Derrick Bird, THAT is why we need routinely armed police.EllEzDee said:
To spite the virtual gun prohibition in the UK with a crude single shot weapon he was able to shoot down 24 people, murdering 12 of them while the unarmed police were forced to run and hide and wait for the "rapid response" armed force. Just a month later Raul Moat paralysed an entire region's police force when he went on a more sustained gun rampage where nothing stopped him targeting police officers, shooting one in the face leaving him severely disabled. HE was a criminal who was able to tap into the large black market for illegal guns in the UK.
Patrolling Officers and detectives are PART OF the community, they know the people and locale and empathise with all of that. When CO19 come charging in they don't know the area, they don't know if there are kids around that like to play with toy guns, or others who might use a harmless air rifle, nor the trouble makers or general attitude. It's as bad as calling in the military, all they really know is how to shoot and they DO take on an invader mentality. They arrive at scenes with vague second hand information that is so out of date and so prone to misinterpretation it's worse than nothing.
That's where CO19 get their reputation for shooting unnecessarily and I believe this is down to their nature as a very separate and de-facto paramilitary force:
When Abdul Kahar's home was raided he got shot in the shoulder. A single shot, there is no logical reason for him to have been shot as he was posing no threat and even if they did think he was a threat he would not have been shot just once. I think like the case of Harry Stanley they simply shot by accident, they carelessly had their finger on their trigger and flinched at seeing an unexpected movement.
They were afraid, confused and poorly disciplined. De Menezes shooting again is a case of negligence as they shot a man who posed no possible threat (either by accident or in illogical panic) targeting him due to mistaken identity. The surveillance team had to be separate from the arresting team that led to CO19 team both not knowing well enough who to arrest and also not having a clear idea of the threat, they assumed he was a suicide bomber executing an attack! If one of the detectives on the surveillance team had the power to make an armed arrest then there would have been a far lower risk to the public.
I'm not saying we don't need CO19, they are clearly necessary for severe threats like a Mumbai style terrorist attack, hostage situations, large scale armed robberies and so on.
But lone gunmen are best dealt with As Soon As Possible, as soon as shots are heard the nearest patrol officer or authorised/deputised armed citizen should approach with a firearm to engage them. A cop with a revolver responding within seconds is better than a dozen Machine gun armed Commandos arriving 15 minutes late on poor 2nd hand information. At the very least a cop with a revolver can more confidently stay close to and advance on a gunman, pass on better info about where they are and what threat they pose.
