Hey Everyone,
A friend of mine shared his thoughts with me and gave me permission to post them here. His perspective is different from what most people in this thread believe
I’m posting this because I think it’s important to understand how people think who strongly disagree with each other. I’d like to hear your responses to his views and how you would address his arguments.
As always, please respond respectfully and thoughtfully. This is a good opportunity to show that people can disagree passionately and still have a productive, civil conversation.
From my friend
I think that any LE officer in this situation could have felt threatened by this guy's movements. He is clearly resisting the officers and reaching for something.
I disagree with his characterization here. Pretti isn't "clearly resisting." I haven't watched the footage as much as some have, but I don't see any indication of someone "clearly resisting" anything.
I also think it needs to be taken in context. Per multiple media reports, prior to being shot, he was sprayed with pepper spray. So his movements were most likely due to pepper spray in his eyes, which can be quite painful and disorienting. Any officer who doesn't know this is an officer who isn't trained enough to be dealing with the public.
Did someone shout "gun" at some point?
Yes, an agent at some point seems to shout gun, after they disarmed him.
If so it would heighten the fear among the officers. Did the officers who fired at him know that another officer had taken a weapon from him? I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't from watching that confusing struggle.
They shot him in the back something like 10 time-s (I don't know if the number of bullet wounds is confirmed?). Even if they thought he was armed, he was pinned and no longer a threat when he was shot AND he was shot not once, not twice, not three times, but TEN times, which represents a startling overreaction.
Psychologically, if a law enforcement officer entrusted with public safety is so reactive and hypervigilant that they're operating on fear with that type of overreaction, they should not be in their job. They're just not qualified for it. I don't think anyone here would want a pilot who freaks out every time there's a problem with the plane and overcorrects to the point of putting people in danger. We wouldn't want a surgeon who freaks out about getting sued so he overcorrects a mistake in the OR.
We want professionals who keep their cool and do what's necessary without overreacting, overcorrecting, or acting like it's the Wild Wild West and they can do whatever they want.
There are certain standards to being law enforcement. It seems to me ICE doesn't meet those standards. Many lack training, lack character, lack integrity, and frankly, lack a sense of humanity. Wearing masks doesn't help either. It's the same phenomenon that we assign to "keyboard warriors." When you don't have to look people in the eye and they don't look back, it's easy to lose your humanity.
Does taking a single weapon during the struggle mean he doesn't have another weapon that could be used to kill? Of course not
But being pinned with no access to anything on his person does.
So it's boils down to did the actions of the armed instigator cause these officers to fear for their lives or the safety of others. If it did then the shooting is legally justified
And again, I disagree completely with his characterization of this situation. There is zero evidence that I've seen that suggests that Pretti was an instigator. Exercising one's rights does not make them an instigator. He was not violent (that we know of), he did not trespass (that we know of), he did not ignore commands (that we know of). He literally did nothing that was illegal (that we know of).
I wonder if you think it's possible the officers in this case really did fear for their safety during this encounter with the armed protester.
The thing is, I don't care if they did. Because even if they did fear for their safety, their response to it was grossly inappropriate and incompetent. That is not how trained law enforcement responds to a threat. If there was one shot, even two shots, one might be able to convince people they were afraid. But that many shots
in his back is either reckless disregard, incompetence, or trigger happy and indifferent.
MOO of course.
And also, this.
In total, 10 shots were fired in less than five seconds, according to a forensic audio analysis of the videos conducted for ABC News.
abcnews.go.com
sadly we all have
