Police killed Jason Maccani as he held a fork, one of many cases of confused Los Angeles officers rushing to use lethal force
The first report from the Los Angeles police department about the killing of Jason Maccani on 3 February immediately drew scrutiny: an officer had fatally shot a man who had been “armed with a stick” and threatening people in a building on Skid Row, the department said.
LAPD’s update a day later raised new concerns: the 36-year-old Maccani hadn’t been holding any weapon, but rather a “white plastic fork”.
Body-camera footage released two weeks later raised even further questions about LAPD’s shifting narrative. The footage showed Maccani alone walking out of a unit into the building hallway, not threatening anyone, when seven officers approached with weapons drawn. The officer who fired the fatal shot opened fire within roughly 15 seconds of seeing him.
Maybe it was an assault style fork
Actually, as you can clearly see, the food storage area was located behind the action (handle) area.
So the fork was technically a bullpup.
“Warrior Training”:
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/08/warrior-cop-class-dave-grossman-killology.html
https://boltsmag.org/warrior-cop-training-persists-in-minneapolis-despite-reforms/
Good video here, NSFW hilarious language:
This exactly. Thank you for bringing attention to this. This is the real problem, and Grossman should be drummed out of the industry. His methods promote crimes against humanity.
Copying my comment from a previous post:
Fun fact: ‘police officer’ isn’t even in the top 10 most dangerous professions in the US. It’s solidly beat by things like garbage collector, delivery driver, maintenance worker, and pilot. None of those professions typically carry weapons on the job.
Lots of police officers were former bullies with an inferiority complex. Some are wusses who only feel powerful because they’re carrying a deadly weapon.
Another fun fact: police in several other western countries don’t carry deadly weapons and yet are able to do their jobs just fine.
American police are trained to think everything and everyone is against them, through programs like David Grossman’s Killology course. Weird how a program designed to teach recruits to kill without empathy would result in people killing without empathy.
Elsewhere, police are learning de-escalation tactics, but police in the US are learning escalation.
I appreciate you bringing this up, as it means this issue is getting more exposure. Anyone reading, please share this information so we can begin to dismantle this destructive and anti-humanitarian system.
Because they enjoy killing people and they’re pretty certain they’ll get away with it.
ACAB
Because they’re scumbag fascist pigs who shoot first and ask questions later.
Because they’re bastards. All cops are. Hence the phrase.
Because 🔫 you that’s why.
It’s not “to protect and serve”
It’s “to intimidate and control”
Read it as “to serve and protect the rich and powerful”, and then it starts to make sense
Without reading- is it because all cops are bastards?
Wild guess but they probably thought it was a weapon
Studies have been done about this phenomenon where under stress the mind “sees” something that is not there. It is essentially projecting what it fears most. In the case of police, they lack training and conditioning to help them see reality. Many special forces such as Army Rangers train for this so that they don’t shoot a civilian holding a harmless object. It is shameful how under trained cops are.
I think the poor training is the point. If they were any better trained they might be held accountable for their actions.
Sadly I think you may be correct.
- They’re terrified
- They know they won’t face consequences
They’re terrified because their training is all about surviving an encounter with the most evil bastard ever to walk the earth. Even though the majority of cops go their entire careers without using a gun on the job, they’re all taught to have the mindset that at any second they’re about to be killed. Imagine trying to do a job that’s mostly about taking reports, writing tickets and marriage counseling with the mindset that every person you meet might be planning to kill you. They’re super jumpy, and often in contact with strangers. So, of course they’re going to shoot people.
Just as big an issue is that nobody polices the police. Their unions make sure they’re unaccountable. If ever a cop is investigated it’s by another “brother” cop. They have massive latitude for the use of force based on their own personal judgement. If they ever do something that could be considered a crime, they get to postpone the interview for a few days and consult with a union rep / lawyer before the interview. This means if you want to kill people, you can get away with it. If you don’t want to kill people, but you end up doing it because you were terrified of a black man during a standard traffic stop, you can also get away with it.
The description of the fork incident is pretty misleading. Maccani stormed up to the officers undeterred by multiple bean-bag rounds, holding the fork reversed so that it looked like a knife. Take 20 seconds and see for yourself:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwXjrS9bPQ4
A better trained / equipped group may have been able to de-escalate / disarm him, but – unlike many other cases – they didn’t just wander up and shoot him for existing.
Because they have almost no training.
Because they are fascists?
Maybe if you start by having less guns in your country.