...and then enjoy your indefinite "vacation." Seriously, police aren't going to grapple with someone with a knife. It's not a Chuck Norris movie. They are going to neutralize the threat, and if a sidearm is what they have then it's what they're going to use.

I'm just assuming someone, somewhere, video-taped an officer being actively attacked because this is what everyone defending the police are saying. That he was in 'immediate' danger, which to me translates to, having someone lunging at me with a knife. I don't believe it for a second but, that's because I can't actively seeing someone with a knife thinking "im going to chase down cops who are far away and trailing me".

And actually, you don't "Defend yourself and cap their ass". You "Defend yourself and subdue to suspect with restraint against lethal force unless it's the only option".

I love how easily people forget police are trained in CQC to restrain suspects whom have weapons [that aren't guns]

No where in the article does it say the homeless man was far away. He could have been just inches or a couple feet from the officers, we dont know. I've been a police explorer for almost 4 years (basically cop training for high schoolers) and we do lethal confrontation scenarios all the time and you'd be surprised how quickly a man can close a distance with a knife. Those cops obviously wanted to make it home to their families that night and didnt take any chances. In an ideal world or even a movie setting they should have used less lethal options but look at it this way:

The man already has a knife pulled out on you (thats considered a lethal weapon right there), whos to say he doesnt have a gun too? So, naturally you have your gun out too, you're not going to put your gun in your holster and pull out your OC spray and pray he doesnt one-up you with his own gun.

Also, its some common misconception that tazers are an all mighty, magical people stopping device. While they would drop a lot of people with no problem (assuming they dont malfunction which happens sometimes) a man already lunging at you with a knife is just going to continue to fall into you and cut/stab you one way or another. Also, many narcotics will "soften" the effects of the tazer and, no offence to the homeless, but many of them take narcotics and it is part of the reason they are where they are.

So, like I said, we werent there so we cant judge the officers and say they are horrible people, they should be executed, etc. They feel horrible enough knowing that they killed an innocent bystander which is another thing we cant blame them for. If you've ever fired a handgun you would know how difficult it is to hit things, especially a real moving, probably charging, target and all your adrenaline going through you I can guarentee you no one shot the bystander on purpose, still very very sad he died without even being involved. Anyway, I feel like the devil's advocate right now as these stories tend to get pumped with sensationalism and people jump to conclusions about the police as a whole. Just remember this isnt the movies, those officers know thedangers of a knife wiedling man and took the action they needed to avoid serious injury or death, I feel like if the bystander getting shot people wouldnt pay any attention to this story but we love to critisize those who do a good job every day without being mentioned.

Edit: @ OP's post above me: people also forget that we dont live in an ideal world of perfect scenarios, you want to disarm a man with a knife? Those CQC techniques ARE the last resort, meaning if you are out of weapons, no sane man is going to disarm an armed suspect when you have a gun at your disposal. Also, I dont know if you knew this but cops dont train on these things as extensivley as you like to think, because the people have to pay for the extra training and the people dont like to pay for anything extra, yet when the cops slip up or look bad because of lack of training its the people who wont pay for it that complain, its viscious cycle and being a police explorer for over 3 years I've seen too much of it.

I'm personally not defending the police. I'm just saying that it's wrong to jump to the conclusion that they were negligent based on the information provided.


Being trained to do something doesn't automatically make it the advisable course of action, you know.

And nowhere does it say in the article the man was actively attacking the officer. Watching the news, the general idea of what happened was the Police had been trailing the guy for awhile on reports that a homeless man was walking around, cutting open garbage bags with a knife. Then the story proceeded to go on about how the officers had been trailing him. So unless they turned a corner and this guy was magically waiting for them, I don't see how the guy closed a distance without them having some knowledge. But that's just my take on it.

And you shouldn't be praised for doing your daily job correctly. Assuming you aren't burning your company to the ground, you are getting paid to work. I don't ask my boss to thank me personally each time I fix some coworkers stupid database mistake that just so happened to completely screw up the records because the DB who designed the database made some dumb errors. When I get my pay every 2 weeks, that's my "Thank you for not burning our company to the ground".

As for the suspect being under a narcotic. I don't expect a homeless guy to have much drug use in his system [obviously. this could easily be untrue], but if a guy is cutting open garbage bags for tin cans to sell... you think he's got money for a drug strong enough that he's going to pull a Rodney King? Lol.

And yes i'v fired off handguns and shotguns before. But isn't this was officers train to do? I mean.. a hunter training on traps.. can usually get to the point he hits every trap...? I'd hope that a police officer on the shooting range is, actually hitting the targets.

the guy has a knife............you dont try and ninja/samauri someone with a knife unless you have no other options. if you are walking along in the park and someone comes lunging at you with a knife and your armed are you seriously saying that you would try and negotiate with him or use kung fu on him instead of taking out your firearm. once again people seriously overestimate the amount of training that police get. these guys are not navy seals or green berets. also, were talking about canadian police here.

There's a rule police officers learn in training.

A man armed with a knife at a distance of 21 feet from a police officer can reach him for a kill in 1.5 seconds.
A regular police officer with an holstered weapon can take it out and shoot (blindly) in 1.5 seconds.

So, considering that the aggressive, unpredictable homeless man had a combat knife at the ready, they did not have much choice.



Your article is now old. As I mentioned in my second post, an article from yesterday from Quebec's newspaper states that the man was not just cutting open garbage bags with a knife. He also chased his neighbor with it. The police officers who arrived on the scene first followed him, trying to talk him out of it. The homeless man, who did not comply, then got too close to one of the officers, knife in hand.

Uh... The Police foundations course in my University has 8 months of Combat Training.... Every semester there is another course for basic, advanced combat, etc. I am pretty sure 4.5 hours a week for 4 years constitutes as ALOT of training?

Also. By your logic, anyone who poses a threat should be shot on sight to avoid confrontation. If I have the training to break someones arm who is coming at me with a knife, then i'd preferably break their arm to shooting them. Why? Well, for one. I shoot him, and my plea of self-defense turns into man-slaughter and I go to jail for 10-15 years.

I shoot him and he doesn't die. I get sued, regardless of it being an act of self-defense, and go to jail for 5-10 years.

Or, I use the training I had gotten, do my best to subdue and restrain the guy while causing as minimal damage as possible, and I don't go to jail and get violated by a guy named "Missy" who is using my rear-end as paying for protection against being shanked in jail.

"Also, were talking about canadian police here" ? I'm not sure if this was purely meant to be discriminating or not, but cops here don't take [censored]. I had a cop throw me into a wall at Mach 4 because I tried to run away from him when I was 17. [ok not mach 4. but needless to say I didn't try standing up after hitting the wall].

Watch yourself mister :stare:

I'm glad you did a mental evaluation on these officers before you said that. :rolleyes:

Your job doesnt put you into harms way on a daily basis, your boss doesnt tell you to walk into a house with a husband and wife screaming and threatening eachother and expect you to peacefully resolve the situation, you dont get the bird flipped at you, called names, or spit on almost daily, peoples lives are not in your hands, you dont know the pressure this has on a person, the reason why a lot of cops have marital issues is because they see things and do things most people dont have the stomach for and when others dont realize how difficult the job can be at times and they dont thank them every now and then they naturally get upset. So in my book, yes, the cops should get some thanks for a good day at work considering a real good day is rare for many officers. Not saying they need a party thrown in their name every night but simply realizing their job is tougher than we think is enough to make them feel like they aren't alone.

sad indeed.

maybe its different up there in canada but there are numerous instances of police shooting people threatening them with knives and nothing ever comes of it. i also know some cops and just asked one and they said you get basic training for regular officers and some additional training if you go into swat or something. when i asked the difference between police training and his military training he said there was no comparison. he compared alot of the police training time to being at a martial arts dojo which is not the same nor as "hardcoe".... his words.. the difference in training has been an issue as of late because some gang members have returned form the military and have been chewing up the less well trained cops. and we are talking LA police here not some hick town sherrif.

the canadian thing was a joke but i forgot to put my smiley face after it so i apologize.

your comment about "if im trained to break someones arm if they have a knife is also utter nonsense. clearly you have never taken krav maga or any other form of martial arts. one of the first things they tell you is to avoid close fights if possible specifically because in this day and age you DONT know whether or not the other person is armed with a knife or gun. they empshasize that its a last resort. you dont know how strong the other person is compared to you and you dont know if they had similar training or are hopped up on drugs which would make them significantly stronger than you etc.

Do you just not pay attention to anything that going on here? You didn't even read what I said, let alone the article. You are the reason why police officers have such a bad image in our culture today. You read just the headline and think you know everything there is to know.

Just don't let his read about the incident at the TJ memorial

:lol:

That there is a fantasy. Did you read that http://www.nononsenseselfdefense.com/knifelies.html I gave you earlier? To sum it up: controlling someone else's knife is very difficult, getting hurt by a knife is very easy, every knife wound reduces your ability to do anything, even one knife wound can put a person into shock (a physical state that is difficult to overcome), a knife is an extremely deadly weapon within it's range.


True, though I don't think there have been any statements regarding the bloke's health (he may not have been ill). Drug/alcohol use is a strong possibility (sadly), with similar results.


You try hitting a fast moving target every shot in a high stress situation. It could well be that the stray bullet was the only one out of half a dozen, which would be hitting the target more than 92% of the time. All it took was one stray bullet, not a storm of them. But we have no such statistics whatsoever, which means we can't make any proper conclusion one way or the other.


If someone has 24 hours a day to scraqe up the money for one high and doesn't 'waste' any money on things like food, they will get high at least once. I'm not familiar with the prices, but I'm pretty sure $20 will get you at least one dose, and that isn't too hard to scraqe together. Alcohol, too, can be had fairly easily (in this part of the world, you can pick up a 4L (~1gal) cask of goon for $15 without shopping around).


A knife at two feet is at least as deadly as a gun at twenty. Knife wounds can be messy in a way that lower calibre full jacket bullets can't match, knives can be pretty fast in any hands, almost any part of a knife will hurt you... knives are not to be underestimated. The only sane way of dealing with a knife is to either 1) Run the bloody hell way 2) If you're absolutely forced to, use a weapon with more range (longish stick will do) and keep enough distance to maintain your advantage.

Anyone more experienced in dealing with knives in real life see anything to contradict?

Oh come on, I have better knowledge of the Rules of Engagement than those clowns did, and I know that from playing a video game (Swat 4). What a crying shame.

Also reminds me of the original ending to Paranormal Activity. While arguably the best one, it was still pretty silly.

Watch what?



This id true, a homeless man with a knife is mor than likely to be jacked on something, more foten than not. Now Im not saying he si snorting so much that he is like Scarface or anything. But the fact that they killed him and a commuter makes me sad, even sadder is it is a Canadian Cop



They have a bad image yes because people are stupid and dont know the facts, but he is nto acting stupid or anything like that.

I'm sorry, but the idea that a police officer would try to fight someone armed with a knife hand-to-hand is nowhere close to being realistic. :shrug: