Quitshootr, Armdlbrl:

It's not that you shouldn't criticize, examine or comment. But, I think that several others have raised questions with your analysis and you have gottten hot about it.

Quieshootr, Since you were in the Army you probably know that in Vietnam they calculated body counts vs. TONS of ammo used.

I would also point out that infantry combat with people 200 meters apart is much different than a "cop" type encounter where you are 5 ft apart, and even if you hit the BG nice and square he will probalby have enough time to shoot back and kill you before he dies, if you stand there and admire your handi-work.

Also next time you go out shooting, take a friend with you, and a baseball bat. When you start shooting tell your friend if you aren't using proper cover he can feel free to hit you. Also put your target behind cover, or concealment, and make sure it is moving around. Let us know what your hit percentage is then.

The Troopers survived an encounter with an armed suspect who tried to kill them.

If you haven't been in the exact situation, then, NO, you don't have a right to second guess them.

Oh yeah you already know everything.....

When I do that, I'm shooting down into a valley that's deep enough you can safely shoot clays on the fly and have your round impact a hillside that is also on our property.

That makes me feel much better.

Why are you bringing up Quietshooters questionable communication skills?

That had very little to do with my reply. Nor was my reply limited in scope to just this thread.

EVERY god-dammed time someone posts here questioning the conduct or talents of a law enforcement officer the resoponse from the law enforcement officers here is the SAME. First its "your not qualified", then if you still persist follows personal attacks, and when all else fails you are suddenly a "cop basher".

The lack of self criticism amongst the LEO's here is very scary.  Just for once before I die I would like to see a cop go, "You know, this guy fucked up, he needs to go back to school."
But I am begining to doubt that will ever happen.

Now to specificly address the thread, the cops in the story need better training. Those other 9 rounds could have killed a innocent person, and there was [i]probably[/i] no need for them to be fired.

How can I make such a statement? Simple, records are kept of officer involved shootings. The FBI studied those records. For the 50 years prior to 1980, the average number of shots fired by a officer in a officer involved shooting was 2.8. That is 2.8 shots FIRED, not bullets plucked from the corpse. The same proportion of those shootings happend at night as today, and nobody had nice things like tritium sights and convinently mounted small flashlights. Nobody had bullet proof vests either to provide security if the officer took a little longer to aim and allowed the bad guy off a shot first...

So why is it NOW acceptable for officers to use a entire magazine in a shooting?  This very thing is what opponents of the autopistol for law enforcement lived on for seventy odd years. Long after the automatic had proven its tehcnical superiority over the revolver as a fighting weapon, this concern was what kept revolvers in the hands of 90% of the officers in America. Only in the 80's were officers finally able convince governments and insurers that officers could be trained to not "spray and pray" and they finally got their automatics.

But now what to we have? Too much spray and pray. Everything the old critics of the automatic said would pass. This same shit is happening with cops nation wide. I see it happen here in AZ. I can only guess that this is a side effect of departments finally getting to the point that most of their officers now have never used a revolver on duty. That officers who learned first on the revolver became conditioned to having to make their shots count, and that kept them from leaning on their automatics firepower.

Quietshooter shouldn't have tried to exercise his wit in describing the problem, but it is a fact that Law Enforcement Officers in this country and not that long ago were able to win night time gunfights like the one at the start of this thread. They were able to do this without sending a half magazine of bullets down range, and did this WITHOUT the availabilty of so much of the MUST HAVE gadgets like night sights and handy flashlights that we use today. Peace officer shooting should be getting BETTER not worse but I for one dont see it happening.

1) I think from other posts QS is a  far above average shooter. He will base any decisions he makes about shooting based on his level of skill......

2) I think you are assuming that those other bullets weren't accounted for...... What if the other 9 bullets are in the car the BG came out of??? So yes they missed him but they weren't wild shots. What if that is the case??

3) What about the fact that apparently the BG was in the car while the troopers were questioning the other occupant of the subject vehicle, behind the vehicle. So the troopers managed to return fire, not hitting the other subject and he is now in custody.

4) LEO's are human, they should be judged as such. I think from the limited info they did a fairly good job in this incident. Not perfect, but good.

It could be that more and more perps were using autos - I'll bet it's hard to keep your cool and bust off some nice aimed shots while the other guy has already busted a half dozen caps in your direction.

As to rounds fired. Could it be in the old days, like when LEO's could shoot ANY fleeing felon, that they were shooting at people that were not an actual threat to them?? What about Bonnie and Clyde? How many hundreds of rounds did they use on that one?

I think that the rules for LEO's using deadly force has changed markedly in the last 30 years and now LEO's have to be about to or actually taking incoming rounds before they can fire back. You can fire fewer rounds if you can decide when the shoot-out will start, but LEO's can't do that anymore.

Incoming rounds can throw a fella's aim off.

My .02 cents.
Last time I looked at police statistics officers usually have a 13% hit rate and the bad guys normally have a 15% because they usually have the advantage of suprise.
In My opinion they did well..

Our dept.  shoots at least 4-6 times a year plus F.A.T.S.  and they highly encourage pratice on your own time..  


But I will concede that as LEO we do need more firearms training.

Let's see.  Go to the public range,  and find bullet holes in everything from the floor to the ceiling. Benches, support posts, target holders, even the wall BEHIND the firing line.  I think the monkeys could use a little refresher training. Go to the police range.  There is one hole in the roof adjacent station 12 put there 6 years ago by a cadet. The guys in the story did good. I shudder to think of the difficulty. Luck?  It certainly was. It was also skill and a 40 pound set of brass balls.  As an aside,  shooting clay pigeons with a rifle?  What on earth for?

My second post to this. Quietshootr, (and I say this facetiously, as in I would not really do this at all. This is all just for argument sake.)

Send me your address and keep your brother or best friend with you at all times.

I will intentionally aim and shoot to kill you and your bother/friend when I am ready to.

You watch, see and hear your brother/friend get shot and go down or otherwise react to being shot.

And then you pull your weapon from your anti-grab holster and fire at me if I don't kill you first. You are about to die.

Then I will tell you how you reacted or performed. And if you don't hit me with all of your 14 shots, when I am shooting at you, then I will tell you you suck at shooting.

Close your eyes and think,,, real hard.

You really think you will land all 14 shot's do you? If you do, you are really living in a fantasy world.

Yes there are some LEO that shouldn't be carrying a firearm, and there are definetly some people who shouldn't be Monday morning second guessing anything. My last .02 about this

[edited for spelling]