What I meant is that at the scene of a crime or possible crime, there is no time to follow the normal court process of proving guilt and innocence based on evidence that needs to be evaluated. Neither is there automatic presumption of innocence, an important part of due process.
If an officer cannot say, with reasonable suspicion, that the person is about to attack someone, or his own person, then that officer simply has no right to harm them.
I've never claimed that a police officer needs to hold an immediate court of law if he decides to shoot someone.
My point isn't to say that police officers can never use lethal force. My point is to say that police officers cannot use lethal force if they don't have reasonable suspicion that they, or another, are in danger.
I am not advocating automatic innocence. I am advocating that someone is innocent until proven guilty. It's a big leap to say that innocent until guilty means automatic innocence. Innocent until guilty is precisely the idea of due process. When did I ever state that everyone is always innocent?
I have nevertheless said there are procedures that must be followed when pursuing fleeing suspects, such as ordering them to stop and firing warning shots.
You're right, you did say this. My apologies for not addressing it. The problem with this idea, though, is that if authority (police) are not held to a common standard that none of them can violate (the bill of rights), then police will inevitably drift towards tyranny. Historically speaking, when a government or authoritative power is not restricted in some form or manner, it almost inevitably ends in tyranny.
To you I ask this. What is the stated purpose of a police officer? To serve AND protect, right? How do you serve the people if you are willing to violate their rights? When you start violating the rights of the people you are serving, you are, BY DEFINITION, no longer serving them. You are RULING them.
We could argue that they are serving the rights of the other "innocent" people, but that's irrelevant. Firstly, because the suspect has not yet been found guilty of any crimes, and secondly because one group of people is not given special rights over another group of people. All people get the same rights. Even deplorable types, like rapists and murderers, have a right to due process should they be caught
after the fact. If they are caught
during the act, that is an entirely different situation, and depending on the circumstances the police officers could very well use lethal force.
A good police officer should be looking firstly to the constitution, secondly to supreme court rulings, and thirdly to department procedure. Why? Because if the police officers want to
serve AND protect, the one's they are serving are the people. You cannot serve the people if you violate their rights.
Therefore how does your argument follow? ie that police will just be killing people to prevent a trial?
Because historically speaking, unchecked authority almost inevitably leads to tyranny. The police need to follow a commonly held standard so that their authority cannot go unchecked. This standard, in the United States, is the Constitution, and specifically the Bill of Rights.
The main problem with this line of argument is that it fails to adequately address the point that a fleeing suspect is not an ordinary suspect so to speak and should therefore be treated differently.
The main problem with this line of argument is that it fails to adequately address that, constitutionally speaking,
all criminals have a right to due process. Even criminals that have committed extremely heinous crimes have a right to due process. If this weren't the case, why would we take suspected murderers to trial at all? Why not just shoot anyone that's accused of murder or rape?
Do you not see the paradox in your argument? If you are guaranteed the right to due process, except for when you are a suspect, then you effectively have no right to due process. Why would any citizen need due process of law if he weren't being charged with a crime? The non-suspect has no need to be protected from prosecution, because the non-suspect, by definition,
is not being prosecuted or accused of crime. Due process is meant to protect the citizens from false accusations, false imprisonment, and false execution. If you take due process away from suspects, then, by its very nature, the idea of due process becomes paradox:
You have a right to fair trial, but only if you do not need to exercise that right.
This is a person who is actively frustrating the course of natural justice by fleeing.
Yes, and they can be charged with resisting arrest in a court of law because of this. We could argue that the man might never see a court room, because he might get away, but it really is irrelevant. This is the very nature of police work. You can't always catch all of the bad guys. Some of them will certainly get away. But, in a free society, you must be willing to accept that some of the bad guys get away, so that some of the good guys aren't unjustly punished.
They are directly preventing the same due process that you keep emphasizing from being carried out on them. So why should they be treated the same as everyone else when their very action by its nature nullifies due process?
The unfortunate nature of due process is that people are able to occasionally escape justice. Personally, I'd prefer the
relatively low possibility of someone escaping justice, over the
high probability of tyranny in a society without due process. Again, I defer you to look at history. Unchecked authority almost as a rule leads to tyranny.
If they are so innocent, why don't they stop, be subjected to a minor inconvenience of being questioned and they go about their business afterwards?
I never argued they were innocent. I argued that, regardless of whether or not they are guilty, they are still guaranteed the right of due process. Again, unless an officer has reasonable suspicion that he or another are in imminent danger, said officer has no right to employ lethal force, whereupon someone is denied right to due process by sheer fact that they are now, indeed, dead. I defer you to my above points.
Strawman. I never make any assumptions about anything, which is something you would have gathered by now if you were a bit more honest. Do not conflate a normal innocent person with a fleeing suspect who belongs to a different category as I have argued above.
You never make assumptions about anything? And you call
me dishonest. You've made plenty of assumptions. Case in point, below....
The main problem with this line of argument is that it fails to adequately address the point that a fleeing suspect is not an ordinary suspect so to speak and should therefore be treated differently.
If they are so innocent, why don't they stop, be subjected to a minor inconvenience of being questioned and they go about their business afterwards?
Do not conflate a normal innocent person with a fleeing suspect who belongs to a different category as I have argued above.
bearing in mind my argument that such a suspect is not an ordinary suspect, but someone actively frustrating due process.
You keep avoiding asking yourself and answering why any innocent law-abiding citizen would run away from the police making a routine enquiry.
All of the above are assumptions. You are assuming that ANYONE who runs from the police is guilty of a crime.
Some of you in here have no interest in getting to the truth.
Assumption. You cannot see inside the minds of others.
IOW, Cook could have also just as easily been a child trafficker in an identical situation.
Assumption. The only things you know about this given situation are that A) A woman is hanging out around a school, and B) People don't know why she's doing it, want her to leave, and she won't. There is no logical basis for concluding, from these facts, that Cook is a child trafficker.
Let us assume he wanted to arrest her and she resisted and fled.
I am just as against a police state as anyone here but I will not participate in irrational group-think based on conspiracy theories and emotions.
Assumption that others are indulging in irrational group-think based conspiracy theories. Again, you can't read our minds. Also, assumption that YOU are correct, and that all of US are wrong.
You can argue these beliefs. That is fine. Everyone is entitled an opinion. But if you argue these beliefs, you cannot label yourself as someone who follows the constitution, as you are expressly stating things that are just the opposite. I haven't read many of your posts on RPF, so I don't know if you believe in/follow the constitution. From what you've stated here, however, I can only conclude that you're OK with constitutional violations, as you are directly arguing against the Bill of Rights, amendments five and fourteen. This doesn't mean I hate you, it just means that I completely disagree with you. To me, the constitution is the supreme law of the land, and all laws therein should not violate the constitution.
