15 yo Asperger Teen Shot Dead by Police

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The same reason anyone else who tries to kill an officer gets shot. Tasers aren't a replacement for guns when someone is in your face trying to stab you.

Being 15 years old and having Aspergers doesn't give you special priviledges or treatment when you try to murder someone.

i agree but then again do you think a person in that state of mind would be charged with murder or manslaughter?
but all of that is beside the point here, if they cannot use a taser to defend themselves in these situations why do they have them? (the only reason they are even semi legal on an experimental basis here)
so they can escalate force against unarmed civillians without killing them?

you may think that this was an apropriate response but i think it was the response of an ignorant man and no not because of as, asds or anything specifically, but because there is a clear difference in pre meditated and instigated incidents in people, especially when you are talking about people with mental difficulties, i think its a pretty darn low requirement to have at least basic psychology classes (required here, throughout the police academy, so a little more than basic, almost a third of the pensum of a psychologist)
as well as a wroking understanding of motivation, even in agitated or irrational people because chances are as a cop you will encounter them, should they all have a bullet to the head if they seem threatening?

a couple of years ago there was a man who escaped from a mental hospital in denmark, when they later found him he had barricaded himself in a train wagon with a handgun and was threatening to fire at the police, had the danish police followed your logic they would have killed him on the spot since he was a direct threat to their safety, but no, that man, while probably still unstable was talked down and is in treatment today, no lives lost and dare i say quite severe compared to a 15 year old throwing a tantrum with a butter knife.

i also agree it can be hard for anyone outside of the situation to get a complete picture but if there is anyone you can be sure doesnt have a complete picture is the people invlved, without correlating all the different viewpoints observer bias would simply be too strong, he might or might not have needed to shoot the kid but i think anyone that decides to shoot a 15 year old kid in the head requires some more than close scrutiny.

also the gun vs taser argument, you do realize that the muslce contraction from a taser is faster than many fatal wounds giving it equal stopping power unrelated to aim or injury infilcted compared to a handgun?

Yes. The insanity defense isn't a magic get out of jail free card for people with mental disorders.

If you can't grasp the idea that a person in melee range trying to stab you at melee range is dangerous, then I really don't know what to say. Oh, and if the guy in your Denmark example actually tried shooting at the police, he'd be dead today.

Seriously? Calling in the authorities to control your children for you? Getting them to subdue your son because he is autistic and obviously not capable of rational thought?

This kid died because his parents are f*****g idiots.

i never said it wasnt dangerous and it might have been neccesary under some pretty darn extrodinary circumstances but as a first respone i find it unacceptable.

and as for the man there were shots fired(and dozens of others, even a 72 year old that fired a .22 into the right shoulder of a policeman was arrested unharmed, without a taser, in threat level i would take a 15 year old with a butter knife over a 72 year old hunter with a .22 any day),

Actually, social workers told them to call the authorities whenever their child throws a tantrum.



It's easy to say that when you're not the one being stabbed.



Not everyone can be extraordinarily lucky.

And I meant the insanity defense isn't even used most of the time, and it usually doesn't succeed either.

over here its the norm, we simply dont see the same relative proportion of violent incidents.
almost all of them end with most people coming out of it alive, there are notable exceptions but the italics tell the story.

Strange country you live in where it's normal for a guy to shoot an officer and not get shot back.

because most of the people that do end up doing something so stupid are usually not fully aware of the act or fully capable of controlling themselves in the situation.
which is hwre extensive psychology training comes in and a disposition where any injury is viewed as a negative.

there are notable exceptions where people were deliberately firing to kill the cops and they do not receive qwuite the same courtesy.

Where is this imaginary place you live in where people with mental illnesses get special treatment when they're shooting at cops? The number of people I can think of who shoot at cops without deliberately trying to kill them is 0.

i think you are taking things out of context.
also we quite simply dont have the ammount of gun crime you do in the us even when size is taken into account.(i know the study below goes for all homicides but that leaves even less for guns, same can be said for the us, the gun culture is quite different in the us though(or thats my impression))
especially shootings involving police, if anything the people that actually want to harm people are the ones that dont shoot at the police because they know they wouldnt get peace.
"Murders per 1000 people, from highest to lowest:

Russia: o.201534
South Africa: 0.0562789
America: 0.042802
India: 0.0344083
France: 0.0173272
Canada: 0.0149063
Britain: 0.0140633
Denmark: 0.0106775
Japan: 0.00499933"
from http://www.nationmaster.com/index.php

its not inherently because people have a diagnosis, but the police in denmark is trained in psychology excactly so they can differentiate between a directed threat and a person randomly lashing out during a psychotic break, usually it works and there are plenty of cases to show for it.
not always and not every case is discernible but what i am trying to do here has less to do with any one countries actions but whether one can justify killing people in that state when they are a relatively low threat, a butter knife could be stopped by simple clothing if he didnt stab directly, then again even then theres a chance it would deflect, im not saying he had a right to behave that way, there should be consequences, but i am saying that i think a lethal response against a single attacker with a butter knife is far beyond a measured respone, he might really have been violent but why?

How did you arrive at that conclusion? Most homicides aren't done by the police, and if an officer legally kills someone, it isn't counted as a murder. Denmark has a lower murder rate simply because people don't kill each other in that country very often.

Where are you coming up with this stuff? Police officers are trained to shoot if you're dangerous, not whether or not you're crazy. It's the court that cares whether or not you're mentally ill.

And you really need to get it through your head that a person trying to stab you with a knife is trying to kill you. And I doubt the officers noticed the knife was a butter knife in the heat of the moment anyways.

bolded parts are misunderstood,

i never meant to say tehre were more shootings with the police involved, nor that that is counted as murder
my parenthesis got me in the end, what i meant to say is that there are less shootings where police are involved compared to where they arent,
i elaborated by saying that one of the reasons is the people that actually want to hurt people usually dont mess with the police,

as for where i got "it",

directly from the horses mouth(Rolf Bjørling Salomonsen ), during a discussion in parliament regarding the merrits of less than lethal alternatives (we only got experimental taser access in 2010 i think, pepper sprays were illegal for the police to use untill 2008, still experimental)

and the police academys page on our education portal "På den almene del undervises du i fx strafferet, psykologi, peronaleforhold og ledelse." (directly translated by me) "in the general pensum you will study criminal law, psychology and HR(last 2 words not regarding the "and"(og))

that pensum is 6 years with practical "real" assignments during the last 3, the lowest lesson plan is the graduating year with 6 months out of the year, higher the eariler in the proccess you are.linksies

Most people obviously think twice before shooting at people who can shoot back. I don't see what this has to do with anything.



And from that alone you came to the conclusion that police officers in Denmark have magical powers allowing them to disarm crazy people shooting at them with guns.

Doesn't matter who gave them that advice. They are just compensating for bad parenting by getting a third-party to assert their authority, which is bad enough by itself, but calling the police, of all people, on your autistic son is just beyond moronic. Can you imagine how confused, alone and utterly frustrated that kid must have felt?

i cant know for sure but one certainly gets an idea.

and while you ay not believe it psychology is a part of the pensum and plenty of people survive similar circumstances here, so we can pretend its magic, certainly.
wont make it so.