Dawson Co Shootout

Local Color:

Our farrier, who is also a deputy sheriff in Dawson County, was involved in this little hostage situation.

The police did not return fire due to concern for the 8 year old hostage, which is good, given that the police were apparently armed with automatic weapons. However, according to our farrier, the hostage-taker reported at one point (after a shot fired inside the house) that he'd shot the boy. Negotiators on the phone later established that wasn't true.

I gather the drug-abuser in question has been arrested before, and turned loose. This is apparently normal behavior for him.

I wonder the following things:

1) What is the point of issuing automatic weapons to police? If they have to be afraid to use them because of concerns for noncombatants, the benefit of having them is nonexistant. There will nearly always be noncombatants in a policing situation. A scoped rifle would seem to be a better choice, not only for this situation, but for almost any conceivable policing situation.

2) The police were obviously constrained from simply killing the man, in spite of the fact that (a) he had a child as a hostage, and (b) he was a repeat offender in terms of going crazy on drugs and shooting at people. As a potential juror, I can't imagine voting to convict an officer under these circumstances -- but I'm not sure why it should matter anyway. Yet the policy of the deparment was plainly to protect the criminal and hostage-taker, which is madness.

3) E. Charles at Gwa45's place was asking if anyone still supports the war on drugs. I can't say that I do. It's a needless expense with serious dangers to our notion of liberty. Can we agree, however, that if we were to legalize certain drugs, we'd be willing also to take the cuffs off cops who have to deal with people who are driven mad by their abuse of drugs? In other words, are we ready to say that (a) drugs can be used, if regulated like alcohol or tobacco, but also (b) that people who take kids hostage, claim to have shot kids, etc., are taking their lives in their hands?

4) How did we get to the point that a claim to have shot a child -- who might be dying from blood loss at this moment -- is something to be resolved by negotiators, over time, on the phone? If anything justifies a frontal assault, or a sniper putting down the criminal in question, surely that is it.