Footage of two New York City police officers opening fire at a subway station as they confronted a man holding a knife shows they shot at him as he was standing still, his arms by his side and his back to a train.

In the days since Sunday’s shooting, police officials have repeatedly emphasized that the officers fired after Derell Mickles “charged” at one of them, and when their attempts to deescalate the situation and use Tasers had failed — leaving them with little choice but to resort to deadly force to protect themselves and passengers.

The footage, uploaded to the NYPD’s YouTube page Friday, offers a different view of the shooting that not only wounded Mickles but also a bystander, who was hit in the head with a stray bullet. Gregory Delpeche, 49, was sent to the hospital in critical condition, where doctors had to open up his skull to reduce brain swelling, according to his family.

  • Nuke_the_whales@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    A cop would rather shoot and kill a suspect and bystanders than suffer even the slightest of injury. I don’t blame the cops for being scared of a potential knife and blasting the guy without a care for anything but your own skin. But don’t do that and call yourself a hero.

      • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        Context is important.

        A knife is “potentially deadly” sitting in a knife block if there are people around because someone could grab it out of the knife block and start stabbing.

        This guy was not posing a threat.

        • aStonedSanta@lemm.ee
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          7 months ago

          I’m not so sure in this situation that I wouldn’t call him a threat. He shrugged off a taser or two?(unsure if they hit their taser darts or whatever) sprinted at an officer with a knife in his hand yelling shoot me if I heard correctly. But shooting at him 9 times is absurd. They shoulda just kept dancing around with him tbh and never drawn their guns only tasers. Or shit find a broom and just use reach he didn’t seem to want to hurt anyone but maybe suicide by cop from the whole sprinting at the cop saying shoot me. Again if I heard correctly.

  • catloaf@lemm.ee
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    7 months ago

    So have they actually shown that he had a knife yet or not?

    • Cadeillac@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      From what I’ve gathered, they stated an unidentified man left the crime scene with the knife. They showed a still from “body cam footage” of a hand holding a knife, but someone said the clothes didn’t match up

      • catloaf@lemm.ee
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        7 months ago

        So yes, I guess. I’d seen reporting saying he did, then he didn’t, then he did but he didn’t take it out, then someone did have a knife but not him, then he did have a knife but dropped it and someone took it.

  • capital@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    I’m here for the goalpost moving. Last thread regarding this incident was a bunch of “cops are lying”, “there is no knife”, and “yeah that’s a picture of a knife but we don’t know it’s real”.