Wednesday, November 18, 2009

A Glock What???

From the news today:

Officer shoots man, Taser left holstered
A LONG-SERVING police sergeant was equipped with a Taser when she used a gun to shoot a man in suburban Sydney.

The man, who also had self-inflicted knife wounds died at Canterbury Hospital this morning, the Daily Telegraph reports.

It is believed one reason the officer fired was that the confrontation occurred in the kitchen of the Lakemba house, meaning the man may have been too close for the Taser to be effective.

Police have revealed they were called to the Wangee Rd home about 8.50am (AEDT) after reports of a man trying to kill himself with a knife.

They arrived with paramedics and started to treat the 36-year-old man on the floor of the kitchen.

South-west Metrpolitan Region Commander, Assistant Commissioner Stuart Wilkins, said the man then got to his feet, grabbed a knife and confronted those attempting to help.
A female Sergeant with 21-years experience then drew her service-issue Glock revolver and shot the man once.

"He's committed self-harm again and have police have wrestled the knife from him," Ass Commissioner Wilkins said.

Paramedics again started treating him and raced him to hospital but died.

The shot man, known to neighbours as Adam, had walked next door about 7.30am (AEDT) to ask to borrow a mop, and was not suffering injuries at that time, a neighbour told reporters.

About 90 minutes later emergency service crews were called to the house.

"Upon arrival with the ambulance, police located a male suffering stab wounds in the kitchen of the house,'' Mr Wilkins said.

"Paramedics had attempted to assist that person. During this time the male, who has got up from a lying position, we believe he has grabbed a knife from the kitchen and confronted police.

"During that confrontation that male has been shot, once, by police ... a further struggle has ensued, the male has committed self-harm again, police have wrestled the knife from that male person.''

The man was then taken to hospital by ambulance.

Four police officers, three women and one man, were at the house at the time of the shooting.

The man's father was also at the house at the time.

Police say he was not injured, but a next-door neighbour, who did not want to be identified, said the older man had been brought into her backyard for treatment and had been covered in blood.

The father and son are believed to have lived together and were the only occupants of the house.

The man was not known criminally to police.

Mr Wilkins would not confirm that the officers were threatened, but said the decision to use a firearm was "not taken lightly'' by officers.

"I'm not here to speculate on the use of Tasers or whether or not that was the appropriate use at that time,'' he said.

"Tasers are just one option available to us, we have a number of options available.''


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Sad situation but interesting that she went for the gun instead of the taser!

And I'm pretty convinved that it WASN'T a glock revolver!

3 comments:

Old NFO said...

Yeah, interesting report. Fear for life vs. normal bad guy means go for the proven stopper!

Chris said...

Taser, schmaser. Go for the heavy artillery. And besides, the guy had ALREADY stabbed himself.

Ride Fast said...

Those cops are too well funded if they can afford Glock revolvers. They are so rare I've never even seen one.

Was it a fully automatic revolver?