Local News

These cases are hard to deal with. If the police officer was not a police officer, he would be charged with manslaughter. Of course most police officers use their knee on someone to apprehend and handcuff them, but excessive weight on the neck could and was in this case, fatal.

Now if all police officers are acquitted of inadvertent crimes like this - then any man defending his property, home, family, etc..from someone committing a crime on them who inadvertently recieves a fatal injury should be acquitted as well. Unfortunately in these cases the dangerous person, who is unfortunately now deceased, will have most likely caused an innocent law abiding citizen to go to jail.
Is it right for any man to defend himself? Yes. But a police officer always has the capacity to kill, and if he mistakenly thinks his life is at risk, it is possible the criminal may be killed. But if the officer inadvertently uses excessive force on someone who is at no risk to the officer there is really no quantifiable evidence to prove or not prove he did or didn't use excessive force. It is a hard case to call.

It is rather ironic that it is robbers who have the higher rate of mortality than do killers.