So they've got one of the ********. Great stuff. One thing that's troubling me though

If they can use one of these taser jobs on someone who they know to be a suicide bomber, who they must suspect of having more explosives (as he did have), why couldn't they use it on that bloke in the tube station? Why did they have to shoot him? The bloke they know to be a suicide bomber gets an electric shock while another bloke who just happens to live in the wrong place gets 5 bullets in the head?

 

The very same question that I asked myself when I heard it on the news.

 

I asked the same thing - maybe they have learned their lesson. However, it can be said not nearly as many lives were at risk in Birmingham - maybe just 3 or 4 as against potentially hundreds. This may have had some bearing on the situation.

 

my guess would be

that they could quite clearly see that the bomber didnt have any explosives on him but suspected he would have some in the house so they zapped him before he could run to them etc. whereas the bloke on the tube they suspeced actually had the bomb on his person. a tasar creates an electric current which i would guess could set off a bomb?

its one explanation i can think of.

 

God knows, they entered his flat knowing full well he or the flat might be wired to blow up just as the Madrid bombers did when they were hiding out. My best guess is that they wanted him alive and were prepared to take the risk.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4720027.stm

 

well, on Sky news they were saying that Tasers cant be used repeatedly or quickly - ie if the armed cops had used tasers instead, and one missed, that would be him out of use until it was re-armed (however that happens). So in the case of chasing someone onto a train it wouldnt have been feasible given that they thought he had a bomb and was liable to detonate it.

 

Of course given they were plain clothed officers who shot the guy, they could have walked up to him without suspicion and tazered him, that way he wouldn't have had to make the choice to run or not.

 

Tazors can set explosives off...

...so they were running a huge risk using one, especially as he is reported to have had a rucksack on his back. I hope the shenanigans over the shooting isn't going to influence the police into making an equally wrong decision in the future.

 

RE: Tazors can set explosives off...

Got any proof of that? As far as I know, which admittedly isn't much - the chances of a tazer setting off a bomb are very small indeed.

 

You obviously know nothing on the subject.

If a bomb was electronically triggered there is a very real danger of a Tazer detonating it.

I'm also alarmed that you'd rather run the "small" risk of a bomb going off in a public place than knock someone out with a Tazer.

For one so vociferous you don't half talk a load of crap Acky.

 

Absolutely. They should shoot all the *******. Dead.

 

That's one way of looking at it

 

RE: That's one way of looking at it

They're now saying the Brazillian bloke didn't vault the barrier on the tube and was wearing a denim jacket.

Mind you anyone who dresses like Status Quo deserves to be shot in my book.

 

Yes...........

........or maybe one of those guns that fire a net.

They could keep it their utility belts right next to the Routine Investigations Emergency Containment Force Field Generator.

 

RE: That's one way of looking at it

What did he do? Use a step ladder?

 

RE: That's one way of looking at it

Pole vault

 

It wasn't a statement of fact

I dunno, there may be very good reasons. Just wondered why someone who they knew to be a suicide bomber who did have explosives could be tasered while someone who they had little or no intelligence on had to be shot.

 

RE: It wasn't a statement of fact

I meant maybe he didn't have a taser on his utility belt that day.

I must say you're remarkably restrained in the face of such crude and clumsy sarcasm.

Oh and i'm just going to mail you re that thing.

 

RE: You obviously know nothing on the subject.

Obviously reading isnt one of your strong points. I said I knew very little, only what someone else had said elsewhere. That's why I asked the question. Is that so hard to comprehend? The police used a tazer so they obviously decided that blowing up the house was a risk worth taking.

And for one with such strong opinions of me its a shame you dont have the self conviction to put your own name on the post.

 

RE: That's one way of looking at it

I've read a couple of people saying that - also one witness who was stood on the tube station platform said that the police didn't put on their flat police hats until they had begun the chase, so it's possible he didn't even know who was chasing him.