^^^ Exactly DM. For a guy who was supposed to be hopped up on dope he did a remarkably good job of keeping four flat tires on the rims. The FTV reporters behind were commenting that he was going 10kph in turns because all the tires were flat. Hardly worthy of Hollywood eh?
As I mentioned in my first post, the cops had numerous chances to pass him and cut off his escape routes. Another couple of times they could have simply run to the car in front and taken the keys to prevent the vehicle being moved out of his way, but instead they all ran around like headless chickens…
Pretty different from the old days when the MPs would join the road blocks and flash those M16s eh?
Wikipedia article - what common people read about Taiwan Police:
With increased media coverage in recent years and the proliferation of tabloid newspapers and 24 hour cable news channels throughout Taiwan, the police force has been faced with new challenges involving high profile crimes, and increased media involvement. [quote]Past concerns of police corruption have largely been replaced by concerns of police ineffectiveness, particularly in light of several high profile cases in recent years[/quote]. Gun related crime has also increased, though the overall crime rate in Taiwan remains lower than that of most western and Asian nations.
Just another case for the statistics no? What happened to those foreign instructors who were hired by the Taiwanese Police Corps anyway? They were supposed to train the local squads for such a situations…
[quote=“ceevee369”][I am not defending the attitude of the victim pall. People do mostly got wht they deserve, but this guy ,drug addict or not , did not had to die because of “wrong assumptions”.
You would have had another view presumably if you were one of the bypassers hearinf FWIIIET next to your ear when a bullet went bye no?[/quote]
Mate if your going to ignore orders to stop by armed police then these things will happen.
Deserve, deserve’s got nothing to do with it. He’s probably better off dread anyways.
And how do you know those bystanders heard anything apart from some gunshots?
I am not a cop that is right, but the cop who fired the final rounds from close range (the ones shot through the left window which hit the guy in the head) was in no circumstance in danger. I guess that it is indeed very difficult to judge what to do, but majority seems to agree that it was not the best way to end this pursuit.[/quote]
There was no shot to the head, by the way. Legs and stomach only. He died on the way to the hospital. A head shot and he would have been dead at the scene.
It can always be handled better, but I just don’t feel too sorry for this guy and his demise at the hands of the cops.
[quote=“TheGingerMan”]A sad, troublesome story of plain idiocy all round: criminal, police, media, and gormless bystanders.
A Confederacy of Dunces.[/quote]
SO the idiot driver was not to blame then… thank god for that.
[quote=“TheGingerMan”]A sad, troublesome story of plain idiocy all round: criminal, police, media, and gormless bystanders.
A Confederacy of Dunces.[/quote]SKOP, I think he covered that one mate.
[quote=“ceevee369”]Wikipedia article - what common people read about Taiwan Police:
With increased media coverage in recent years and the proliferation of tabloid newspapers and 24 hour cable news channels throughout Taiwan, the police force has been faced with new challenges involving high profile crimes, and increased media involvement. [quote]Past concerns of police corruption have largely been replaced by concerns of police ineffectiveness, particularly in light of several high profile cases in recent years[/quote]. Gun related crime has also increased, though the overall crime rate in Taiwan remains lower than that of most western and Asian nations.
Just another case for the statistics no? What happened to those foreign instructors who were hired by the Taiwanese Police Corps anyway? They were supposed to train the local squads for such a situations…[/quote]
Something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately… has anyone here ever actually heard a Taiwanese police siren? I certainly haven’t, and that includes 6 months in busy parts of Taipei. I live en-route to a hospital and hear at least one ambulance per day bringing up the rear (with uncle Llary here forced to - sometimes literally - push the fucking traffic out of the way) but no police.
Once every few nights I will see a souped-up rice rocket doing a clear 130km/h+ on a busy urban road straight past a cop car or ‘roadblock’ (HA) and watch the police do sweet F-all. I have seen the UK police give chase - successfully - to several vehicles doing maybe 20-30km/h above the speed limit, and I don’t think I would even dare smile at a US traffic cop the wrong way. This is not, as certain Taiwanese friends will spout, ‘Taiwanese culture’ but simply an utter disgrace and insult to the people of Taiwan. I love Taiwan but that doesn’t mean I don’t still have a fair bit to complain about… and sadly I think every one of those complaints boils down to the lack of law enforcement. I often daydream about what Taiwan would be like with police enforcing EPA rules and traffic laws while making a serious effort to challenge wannabe gangsters and other lowlifes.
I’m not saying that sirens blaring all hours of the day is evidence of a well-adjusted society, but surely nobody can try to suggest that Taiwan’s crime rate is several thousand percentage points lower than UK/US cities I have lived in? My conclusion is thus that Taiwan’s police do even less than the fuck-all I had originally thought. And it’s no wonder that when they absolutely have to take part in a ‘high speed’ pursuit they shit their pants, panic and completely fail to respond in an appropriate manner. I’d bet money that the cops were also thinking “man, if I scratch this car I’m going to have to pay for it.” They shot the guy because they wanted an ending with the least possible risk to themselves or their careers.
[quote=“llary”]
Something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately… has anyone here ever actually heard a Taiwanese police siren? I certainly haven’t, and that includes 6 months in busy parts of Taipei. I live en-route to a hospital and hear at least one ambulance per day bringing up the rear (with uncle Llary here forced to - sometimes literally - push the fucking traffic out of the way) but no police.
Once every few nights I will see a souped-up rice rocket doing a clear 130km/h+ on a busy urban road straight past a cop car or ‘roadblock’ (HA) and watch the police do sweet F-all. I have seen the UK police give chase - successfully - to several vehicles doing maybe 20-30km/h above the speed limit, and I don’t think I would even dare smile at a US traffic cop the wrong way. This is not, as certain Taiwanese friends will spout, ‘Taiwanese culture’ but simply an utter disgrace and insult to the people of Taiwan. I love Taiwan but that doesn’t mean I don’t still have a fair bit to complain about… and sadly I think every one of those complaints boils down to the lack of law enforcement. I often daydream about what Taiwan would be like with police enforcing EPA rules and traffic laws while making a serious effort to challenge wannabe gangsters and other lowlifes.
I’m not saying that sirens blaring all hours of the day is evidence of a well-adjusted society, but surely nobody can try to suggest that Taiwan’s crime rate is several thousand percentage points lower than UK/US cities I have lived in? My conclusion is thus that Taiwan’s police do even less than the fuck-all I had originally thought. And it’s no wonder that when they absolutely have to take part in a ‘high speed’ pursuit they shit their pants, panic and completely fail to respond in an appropriate manner. I’d bet money that the cops were also thinking “man, if I scratch this car I’m going to have to pay for it.” They shot the guy because they wanted an ending with the least possible risk to themselves or their careers.[/quote]
Hit the nail squarely on the head. The local constabulary is a rabble of untrained, lazy, and often corrupt idiots. Point a news camera at them and they morph into a rabble of untrained, lazy, and often corrupt maniacs. Pathetic.
That being said, I think the police handled the situation very badly. Why? I have no idea. It could be a lack of training or just mere incompetence. This is the second shooting that I’ve seen on Taiwanese TV where 50 or more shots were fired by the police before any real results were achieved. A good shooter should be able to neautralise someone with two shots or less. A double tap is usually the benchmark. More than that is not only dangerous to the public, but also incompetent shooting.
Other than shooting, as other posters pointed out, they should have either boxed him in or used one of various driving techniques to immobilise his car.
All things considered, from what I saw on the news, it wasn’t entirely necessary to even fire any shots and he should have been stopped by other means and been brought to justice.
But this isn’t unique to Taiwan. I’ve seen many other reality based TV shows of police chases that have ended in extreme gunfire where in most cases it hasn’t been necessary. Sometimes it seems to me, that the cops get pissed off being under-paid and overworked. They snap from frustration and this is what happens. Whether this is the situation in Taiwan I wouldn’t know.
People are criticizing the police for using fifty-one bullets to stop a man suspected of violent crime who chose to drive away rather than surrender. I guess the guy had a good idea he might get away successfully. It seems he was right. Watching the news tonight, it looks like the cops could have easily pinned the guy’s car if they were using their brains. Instead they went trigger happy and shot the suspect to death.
In one scene, the guy was directly behind several stopped taxis with a huge dumptruck or something alongside. Instead of getting the drivers of those taxis and truck out of their vehicle and blocking the fugitive from behind, the cops just kept shooting at his tires. He waited for the traffic to clear and drove away again. This is probably gonna be running on American TV as comedy.
Well merge it already then I say. I shoulda looked on the open forum before posting on TP. I guess the recent political fever got the better of me. All is political. Rah, rah.
But, yeah, I still think a roadblock could have stopped this guy. He never seemed to get going very fast. I guess people just simply made way for him. I think it’s pretty surreal. I hope someone pieces together a good film of the whole chase.
And the cops firing guns point blank at the slow moving car is just stunning. It was like watching some movie about a possessed car.
According to some t.v. reports; many people are upset about the amount of bullets used-50 or so.
I say from now on they only be allowed 12 shots and if the guy isn’t down after that they just let him go and nobody can blame the cops if anything happens.
Being as there isn’t likely to be any proper training or cooperation in orchestrating such a chase–maybe the better option is to just use rocket propelled stun grenades.
Yeah and when they succeed to set up a road block trying to catch drunk drivers it goes like this …
Taiwan’s finest stops a car, while chewing binlang, spit is flying around:
Did you have some alcohol consumed sir?
Driver: …? Sorry … burp …
Taiwan’s finest: Did you have some alcohol consumed sir?
Driver: burp … hik-up … burp … no … just some 88 Kaoliang … burp … (spit binlang too)
Taiwan’s finest, while spitting binlang juice: OK … that’s fine … as long as you didn’t drink Meiguo beer or Heiniken … carry on and have a good time … (spitting)
[quote=“ac_dropout”]I don’t see how else this could have ended. The suspect is prone to violence, maybe armed, and resisting arrest.
A road block is not going to turn this guy into Ghandi.[/quote]
You can’t be serious? I’ve seen - with my own eyes - unarmed British police take down a suspect doing 60-70mph using two cars and a helicopter, with no shots fired.
I’ll tell you how it could have ended: with police co-operating by radio and nearby units pulling ahead to clear traffic. Taiwanese police carry guns so it should be even easier - two cars in front, one car behind, suspect trapped at least momentarily. Cop gets out, trains gun on driver and if he continues ramming the cop cars gets a clean, close-range shot.
I think it’s bad when I have to say that the most sensible short piece on this issue came from the Apple Daily… I happened upon a tiny column last night talking about this issue and comparing how different countries train police to use weapons. The consensus was that sensible countries have a ‘positive identification’ requirement, which means no shooting blindly and wildly into the back of a fucking car. It also asked something along the lines of ‘what the fuck do these guys do in police university?’
…? Sorry … burp …