Law - Police Use of Force: Shooting at or from a Moving Vehicle.

Frank Kardasz, January 29, 2015

A common dilemma in law enforcement use-of-force circles pertains to officers’ shooting at or from moving vehicles.  Police use of force situations occur in seconds while armchair quarterbacks can take days or months to second-guess the shooters decision.

Consider the following precepts:

• In general, law enforcement policies permit the use of deadly force to protect the officer from serious injury or death and/or serious injury or death to another person.
• Based on the physics laws of mass, motion, and inertia, think  about a police handgun firing a bullet weighing 124 grains where the bullet travels at 1,200 feet per second. Then consider a vehicle weighing 3,000 pounds and traveling at 30 miles per hour. Under no earthly circumstances will that bullet striking that vehicle immediately stop the vehicle.
• Shooting and killing the driver of a moving vehicle may result in the vehicle becoming a driver-less unguided missile that could injure or harm others.
• Police officers typically do not ever practice shooting at or from a moving vehicle.
• Most law enforcement policies prohibit shooting at or from a moving vehicle.
• A law enforcement officer must sometimes make a life-or-death use-of-force decision in a fraction of a second.

Now consider the following questions:

• Under what, if any, circumstances should a police officer shoot at a moving vehicle?
• Under what, if any, circumstances should a police officer shoot from a moving vehicle?
• How do fictional action-adventure television and movie dramas contribute to misunderstandings about law enforcement use of force?
• What if any exceptions should exist to a law enforcement policy prohibiting shooting at or from a moving vehicle?

Below, for your further consideration are links to stories about officers who fired at moving vehicles and the repercussions of those actions. Do any of the stories change your opinions about the justifications for shooting at or from a vehicle?

Malinowski, W. Z., and Kuffner, A. (January 3, 2015). Police: Cranston officer fires gun at vehicle that tried to run him down. Providence Journal. Retrieved from http://www.providencejournal.com/news/police-fire/20150103-police-cranston-officer-fires-gun-at-vehicle-that-tried-to-run-him-down.ece

Associated Press. (January 28, 2015). Friend disputes Denver police account of death, says teen was shot before car ran into officer. Fox News. Retrieved from http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/01/28/friend-disputes-denver-police-account-death-says-teen-was-shot-before-car-ran/

Nexstar Broadcasting. (January 9, 2015). Update: Jonesboro Police Officers ‘Justified’ in Shooting. Arkansas Matters. Retrieved from http://www.arkansasmatters.com/story/d/story/update-jonesboro-police-officer-justified-in-shoot/32017/dhEdRsuvr0qvLFchoHmQoQ

Pineda, P. (January 28, 2015). Phoenix police: Officers shoot, kill fugitive at motel. AZCentral, 12 News, The Arizona Republic. Retrieved from http://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/phoenix/2015/01/27/phoenix-police-shooting-motel-6/22442483/
 

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