Now, I know most cops are good peeps. I understand that the overwhelming majority of the time police officers do everything more or less right. However, in the last week or so, I’ve read about cases of cops indulging their trigger happy fingers which resulted in one death in each instance. The case that got the most press was the black guy in NYC who was driving out of a strip club parking lot the morning of his wedding. Cops thought he or his two friends were armed, so they fired 51 shots at their car. One cop even stopped to reload. Too bad they weren’t armed AT ALL.

The next event that has been getting a bit less press, I believe, occurred before the event with the black guy. This is the case of the 93 year old woman who was scared of intruders so she bought herself a gun. When police officers showed up to execute a “no knock” search warrant, the woman probably (and understandably) thought she was about to get robbed, so she opened fire on whom she probably (and understandably) thought were intruders. They, of course, fired back.

It’s my understanding that the police were at the wrong address. The woman was shot to death.

Finally, today, Engadget.com blogged on a case of a young man suspected of PS3-theft getting shot when police arrived to execute a search warrant. The theory is that he was probably holding one of the PS3’s game controllers which cops may have though was, you know, a gun. It’s still pretty early to know what’s what in this case, but one thing is clear–cops need to remember their training–that guns are drawn in DEFENSE–not offense. Be ready to end a person’s life when you pull that gun and you’d better hope that the sight of the gun convinces them to give up before they end up like the poor suspected PS3 thief–no extra lives or replays for him.

Come on, Police Officers, think about your suspects as human lives, innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.