Nightmare scenario…
Thoughts go out to the families and the officer. That is a heavy burden for him to carry…
Sorry, but this is pathetic. He killed an innocent woman. End of story. Who cares that he took out a criminal? There’s a good chance the hostage would still be alive had the officer not shot.
ETA: meant woman not man
I think it was an innocent woman. But either way.
Just like the shoot out in the street in NYC a year back. A bunch of bystanders hit by LEO fired rounds and none were hit by the assailant.
Truly sad situation. I don’t know if I can blame the officer entirely, the major fault lies with who ever let this scumbag out of prison in the first place. Maybe some blame must fall on the officer, no? Did it really require 8 rounds?
And what the fuck is up with 8 rounds? The law in NY is 7. That means the officer reloaded and shot one more round. Unless it was one in the chamber and 7 in the mag. Either way, he shot the gun dry. Was that really necessary?
At the LAV Adv Handgun class I took, there was an LE student telling us about how “instructors” would teach recruits at the police academy how to qualify for handgun if missing the target by using Kentucky windage rather than teaching them the fundamentals of marksmanship.
Cops need training, just like everyone else.
You serious???
Shame we didn’t take the same class together…mine was in PA though.
This is super tragic. I’ve been following the story for a few days…
I couldn’t help but think of how it happened in one of the most anti gun counties in the State and how many times I have heard anti gun people say: Things like home invasions don’t happen to anyone other then criminals.
In regards to the police officer shooting the woman? I am a little surprised he fired eight rounds, he is going to have to live with his mistake for the rest of his life.
Tragic story.
Bush’s fault defense.
So he should have just let the gunman shoot him? And then maybe the woman and the male hiding behind the couch?
How would you have handled it? It is a very difficult situation. What if you came home and it was your wife being held at gunpoint, and the gunman aimed his gun at you? What if you escaped the threat, and you heard a shot, and found out later that the gunman killed your wife before running away?
It is a tragic event, and the police officer will have to live with his mistake for the rest of his life.
i think he was between a rock and a hard place…
indoors with a suspect, who is using the female hostage as a human shield, then the suspect turn the gun on the officer?
whats he supposed to do? just let the guy shoot him?
obviously his marksmanship pretty good,
hit the perp 8 times.
just not good enough.
and the hostage took one to the head.
anyone want to comment about the other circumstances involved?
how about the fact they left their front door wide open and unlocked?
or that there were several people in the home that did nothing to stop the intruder over the course of the half hour invasion?
so many factors that led up to this girl getting killed that were 100% under her control.
i can hardly blame the officer for her death.
I’d have made the same call as the cop. I’d risk hitting the woman as opposed to knowing almost certainly that he’d shoot her anyway.
It’s a damn shame what happened, and training would’ve helped prevent this.
Best post so far.
I’m not so sure that training would not have helped. An officer armed with a carbine and well trained it its use would have an excellent chance of delivering an immediately incapacitating CNS shot.
I know. I was agreeing with that sentiment. Reading is fundamental. 
I have yet to see a LE agency that has sufficient marksmanship training or that zeros pistols to individual officers/loads. I have also never seen an agency that trains for head shots. Every LE qualification I’ve ever seen focuses strictly on “center mass” and everyone can still be passed with complete, off of the paper misses. The best marksmanship training I’ve seen was with the FBI but it is still woefully inadequate for situations like this and it still lets people “qualify” with complete, off the paper misses.
You could gather together any hundred random LE and I’d be absolutely blown away if more than five of those hundred could do 25 yard head shots, reliably, on demand, on a square range. I’ve seen a lot of veteran LE officers qualify with rounds completely missing the paper and actually hitting the 15 yard line from the 25 yard line.
My guess is that this guy was an average cop, probably a decent guy, who walked into more than he bargained for, felt threatened (rightfully so), reacted poorly (defaulted to his LE training), and very unfortunately killed an innocent girl. The cops training failed him and he failed the girl by defaulting to his training. Eight fast rounds is not the proper response to a hostage taker.
Again, just my guess, but this cop found himself reacting to the bad guys actions when the gun was turned on him unexpectedly and made a quick snap decision vs acting in a deliberate fashion. This is one of those situations where the cop should have shot much earlier, on his terms, and in a more deliberate manner. LE frequently (usually) waits until the last possible point of no return before shooting even when shooting was appropriate much earlier— sometimes, most times, that saves lives but this time it cost an innocent life.
There were lots of contributing factors but in the end, the cop killed the bad guy (good shoot) and he killed an innocent (bad shoot). It looks like there was no malfeasance but there was certainly negligence. This is about on the same level as crashing during a pursuit and killing an innocent— in the end the blood is still on your hands unfortunately.
Provided the girl who called the police explained, he knew going into the situation that there was a potential hostage situation. He also knew the guy had threatened to kill the hostages.
Knowing that, who in their right mind would go in without a hostage situation team or SWAT team? This cop decided he could handle the situation and then, when HIS life was threatened (when a gun was pointed at him), put the girls life in danger and ultimately (and directly) killed her.
His actions were inexcusable and blatantly stupid… And he killed a hostage because of it.
He should have waited for backup. He should have waited for a negotiator. He should have had tactical backup. That’s what I would have done/requested and what anyone who cares about the lives of the victims should have done.
He singlehandedly escalated the situation.
Bingo. This was my assessment as well.
I can go both ways on this issue. If he just thought there was an armed robber in the house he could have reasonably gone in to confront him and keep him from the innocents. That makes sense.
If he knew it was a true, gun-to-the-head hostage situation he should have waited for support or posted up at a position of cover protecting himself and buying himself precious time if he had to shoot. He got caught/put himself in an “oh shit” moment and hosed the bad guy down along with the hostage.
In my mind, he’s both criminally and civilly liable. I imagine that the victim being a beautiful, soon to be college graduate, middle class white girl is going to make this a bad ride for the cop. I can easily see an indictment for manslaughter being brought.
There is a reason only a couple units in the military have the primary responsibility for hostage rescue and only a few more are trained to do it only in extreme emergencies. The same applies to federal law enforcement— only HRT has the primary hostage rescue mission with the field SWAT teams doing it only if HRT can’t get there in time.
A Marine Corps general once visited a military unit that specializes in hostage rescue. During his visit he watched a mock building take down and hostage rescue. After the successful mock rescue he commented (paraphrased) that “a platoon of Marines could have done that” to which the unit’s commander answered “that’s why you don’t have the mission.” This was a extraordinary situation that was attempted by an ordinary individual.
I feel truly bad for the family (primarily) and the cop. He’s probably an okay guy who has to live with this the rest of his life. That doesn’t absolve him from responsibility for his actions though.
I’d like to think that the small screen on my iPhone is the problem rather than my aging eyes…
There is so much derp in this thread I cannot even begin to take it seriously.
Tragic loss of life.
LEO’s need more training.