September 30, 201412 yr Author The video is quick but didn't he turn towards police though? I only watched it once and can't remember. 30 ft means nothing. If it's a real gun and he wanted to kill them 30 ft isn't helping anyone, nor would any "cover" wal Mart offers. You have to look at the totality of circumstances and put yourself in their shoes. They think it's a real gun and that he's pointed it at people and acting strange. It's easy to say what you would do now but they made a split second decision. Not the right one obviously but they thought it was at the time. My dad was an officer. Had to be in a shooting situation before and make that call so I'm indirectly familiar with it. He did not ever point the gun anywhere. It was down by his side when the first shot was fired. He then dropped the gun and the police moved in. Not sure if more shots were fired after that or not. No one was in danger. That's my issue.
September 30, 201412 yr My dad was an officer. Had to be in a shooting situation before and make that call so I'm indirectly familiar with it. He did not ever point the gun anywhere. It was down by his side when the first shot was fired. He then dropped the gun and the police moved in. Not sure if more shots were fired after that or not. No one was in danger. That's my issue. Like I said it looked to me like he started to raise it at one point but I can't remember the video perfectly. Either way he doesn't have to actually have the weapon pointed to be a threat. If he starts to raise the gun and they think it's real they have no other choice. We know now that no one was in danger...but how do you expect them to know. It may have looked like he was raising the gun to one of the officers, I don't know. I am confident that they didn't go in there with intentions to kill am innocent man.
September 30, 201412 yr Let's assume it was a real gun. Who was he going to shoot? Was there someone there that we can't see? Were his legs broken?
September 30, 201412 yr My dad was an officer. Had to be in a shooting situation before and make that call so I'm indirectly familiar with it. He did not ever point the gun anywhere. It was down by his side when the first shot was fired. He then dropped the gun and the police moved in. Not sure if more shots were fired after that or not. No one was in danger. That's my issue. Please watch this video and tell me at what point (time) in the video you think the officer would be ok to take the shot. And then tell me if you think officers should wait until fired upon or aimed at to shoot. This officer lost his life because he waited till the man with the gun took the fight to him.
September 30, 201412 yr And to add to that, when later asked why he shot that officer, he stated he shot him because he let him shoot him.
October 1, 201412 yr I have a hard time finding any fault with anything the officers did in this case. The way the information was presented to them got the guy shot. Reporting that he was pointing the gun at kids was just ridiculous. They continued shopping and even went right back by him at a leisurely pace after going outside and returning inside. The guy that made the call caused this--well, that and the fact that the guy was on his phone and probably wasn't paying attention to what was going on around him. I'm willing to bet he never realized that a police officer was pointing a gun at him until he was shot.
October 5, 201412 yr The caller initially claimed to media he was an "ex-Marine". He was actually in the service for 7 weeks before being kicked out after it was determined that he lied on his paperwork. He was charged with "fraudulent enlistment. Looks like a guy who has a pattern of lying. Once to the Marines, to 911 operators, and now to the media. Oh, and he has a theft charge and drug charge as well? In January 2012, Ritchie pleaded guilty in the Montgomery County municipal court to theft. All records of the incident have been expunged by the court and the Huber Heights police department. In 2010 he was fined $250 and given a year’s probation after being convicted by Miamisburg municipal court of possession of drug paraphernalia." Since everyone loves blaming victims and looking into their background, I wonder how this one plays. Doubts cast on witness's account of black man killed by police in Walmart | US news | theguardian.com
October 5, 201412 yr Officers still acted in "good faith". Where did I say they didn't? Whole point of the story was to expose the caller as a liar and fraud.
October 5, 201412 yr I'm not sure if you can, but I'd like to see the caller charged with something. Could he be charge with murder?
October 5, 201412 yr Where did I say they didn't? Whole point of the story was to expose the caller as a liar and fraud. I wasn't being argumentative. I was just making a statement. Very few people on here defend officer actions. Just wanted to say it before some clown came on here still trying to blame the officers.
October 5, 201412 yr I'm not sure if you can, but I'd like to see the caller charged with something. Only thing I can Fathom is maybe falsely reporting an incident, but not sure on that states statutes. In KY you have the filing a false police report, but you actually have to file an actual Report. There may be some obscure KRS I'm unfamiliar with that could apply.
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