"The Only Ones Professional Enough" kill homeowner

[skb12172]

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,444667,00.html

[Catbird]

Julian Alexander died after being shot twice in the chest by a police officer who was chasing four burglary suspects early Tuesday morning.

So, does this mean they can charge the burglary suspects with felony murder/manslaughter?

[308Mike]

Well John, you wanted the top job at Anaheim and got it. Going to officer funerals was bad enough, but this is even worse, and luckily not something you had to deal with when you were running SDPD as acting Chief.

I have more faith in John Welter to do what's right than I do MANY others who've been top cop of a department. I worked for John when he was a Sgt and I thought he was a pretty good boss and was fair. He was pretty good at walking the line between taking care of his officers and the public. If you screwed up, you paid for it, but he didn't make it personal (at least not that I saw). If I went back to law enforcement, I'd work for him in a heartbeat.

It'll be interesting to see how he handles this tragedy. Good luck, John!

[BobTheWitch]

If the report is accurate (and that's a big if) It would seem appropriate to charge him with the equivalent of murder 2.

He didn't plan to kill this man, but he did mean to kill him when he fired the gun.

My 2 cents.

[mekender]

question is, did the homeowner go outside armed? If so, did the cop order him to disarm and he refuse?

if so, then the cop might actually have a justified shooting on his hands, even if it were the wrong guy...

[308Mike]

question is, did the homeowner go outside armed? If so, did the cop order him to disarm and he refuse?

if so, then the cop might actually have a justified shooting on his hands, even if it were the wrong guy...

If you go by his in-law's quote, it sounds possible:

"He was a good kid, trying to protect his house," said Alexander's mother-in-law Michelle Mooney.

And just because the guy's a veteran cop with over 10 year's experience does NOT mean he's not a screw-up or a turd-ball, or that he hasn't had issues before. Now that he's in a major spotlight, stuff's going to come out.

But no matter what happens, NOTHING will bring back Julian Alexander, and NOTHING is going to stop the coming lawsuit(s).

[mekender]

some years back, the orlando PD made a traffic stop on a black male that fit the description of a suspect wanted for homicide... the guy takes off running on foot through some of the worst neighborhoods in the city eventually hiding underneath a boat (presumably either overturned or on a trailer)

the cop eventually found him and had his mic recording the whole time... the guy was commanded to get his hands out of his waistband at least 10 times... eventually the cop shot and killed the guy...

turns out, this guy was not the wanted suspect... and for weeks we had to listen to how this "poor guy" was a victim... well the local paper comes out with a breakdown on his criminal past.. he had something like 90+ arrests on his record for that county alone...

but of course he was portrayed by the neighborhood as a wonderful father to his 8 children from 6 different women or some garbage like that...

even though the cop was 100% in the right for shooting him, the neighborhood still had a mini riot about a week later over the whole thing...

i guess i am just saying, lets not be so quick to demonize the cop in a case like this...

[clyde621]

This is one of the things a LEO is afraid of. I feel for both sides of this issue. I can see what might have happened, there is no tape to review so it's going to be tuff. Like what was said the law suits are going to roll in, right or wrong.

[mekender]

one report i saw says that the guy had a "club style weapon" in his hands...

http://www.kmph.com/Global/story.asp?S= ... nu612_2_12

Julian Alexander heard commotion outside his home at about 1:30 this morning. He grabbed a broomstick and stepped onto his front yard to protect his pregnant wife and mother from what he thought might be burglars.

[308Mike]

i guess i am just saying, lets not be so quick to demonize the cop in a case like this...

I'm not demonizing the cop, I can pretty much guarantee he feels terrible for what happened.

My point above was just because a cop's been on a department for many years doesn't mean he's a good cop, of course it doesn't mean he's a bad cop either. More than likely, if he's been on over 10 years, he's a better than average cop and he's been around the block a few times so *something* caused him to shoot this guy, besides that he just stepped outside to see what was going on.

Something like this is a cop's worst nightmare. Guys have stress-retired after incidents like this and the beating they take in the press and in the community.