The great and vast mysteries of the law

[sabotabby]

Wanna hear a joke?

A mentally ill kid on an empty streetcar waves his dick and a knife around. The cops come to the scene. From a reasonable distance (i.e., not stabbing range) one of them shoots him three times, then stops to make sure that he's mostly dead, then shoots him five more times. The kid dies. The cop is convicted of attempted murder.

That's it. That's the joke.

I suppose we should be happy that he was convicted of anything at all, given that he was a cop and the prosecution reportedly bungled some things. The takeaway to cops, I suppose, is that if you're going to murder a kid, make sure you don't pause when you're blowing the shit out of him.

Can some more legalistic minds than mine find out if there has ever been a case of attempted murder where the victim died at the scene?

Comments

[smhwpf.livejournal.com]

Fuck. :-(

At least, as you say, he was convicted of something. Still absurd that they can find the first three shots justified, even to a "reasonable doubt" level.

[sabotabby]

Yeah. I mean, it's not like there was video and a shit-ton of witnesses or anything. Oh wait.

[resonant.livejournal.com]

"Trial by YouTube" - so not covering up the video evidence is discrimination against the police?

[sabotabby]

Apparently not immediately falling to your knees in worship every time you see a cop means you don't believe that Blue Lives Matter.

[dagibbs.livejournal.com]

"The takeaway to cops, I suppose, is that if you're going to murder a kid, make sure you don't pause when you're blowing the shit out of him."

I completely agree with this sentiment.

[sabotabby]

It's a common one around these parts, I think.

[franklanguage.livejournal.com]

I guess they're learning from the NYPD; however, the New York cops have known for years it's better to be safe than sorry, especially when the alleged perp is waving a wallet while black.

[rinue.livejournal.com]

My god. What's the argument? I shot him but didn't kill him, then he died of natural causes in between bullets, and then I shot him more? Incredible.

[sabotabby]

The rumour I heard was that the Crown knew a jury wouldn't convict a cop of murder, so they threw in "attempted murder" because the evidence was overwhelming.

There was a big discussion of it on the radio today but I didn't listen to the whole thing.

[ironed_orchid]

The Crown was pretty fucking smart to do that, given the circumstances and the outcome.

[sabotabby]

Yep. Especially given the weird convoluted ruling.

[frandroid.livejournal.com]

It took days for the jury to deliberate, so I agree.

[misslynx.livejournal.com]

According to what I heard, the logic (to use the term loosely) was that the initial three shots could be regarded as self-defense and therefore legal (if you accept that someone with a knife who is not remotely within stabbing distance of someone with a gun is somehow an actual threat to their life, because telekinesis or something), but that shooting him more once he was already down was not self-defense and was therefore an illegal attempt to murder him. And the reason it was attempted murder rather than actual murder was because he was already dead (due to the above-mentioned technically legal "self-defense" shooting) and therefore could not be further murdered.

[rinue.livejournal.com]

Aha. It makes a certain bureaucratic sense, while also being completely ridiculous.

[misslynx.livejournal.com]

Exactly. There is actually logic to it, of a sort — it's just that it's basically Bizarro-world logic.

[sabotabby]

It's impressively devious.

[the-siobhan.livejournal.com]

The head of the police: the verdict, “sends a chilling message to our officers.”

How difficult it must be for them, knowing that they might be convicted of a laughably reduced charge, instead of just getting away with murder completely.

[sabotabby]

Life is so hard! They might get their wrists slapped.

[kryss-labryn.livejournal.com]

Oh, gods. *Facepalm*

You know, I remember a time when the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (and, by extension, every other force in the country, not that there was any others) were, so far as I was aware, regarded with respect? I mean, sure, down in the States they had racist, bigoted cops who would shoot you as soon as look at you; but up here we were civilized and had cops who had the best interests of civilians at heart. Heck, if we revolted against the government, they'd probably be on our side.

Looking at things now, I'm pretty sure 90% of that impression was because I was a nice white kid who didn't have run-ins with the law and didn't hang out with those who did. And didn't know very many First Nations people very well, because now I'm sure as shit that institutionalized racism against them isn't anything new. But even still. They didn't used to be so fucking blatant about their assholery.

I suspect that, back then, they were afraid of being found out. But now we know, with the consequence that... meh. So what? What are we gonna do about it? Huh?

Fuuuuuck.

[frandroid.livejournal.com]

> regarded with respect

Really?

[sabotabby]

Yeah, not during my lifetime.

[sabotabby]

I remember hearing that cops and RCMP would take FN people down to Cherry Beach, beat them, and leave them to die from exposure. Also I almost got arrested at an anti-FTA protest when I was 8, so my opinion of Canadian cops has never been high.