers who arrived on scene almost immediately after the shooting: what is in their reports regarding the incident? Did they make an attempt to shield the officer from possible culpability? If so, are they then accomplices after the fact?


<O>

Pistols are not lasers, they actually don't necessarily hit where you are aiming at. Its not unheard of to have shot groupings of a foot or more at 20 yards. Cops are also trained to aim for the center mass, and your aiming point will tend to drift upwards when firing multiple shots in rapid succession.

The thing is though, I have met so many police officers where the term pig totally applies. Because they abuse their power (how many times have you seen a police officer go through a red light when they are clearly not responding to a call, or threaten you with arrest if you dare question them in any way). I could tell you about friends that had been assaulted by police officers, I've personally been harassed by them on numerous occasions when I was younger. Then there is the issues with corruption and criminality, and problems with racism in many police forces. Then throw on top of that, the blue wall.

This is not to say that all police officers are bad people, but I do think that the inherent power differential between police officers and the civilian populace is problematic.

Well given the long and extensive history of police forces regularly shooting unarmed black men to death (and not just in the US for that matter either). Race is very important in this case, I mean do you think this event would have happened if the person were white? When do you ever hear of a case involving a white officer shooting an unarmed white suspect? I feel a lot of this stems from the old problem of white people tending to assume criminality when meeting an unknown black man. This is why white women will cross the street when encountering a black man, and why officers are more prone to shooting, as they already have it in their mind that this person is a dangerous criminal.


Police training with firearms can vary quite a bit between different police forces. Some get a lot of range time, others get almost none. There have also been lots of examples of police panic firing where 50+ shots are fired between a handful of officers at one suspect, generally emptying their magazines (sometimes even reloading and emptying a second mag). To me 8 shots seems reasonable at the range he opened up at, if he were trying to put the subject down. Keep in mind that his pistol would probably not have been overly accurate at that range given that officers are not generally supplied with match grade ammo, and who knows when he last fired that weapon.

Tasers are not a deadly weapon (I don't care what Amnesty International claims, I would hardly call them a knowledgeable source for weaponry). They are an LTL (Less Than Lethal) weapon, that is designed to temporarily incapacitate by muscle paralysis/disruption. This doesn't mean that it is not possible to kill someone with a taser, just that the weapon is not designed to kill, and has a very low probability of inducing death barring certain medical conditions. I do think however that police are far too inclined to use LTLs, particularly in situations where that level of force was not warranted.

Also FYI the officer had already expended the ranged payload of the taser into the suspect (he twice fired the taser) so the taser was at that point mostly inert (it would still be able to direct contact stun). So even if the suspect did have it, it would not have been of much threat to the officer or the populace.

Under most cases police officers are not allowed to shoot fleeing suspects unless that person has already shot at or threatened to shoot someone (which the officer witnessed), or is presently pointing a weapon at either the officer or any other person in the area or has started to raise their weapon. Simply being armed is not sufficient justification to open fire. Also attempting to flee from police does not indicate criminality, people panic and run from police all the time who were not guilty of any major crimes.

Also your chain of steps is highly inaccurate. Officers are not trained to react in steps, they are supposed to react based on the situation at hand as it evolves, including jumping to lethal response right away, or not escalating at all. Using LTL's does not come before resorting to deadly force. It's not about following steps, its about adapting to the present situation and the degree of force that can and should be legally applied.

Honestly in this case with the present evidence I feel this officer gravely overreacted from the start, which resulted in this man's death, all for a broken tail light.

Uh what?
There was nothing that I'd call "first aid" at all.
During the video I was thinking "Dude, you shot him, now at least try to help!" and he was just... waiting.

That's not first aid, that is watching someone die.