Deputies shoot, kill man after knocking on wrong door

[JFootin]

http://freedomoutpost.com/2012/07/police-kill-man-at-wrong-house-for-opening-door-with-gun/

[downtownv]

Sniff sniff sniff smell that?
Smells like Huge Lawsuit to me!
Stupid on all parts of this one.

[Barth]

Deputies in Lake County shoot and kill a man in his doorway.
http://news.yahoo.com/video/deputies-shoot-kill-man-knocking-163819466.html
http://media.zenfs.com/en-US/video/video.hearstnews.com/1342456224_1_vqd9v1nh_1_yk711phl_2.jpghttp://media.reason.com/mc/_external/2012_07/sigh.jpg?h=169&w=300

Florida Police Knock on Wrong Door at 1:30 a.m. Without Identifying Themselves, Then Fatally Shoot Armed Resident
http://reason.com/blog/2012/07/16/florida-cops-knock-on-wrong-door-at-130
Via Instapundit comes the news that deputies in Lake County, Florida, early on July 15, fatally shot a man named Andrew Lee Scott. Deputies say they didn't identify themselves as police when they knocked on Scott's apartment door at 1:30 a.m. They also say that when Scott, 26, answered while armed with gun drawn, they immediately opened fire and killed Scott in his own doorway. His girlfriend was present in the apartment.

Police had been following a suspect in an an attempted murder, a man named Johnathan Brown who they trailed to Scott's apartment complex, and who had parked his motorcycle right outside. An hour and a half after killing Scott, police realized they had killed the wrong man. They soon found Brown in an adjacent apartment, as well as another man involved in the scuffle that had seen Brown attempt to bludgeon a man in the head with a cinder block.

According to Wesh.com Orlando, police are admitting the disturbing facts, but not any negligence:

"When we knocked on the door, the door opened and the occupant of that apartment was pointing a gun at deputies and that's when we opened fire and killed him," Lt. John Herrell said.

[OldLincoln]

Well what do you say about this one Barth? Still gonna shoot it out with them?

I know, he shouldn't have pointed his gun at them but I'd like to see the replay of that because I'm not convinced he was. They may have had one posted at the door hing and saw the gun behind the door when it was opened and yelled gun.

My strategy which I have effectively used more than once is to go to the entry armed but pointed away, turn on the porch light and ask who it is from aside the door. If it's someone I know I look through the peephole. If not clear I'll then look from the side window. Then if it's okay, I remove the jam bar from the door and open it, with my gun behind the door until they enter. Then I closed and secure the door and put away the gun.

I have a concealed porch alarm the chimes when somebody enter the porch. My next move is to install a camera.

[Barth]

Well what do you say about this one Barth? Still gonna shoot it out with them?

I know, he shouldn't have pointed his gun at them but I'd like to see the replay of that because I'm not convinced he was. They may have had one posted at the door hing and saw the gun behind the door when it was opened and yelled gun.

My strategy which I have effectively used more than once is to go to the entry armed but pointed away, turn on the porch light and ask who it is from aside the door. If it's someone I know I look through the peephole. If not clear I'll then look from the side window. Then if it's okay, I remove the jam bar from the door and open it, with my gun behind the door until they enter. Then I closed and secure the door and put away the gun.

I have a concealed porch alarm the chimes when somebody enter the porch. My next move is to install a camera.

At 1:30 AM?
Knocking on my door unexpected?
Not identifying yourself?
I'm not opening the door.
I'm not answering.

Nothing...

[jocko]

wow, that wasnot a good scenario,ain't thefirsttimeeither. Damn. where is al sharpton when u need him??????? Just sayin

[MC1911]

Law enforcement should not get off the hook for a a"mistake"


Would anyone be asking this question if the roles were reversed and a deputy was shot by mistake.

I have a major concern with our country becoming a police state with the so called patriot act and the fascist sounding name of homeland security.

[JFootin]

I already posted this in another thread yesterday evening and got one reply. Doesn't anybody like me? :(

http://kahrtalk.com/showthread.php?t=14006

[Barth]

I'm not convinced he actually pointed the weapon directly at uniformed police either.
Dead men tell no tales, so I guess we will never know for sure...

[Barth]

Law enforcement should not get off the hook for a a"mistake"


Would anyone be asking this question if the roles were reversed and a deputy was shot by mistake.

I have a major concern with our country becoming a police state with the so called patriot act and the fascist sounding name of homeland security.

I too believe waiving personal freedom and rights to deal with terrorism has gone too far.
The bill of rights often seem trampled and overlooked these days.
There's a reason they are called inalienable.

[muggsy]

I already posted this in another thread yesterday evening and got one reply. Doesn't anybody like me? :(

http://kahrtalk.com/showthread.php?t=14006

I like you, J. Even if no one else does. :)

[muggsy]

Knock,knock. Who's there? That's how to properly respond to a knock on the door at 1:30 A.M.

[Planedude]

I'll have to agree with Barth in that I'm not answreing the door at 1:30 in the morning. I'm going to holler thru the door to back off, If it is someone I know then they will CALL ME before showing up and/or pounding. If they don't move back I will, by then have 911 on the hands free with my adress clearly spoken and situation noted.
At that point the someone beyond the door better be proclaiming they are police...

Kicking my door in unanoucced at that point would be a poor choice.

[Goldstar225]

I had something similiar happen to me a few years ago. I went to serve a felony warrant on a man. I went to the address that we had on him for the past three arrests. Knocked on the door, (about 8:00 PM), door opened and I was looking down the barrel of a 2 1/2" model 66. Fortunately I also saw that the person holding was not my suspect, it was his dad. I identified myself and we went in to talk about his son. (before you ask, entry was made with his permission).

As for myself? If I get an unexpected knock at the door, I have a gun either in my hand or hip pocket and ask who it is before the door gets opened.

[Barth]

I had something similiar happen to me a few years ago. I went to serve a felony warrant on a man. I went to the address that we had on him for the past three arrests. Knocked on the door, (about 8:00 PM), door opened and I was looking down the barrel of a 2 1/2" model 66. Fortunately I also saw that the person holding was not my suspect, it was his dad. I identified myself and we went in to talk about his son. (before you ask, entry was made with his permission).

As for myself? If I get an unexpected knock at the door, I have a gun either in my hand or hip pocket and ask who it is before the door gets opened.

I applaud your control and professionalism.
Although not LE, serving felony warrants has got to be a high stress situation.
I don't mean to minimize the difficult nature of being an officer.
And everyone makes mistakes.

[OldLincoln]

I like you John. I posted in the other thread because it already had more action. Gotta go where the action is.

[getsome]

In the metro Atlanta area recently there have been several cases of thugs dressing up in Police like outfits and busting into houses they think may have cash or drugs or pulling over ladies at night while driving dark colored window tented Police look alike Crown Vics and robbing them of anything valuable so it's advised to get on a cell and call 911 to see if they are the real cops or not before pulling over...If they are the real Police they will understand why you didn't stop right away and drove on to somewhere safe and lighted well first...

I know if some dudes are outside my door at 2am yelling open up, Police the first thing I'm going to do is lock myself in a bathroom with my shotgun and get on a cell phone to 911...The real Police repond very quickly to calls like this so it's wise to stay on the call with 911 and advise them you are armed and where you are hiding in the house...

There was one kind of funny case where a future genius Darwin award winner had thugs dressed like cops kick in his door, tie him up and rob him...When he was able to get loose the dummy called the real Police who came out and searched his house and promply found his pot grow room in a back bedroom so that night the BG's got away and he went to jail...:biggrin1:

[QuercusMax]

This is really hard to understand, from any angle.

1. Why did the guy open the door to strangers in the middle of the night - with or without a gun? That's really poor judgment. He should not have opened the door at all.

2. Why did the police feel the need to shoot on sight - gun or no gun? I hope to never see the day in our country where police can shoot someone without warning.

It is risky to pass judgment here without having been an actual witness, but unless there is a lot more to the story than has been reported so far, I have to say that my sympathies are with the guy who was murdered by the police.

(By the way, I like you, J.)

[jeepster09]

Just remember:

http://i691.photobucket.com/albums/vv276/jeepster09/1420__68248_zoom.jpg

[jeepster09]

Talking of stupid.....I remember a felony stop I was involved with, we stopped a car which had a kidnapped person in it as hostage, when we got it stopped all the windows had limo tint and next we heard pop pop, as we were approaching car a local news camera team guy *jumped in front of me [*this is where stupid fitts in], to get shot of what we saw when we opened car door of perp, I knocked camera guy on his butt with his camera and he whined "I am the press we can be here".....he jeoperdized a number of lives with his stupidity. We had no idea who or how many were in car. It ended up all in car were deceased, we had no way of knowing that.

[muggsy]

I had something similiar happen to me a few years ago. I went to serve a felony warrant on a man. I went to the address that we had on him for the past three arrests. Knocked on the door, (about 8:00 PM), door opened and I was looking down the barrel of a 2 1/2" model 66. Fortunately I also saw that the person holding was not my suspect, it was his dad. I identified myself and we went in to talk about his son. (before you ask, entry was made with his permission).

As for myself? If I get an unexpected knock at the door, I have a gun either in my hand or hip pocket and ask who it is before the door gets opened.

For that you get a gold star, Goldstar. I know, I'm repeating myself. :)