Monday January 23, 2006
Ithaca man whistles at police, kills himself


Ithaca police are investigating the death of man who killed himself in front of a police officer.

At 12:42 a.m. Monday, a police officer was leaving the Ithaca police headquarters when a man standing in a nearby parking lot whistled.

The whistler pulled out a gun and shot himself in the head, police said.

Identification is being withheld pending notification of next of kin. An autopsy is planned.


www.pressconnects.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060123/NEWS01/60123003

I wonder if it was a 9 or a 40 ?

odd to say the least

Quoted: I wonder if it was a 9 or a 40 ?

Since he's dead, I'd assume 40!!

Quoted: I wonder if it was a 9 or a 40 ?

A 9 would have bounced off his noggin

At least it wasn't a .45, they go so slow he'd probably change his mind!

WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT

Quoted: WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT

I'm sure that this was done so there would be no delay in finding his body and no investigation as to if it was a suicide or not. I guess if you're gonna do it, this would be a good way. Sorry for the cop that witnessed it tho.

I thought guns were illegal in NY

Quoted: I thought guns were illegal in NY

In upstate, rifles are not regulated much different than rest of country.

Pistols need a state permit.

Edit: He was being scarcastic.

i'm sitting here about 2 miles from where that happened

almost surprised i didn't hear the gunshot  

Quoted: Quoted: I thought guns were illegal in NY In upstate, rifles are not regulated much different than rest of country. Pistols need a state permit.

Then the State is responsible for this man's death. The State took the responsibility, and the State gave the OK, therefore the State is responsible.... It wasn't his fault!!

Good deal.

Quoted: i'm sitting here about 2 miles from where that happened almost surprised i didn't hear the gunshot

He was using the new "head suppressor".

The whistle was to imply "Hey! Hold my beer and watch this!"

Quoted: At least it wasn't a .45, they go so slow he'd probably change his mind!

Quoted: Quoted: i'm sitting here about 2 miles from where that happened almost surprised i didn't hear the gunshot   He was using the new "head suppressor".

Let's just wait for the autopsy and make sure he doesn't have 17 entry wounds to the back of his head.  

Quoted: Quoted: I thought guns were illegal in NY In upstate, rifles are not regulated much different than rest of country. Pistols need a state permit.

Sorry, forgot the roll eyes thingy to denote that I was being sarcastic.  I spent many a summer growing up in Honeye Falls, and lived/worked/school post army in Cooperstown, Potsdam and Akwasasne.  Im entirely too familar with NY gun laws.

Quoted: I wonder if it was a 9 or a 40 ?

"Yo, dat's tight, man."

Another attention whore down the shitter.

Quoted: i'm sitting here about 2 miles from where that happened almost surprised i didn't hear the gunshot

Being you're that near, if you owned one o dem fitty cal tank-piercing, anti-space shuttle, nuclear power plant destroying mega-sniper machine gun death rifles....you'd be a suspect.

Quoted: i'm sitting here about 2 miles from where that happened almost surprised i didn't hear the gunshot

12 Tribes member???  Don't they have a "community" in Ithaca?

what's the investigation for? did he whistle? did he kill himself? yes and yes, investigation over

Good thing it wasn't a dog whistle!!  

Quoted: Quoted: i'm sitting here about 2 miles from where that happened almost surprised i didn't hear the gunshot   12 Tribes member???  Don't they have a "community" in Ithaca?

no idea, i don't leave campus much, there's not much to do in ithaca except for bars which i can't get into.

Quoted: what's the investigation for? did he whistle? did he kill himself? yes and yes, investigation over

Motives, possible mental illnesses, who/where is his family that needs to be notified, etc. etc.

Quoted: At least it wasn't a .45, they go so slow he'd probably change his mind!

Very odd, the .45's I use travel considerably faster than either the 9 Madam Mosel or the .40 Short & Weak.

The cops did it and are just covering up because they are evil JBT's.  

Edit:  On second thought, this has to be a publicity stunt for a new do-it-yourself assisted suicide chain that will be opening around the nation.  

What an ass.

Quoted: 12 Tribes member???  Don't they have a "community" in Ithaca?

Yes they do. Dunno if he is one.

www.twelvetribes.com/whereweare/ithaca.html

Not sure if its related, but the amount of panhandling in and around town has greatly increased since they moved into town. Big debates going on about panhandling laws, infringements of peoples right to beg, and how most panhandlers are "mentally impaired".

I want to see the Tox.  Don't you just love it when the paperwork comes to you?

Update from the local paper:

www.ithacajournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060124/NEWS01/601240313/1002

Man kills himself in front of IPD

By ANNE JU
Journal Staff

ITHACA — The identity of a local man who shot and killed himself early Monday morning in front of Ithaca Police Department headquarters could be released as early as today, police officials said.

The man, who Police Chief Lauren Signer described as “from the immediate surrounding area,” shot himself in the head with a shotgun just before 1 a.m. Monday, in the presence of an IPD patrol officer. The man died almost immediately.
 
An autopsy is scheduled for this morning at the Onondaga County Medical Examiner's Office, according to Ithaca Police Lt. Timothy Williams. Police officials are in the process of notifying the man's next of kin, he said.

A written statement IPD released Monday indicates that at about 12:42 a.m. Monday, an IPD officer became the only witness to the apparent suicide.
The officer was on duty and had stopped by the station, according to Williams. He left to go back to his beat, when he heard a horn beep.

“He looked that way, and he saw the individual with what he thought was a stick or something, kneeling down,” Williams said.

The written statement said the male subject, who was in the parking lot across the street, whistled to the patrol officer at that moment.

“Almost instantaneously, he heard the gunshot,” Williams said.

The man had apparently driven to the small triangular parking lot across from the police headquarters on Clinton Street, at the corner of Spencer Street. He had his four-way flashers on and was outside of his vehicle, Williams said.

The victim apparently shot himself in the head with a shotgun, according to Williams. He died at the scene and was taken to the Tompkins County Morgue pending the autopsy. The officer who witnessed the suicide was not injured, police said.

With the exception of convicted felons, a person can lawfully possess a shotgun without a registration, Williams explained.

Chief Signer described the incident as “bizarre.”

“It doesn't happen every day, but it could happen every day,” she said.

Signer said counseling services would be made available to the officer involved, whether through the Police Benevolent Association, chaplain's office or City of Ithaca Employee Assistance Program. The department will also be “flexible” in allowing the officer any needed time off, Signer said.

“Our first concern is for the officer and his welfare,” she said.

Williams said a death investigation is ongoing, in an attempt to “get some kind of idea of why this occurred.” He said there was “absolutely” no indication at this time why the victim chose to end his life in the place or manner he did.

Bangs Ambulance and the Ithaca Fire Department also assisted at the scene, according to police.


Contact: [email protected]


Originally published January 24, 2006

Quoted: Another attention whore down the shitter.

Quoted: Quoted: WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT I'm sure that this was done so there would be no delay in finding his body and no investigation as to if it was a suicide or not. I guess if you're gonna do it, this would be a good way. Sorry for the cop that witnessed it tho.

Why? It's not like he shot at the cop. He got dead and the cop watched, doesn't seem like a real big deal.

Quoted: Why? It's not like he shot at the cop. He got dead and the cop watched, doesn't seem like a real big deal.

You don't think that that would be emotionally traumatic for the average person, to witness that?

Sounds like another college student who couldn't take the sunless winter.  At least he was creative, most of 'em just make use of the gorges.

He was out walking his dog and couldn't stand the thought of living

without him. If only that dog hadn't liked that fire hydrant near the

Ithaca police headquarters so much.

GM

Quoted: Quoted: Why? It's not like he shot at the cop. He got dead and the cop watched, doesn't seem like a real big deal. You don't think that that would be emotionally traumatic for the average person, to witness that?

Maybe for the average person, but I don't think for the average cop. Maybe I'm not spot on in my estimation, but I certainly don't see the big deal. Just another lump of clay looking for a spot to decompose.

Ithacs,

Home to cornell University and Ithaca College.  It's also where the locals put a bumper sticker on their cars that says: "Ithaca, 10 square miles surrounded by reality".

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: i'm sitting here about 2 miles from where that happened almost surprised i didn't hear the gunshot   He was using the new "head suppressor".

Quoted: Ithacs, Home to cornell University and Ithaca College.  It's also where the locals put a bumper sticker on their cars that says: "Ithaca, 10 square miles surrounded by reality".

You always have this option as  well:

images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=sam.tingleff.com/cms/2004/05/26/city_of_evil.jpg&imgrefurl=sam.tingleff.com/cms/2004/05/&h=199&w=204&sz=11&tbnid=PatR81NpaelV2M:&tbnh=96&tbnw=99&hl=en&start=10&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dcity%2Bof%2Bevil%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26sa%3DN

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT I'm sure that this was done so there would be no delay in finding his body and no investigation as to if it was a suicide or not. I guess if you're gonna do it, this would be a good way. Sorry for the cop that witnessed it tho. Why? It's not like he shot at the cop. He got dead and the cop watched, doesn't seem like a real big deal.

How many people have you seen blow their heads off? I guess it's an everyday occurance in your world. No he may not have know him and may be a jaded individual seeing all a cop does, but then maybe not. YMMV.

Quoted: I wonder if it was a 9 or a 40 ?

Don't think he was professinal enough for a 40.

I'm glad he didn't gorge out.  I spent a few years with Ithaca FD back in the day pulling them out after they jumped.  

We had some freaky ones, like the dude who took the 150 foot plunge off the Triphammer Road bridge onto 6" of water over limestone . . . and lived (although he was a bit screwed up).

The 80-something year old ex-Manhattan project scientist who jumped to his end off the Entrepot bridge because of his guilt in making the A-bomb . . . I remember him shooting past in the water at 20 miles an hour in the spring melts.

The guy who jumped the suspension bridge, trapping his body under the ice for the next two months.  

The drunk guy who walked on the railing to the college ave bridge, only to be blown off by a gust of wind.

Quoted: Quoted: I wonder if it was a 9 or a 40 ? Don't think he was professinal enough for a 40.

It was a shotty

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT I'm sure that this was done so there would be no delay in finding his body and no investigation as to if it was a suicide or not. I guess if you're gonna do it, this would be a good way. Sorry for the cop that witnessed it tho. Why? It's not like he shot at the cop. He got dead and the cop watched, doesn't seem like a real big deal. How many people have you seen blow their heads off? I guess it's an everyday occurance in your world. No he may not have know him and may be a jaded individual seeing all a cop does, but then maybe not. YMMV.

I have yet to see someone blow their head off with a shotgun. It's not an everyday occurrence, but dying is a part of living. You don't get one without the other.

I have seen someone ventilate their frontal lobe with a .45. I have seen a guy who used a .32 revolver to put a bullet through his own lung. I have even gotten to know a guy as he apologized to me for dying, after he cut his wrists and then changed his mind and decided it wasn't such a good idea.  The whole idea is, life is a game that you're not going to get out of alive, whether you like the idea or not. Don't let someone else losing their game distract you from the course of yours.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: i'm sitting here about 2 miles from where that happened almost surprised i didn't hear the gunshot   He was using the new "head suppressor".

I know it's cold blooded but: