LogFAQs > #887243679

Yellow posted...

A pipe is not a weapon! He was 15 feet away!

A pipe is most definitely a weapon. As for the 15 feet? 15 feet is next to nothing. It takes what, four steps to cross that distance when running?

There's a bit of informal doctrine used in the police force called the "21 foot" rule. The origination of the 'rule' stated that an offender with an edged weapon within 21 feet of an officer could make it to that officer and kill him before he had a chance to draw and fire his gun. So the rule of thumb in situations within 21 feet, with a perp with a weapon, means that it's a potentially deadly situation.

Whether or not you believe that is up to you. But they've done a lot of testing on this. Still, this was obviously not an edged weapon (though one hit to the head with a lead pipe could easily be lethal), and the officers already had their guns drawn. The perp however was well within 21 feet. So there's a little bit of nuance here.

That said, I would think this officer will likely be fired (and should be) and be at the end of a wrongful death suit. Between the multiple officers on the scene, a taser probably would have sufficed.

As far as I'm concerned, the part about him being deaf is irrelevant. It wasn't that he was following commands incorrectly, it was that he wasn't complying at all. Deaf people can be idiots too.
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