The Fairfax County police officer who shot an unarmed man to death in January will not be charged with a crime, the county's chief prosecutor announced yesterday, and the man's family angrily responded by claiming that a civilian in the same situation would have been arrested.Read that last part again. The Commonwealth's Attorney says that "when a person fires a gun without malice and unintentionally kills someone, they do not commit a crime."
From the start, Fairfax police declared that the killing of Salvatore J. Culosi, 37, was an accident and that the SWAT officer who fired had done so unintentionally. Fairfax Commonwealth's Attorney Robert F. Horan Jr. said that when a person fires a gun without malice and unintentionally kills someone, "they do not commit a crime."
I wonder how well that argument would hold up as a defense for someone who is not a member of the enforcer class?
(note: this article is from March, 2006)
Officer safety trumps all other concerns, but most especially rights. And the standard of behavior for LEOs everywhere these days is simply this: There is no standard of behavior other than what they have already done. in essence the moment an officer does something, it immediately becomes "department policy".
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