Escondido, California — The Escondido Police Department released body camera and surveillance cameras footage that shows an officer fatally shooting a man last week and the events leading up to the incident. The man killed was identified as 59-year-old Steven Olson. On 4/21/2021, at 7:01 a.m., the Escondido Police Department Communications Center received a call from a reporting party advising that there was an adult male subject hitting cars with a “metal pole” in the area of 2nd Ave and Broadway in Escondido.
Officer Chad Moore approached him shortly after 7 a.m. Wednesday. Police say the officer told Olson to drop the pole multiple times, but Olson refused and ended up fleeing the area. Police say Olson continued to advance toward the officer, as he gave multiple commands for Olson to drop the objects. As Olson continued toward the officer, the officer fired several shots from his service weapon. Officers rendered first aid until Escondido Fire Paramedics arrived on scene. Olson was transported to a local hospital where he later died from his injuries.
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Pretty interesting how differently the two cops acted.
They obviously knew the guy, so they knew he was nuts, but he didn’t look like a frail little guy, so it wasn’t going to be easy getting that pipe from him.
Guy wasn’t really advancing, so I don’t see why cop shot 7 times.
probably within guidelines but its pretty rough. not many options for the cop, cant let him just walk away (tho the the first guy did huh? just noticing its two different cops), cant go hands on with him holding a weapon, but like you said it looks they knew him and he had issues, also was only wanted for property crime not attacking anyone. seems like the cop could have kept retreating until help got there, it was literally seconds away (not sure if he knows that tho), not sure what he felt forced his hand right then.
i dont think they would ever try a taser first - taser misses and before you can drop it and get your gun out you are getting bashed in the head with a crowbar (thats the argument from the police side).
i didnt even notice it was two different cops at first, yeah totally different reactions.
i think the first guy says he’s “11-5” tried looking it up but didnt find anything. figured it meant mental health issue, one urban dictionary reference says its an old narcotics code.
Definitely didn’t seem like he needed to kill that guy at that moment.
Did he have a weapon? Yes. Did he refuse to comply with dropping it? Yes. Did the cop warn him to drop it or he will be shot? Yes.
Was the guy charging and swinging it? No. The moment was not one that required a split second decision that could mean the difference between life and death. It was a crazy old homeless guy moving very slowly and not being particularly threatening. There were 2 other police vehicles that pulled up literally seconds later.
I don’t see how this cop felt it was necessary to fire 7 shots into the guy at that moment in time. Bad policing. Also, fuck that crazy homeless bastard. We’re better off without him.
This. It’s sad seeing shit like this. The homeless guy could possibly be schizophrenic, and be a harm to everyone. The cop couldn’t risk letting him come any closer or the dude could possibly killed him.
Taser is not a better option and here is why. The failure rate of Taser is around 40% and that’s generous. If a person has a lethal weapon and you don’t have lethal cover, you are taking unnecessary chances with your life. If Taser fails, it is in your dominant hand, at that distance the bad guy could split the officer’s head open before he could drop a Taser and get his hand on the gun without any doubt. Taser is less effective at achieving lock up when the suspect is within very close distances and works best with a wide 2 probe spread.
7 shots just to be sure. The zombies in shaun of the dead walk faster than that guy was. The cop wanted to kill him. Anyone that doesn’t think he could have continued to delay him is a liar.
I disagree and I am certainly no liar. Also are you aware that there are countless documented cases of people being shot multiple times and continuing to inflict lethal assaults? Handguns suck at stopping people and aren’t great at killing them quickly either. I think the officer showed more restraint than he had to but I have no judgment about him not shooting a few seconds sooner. I think he did a good job. And whether or nothe could have waited is an unanswerable theoretical. What matters is that he acted reasonably.
After watching multiple videos of tazers simply not working I have to wonder about police officer’s confidence in using tazers on people who are threatening them or other people with deadly weapons. Most recent vids that come to mind are the fat cop that tazed that fat black woman while she squealed liked a pig until she shot her gun at him. The other most recent one I saw was the traffic stop where the guy got back into his truck and the gay officer climbed in the truck as well and then sat there tazing the guy while the guy simply continued to drive away, eventually just getting annoyed and ripping the prongs out.
Personally I’d be pretty wary of them by now considering you generally only have a few seconds to act in may of these situations.
Another one I saw I think last year was at night in a park with a naked black man with a knife. Lady cop is like 15 feet away, maybe more, shoots him with the tazer and he falls for a moment then gets up and charges her and takes 2-3 stabs at her with a big knife. Luckily he vest kept the knife from penetrating but had they just shot the big fuck first then her life would not have been in any additional and unnecessary danger.
