The next time you have contact with the police

[Darius871]

No disrespect or insensitivity intended, but shouldn't proper training make it virtually impossible for an intoxicated, unarmed man in an open yard to grab your weapon out of your hands before you can fire a shot?

*runs*

[MichaeltheGreat]

Nothing said the weapon was in her hands, but the generic answer to your post is "no" unless by proper training, you mean "plugging the son of a ***** before he got close enough."

Presumably, the officer in question was trying not to use lethal force and to restrain the guy, rather than just shooting on the basis that he was armed.

[Darius871]

Fair enough, I see that the weapon wasn't necessarily in her hands; it was just inconceivable to me that any officer - especially a female officer - would attempt to restrain and disarm a belligerent man with no backup, rather than draw her weapon at a safe distance, instruct him to drop the knife, and wait for backup if he refuses.

[Donegeal]

With all this TASER talk, this was just too funny not to post:

BREMERTON, Wash. - A sheriff's deputy who was trying to get a man down from a tree shot and wounded him after mistakenly pulling a gun instead of a Taser, authorities say.

The deputy, a five-year veteran of the force whose name was not released, was placed on leave while Thursday's shooting is investigated.

Deputies carry both a Taser and a gun on their utility belts. The Taser, or stun gun, is similar in shape to the compact .40-caliber gun the deputy carried, sheriff's spokesman Scott Wilson said.

The victim was listed in satisfactory condition.

The man had been climbed a fig tree and stayed there for hours, talking to himself. Deputies were unsure whether he was intoxicated or psychotic, and they wanted to get him down before he hurt himself or others, Wilson said.

Deputies and rescue workers tried to coax him down for almost two hours, during which he became increasingly hostile, said David Blakeslee, an employee at an auto repair shop nearby.

Blakeslee said the man climbed down on his own after getting shot.

"He said, `Ow, that hurt. I'm coming down, I'm coming down,'" Blakeslee said.

[chequita guevara]

There is quite a bit of evidence that the police or resoting to tasering people when it is not called for, simply because it is an extremely easy way to get control of someone very quickly. So while it saves the lives of a lot of dumbasses who would otherwise be shot and killed with bullets, it's killing some people would would have eventually be talked down or controlled some other way (and not by choking the living **** out of them with a night stick).

That said, I always treat the police with respect . . . to their faces anyway. I may not like police as an institution, but I'm not talking smack to someone who can hurt or kill me and make it look like it was my fault.