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Never bring a hairbrush to a gun fight.

cbxjeff
"NEW YORK - An unarmed, mentally ill teenager died in a hail of 20 bullets fired by police officers who mistook a hairbrush he was holding for a gun, authorities said Tuesday.


Officers were responding to a frantic 911 call by the victim's mother when the shooting occurred.

In the call, police said 18-year-old Khiel Coppin could be heard yelling in the background, claiming he had a gun. They also said the five officers opened fire believing the black hairbrush in his hand was the weapon."

Tragic for sure and some will give the cops a hard time. I don't always take LEO's side but think about this. Some crazy is shouting that he has a gun. You have seconds to either ask him what caliber or defend yourself. What would you do?
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Comments

6 comments

Date Votes
  • andersk
    What should be done? Well, it depends on the DETAILS of the scene. From what is given in this posting, it sure sounds like the Police were asked to respond to a dangerous situation ... did they need to bring him down with "a hail of 20 bullets fired by police officers"? I'm thinking ... it probably did not take that much shooting and I'm also wondering how many others were or could have been injured by collateral damage.

    Sounds like a very over zealous response ... but like I already said, the details are not very evident at least to me at this moment.
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  • bhale187
    There's a bit more to the story as well. Officers initially approached him inside his apartment after his parents called in on him, he came at them with a knife in each hand. Officers backed out of the apartment, and waited outside for backup. He then jumped out the window holding a black handle in his waistband. He then pulled the hairbrush and got shot at 20 times, with 10 rounds hitting him.
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  • medic07
    While I am not an LEO, I look at it in this light:

    1. Called to a violent situation...with the suspect in the background stating he has a gun

    2. The suspect initally approached with knife or knives in hand (threat with a deadly weapon)

    3. Suspect advances towards the officers with his hand on "something" in his waistband and then attempts to pull it out (refer to #1 above about statement)

    4. All officers discharge to stop the threat. Overzealous? Depends. Would you wait to fire to see if one of the other LEOs would fire first? What if all waited for that and the suspect did in fact have a pistol and opened fire and struck one or more LEOs.
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  • beantownshootah
    quote:Originally posted by bhale187
    There's a bit more to the story as well. Officers initially approached him inside his apartment after his parents called in on him, he came at them with a knife in each hand. Officers backed out of the apartment, and waited outside for backup. He then jumped out the window holding a black handle in his waistband. He then pulled the hairbrush and got shot at 20 times, with 10 rounds hitting him.

    I think I have more of a problem with the 50% accuracy rate of the police in this incident than with the alleged circumstances of this particular shooting. Where did the other 10 bullets go?

    As to whether or not it was justified, I've seen enough inaccurate (so-called) press "accounts" of things to know that what's been printed about this isn't necessarily what actually happened. Was the reporter there?

    If not, who did he get the story from?

    Can you imagine that the possible sources of the story *MIGHT* be slightly biased as to what happened?

    so not having been there, I don't have enough information to form an opinion worth much.
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  • givette
    The guy comitted "suicide by cop". Must be more to this. Probably unstable.

    And 50% hits. It's common. Sometimes you read in the papers of a cop (one-on-one) shooting three times, hitting the perp once. 30% hits. Sometimes you read of a cop shooting twice, hitting the perp once. Back up to 50%. Joe
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  • 1911a1-fan
    any guy that has enough hair to require a brush needs shot anyway
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