4 Police Officers Shot After Traffic Stop in Oakland

Horrible story. But what is with this:

That's just sick.

 

Damn. Hope those cops make it. Doesn't sound good.

 

Gawd, that's awful...

 

This report says all four were killed:

Unbelievable.

 

Those are some quality citizens right there.

 

If you read the story posted, it says there have been several violent protests after the shooting of an unarmed suspect earlier this year.

Not saying that makes it right. Just saying they didn't show up out of the blue to taunt.

 

Awful story. I don't really expect much less in Oakland, California, though.

 

Very true. That BART incident has led to some very violent protests recently against law enforcement.

 

Google "Oakland + riders" and you will read of four cops who decided they were basically going to re-enact their own version of Training Day, Internal Affairs etc. The city hadn't really healed from that before the BART thing happened. A BART cop, different agency from Oakland but not really all that different in the eyes of the public, shot and killed an unarmed man who was lying on his stomach. The police commissioner's office played hide-and-seek for a week while person after person took their cell phone videos to the local TV station. Only because of those videos did the cops finally own up to what happened. Without the videos, there is no doubt in my mind it would have been written up as "perp got aggressive, cop tried sanctioned restraint techniques, perp got free, gun went off."

There are a lot of questions to be answered on this one. Random traffic stop goes that bad? Could be, but the police agencies don't have a huge reservoir of goodwill and credibility. That recent David Simon story about police reporting, or lack thereof, has echoed in my mind since I first heard this news.

 

A random traffic stop of an ADW parole violator who's got a gun with him goes bad? How could it go well?

 

Just read a story saying three have died. Is it up to four?

 

It looks more like the earlier report was erroneous, but then I just looked at the SF Chronicle's site and while they say that three are dead, they also include this quote from the Governor: