Sisters question fatal shooting in DC police chase

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP-Excite

By LARRY NEUMEISTER

NEW YORK (AP) - The sisters of a woman who was fatally shot in Washington after trying to ram her car through a White House barrier say she was not a criminal and police should not have shot her.

"We're still very confused as a family why she's not still alive," Amy Carey-Jones said late Friday, speaking of her 34-year-old sister, Miriam Carey. "I really feel like it's not justified, not justified."

Another sister, retired New York City police officer Valarie Carey, said there was "no need for a gun to be used when there was no gunfire coming from the vehicle."

The sisters spoke outside Valarie Carey's home in Brooklyn Friday night after traveling to Washington to identify Miriam Carey's body.

FULL story at link.


Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20131005/DA97RVKO0.html

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This 2011 photo provided by Dr. Barry Weiss, from the website of Advanced Periodontics in Hamden, Conn., shows former employee Miriam Carey. The 34-year-old Carey was shot to death by police after a car chase that began when she tried to breach a barrier at the White House. (AP Photo/Advanced Periodontics)

[theHandpuppet]

1. What happened was certainly tragic

But when she aimed her speeding car at the White House security barriers, there's little question how this would end. I do not blame the police/secret service for the outcome.

[RKP5637]

2. To me, it was a police overreaction. Then again, I wasn't there and am only using

arm chair logic.

[DrDan]

4. 80 mph down Constitution Ave, trying to penetrate 2 security barriers, 1 yo in back seat

and they overreacted in stopping her?

[RKP5637]

7. Despite the fact she did not shoot, probably what sums it up best is she was

using her car as a deadly weapon, hence, justifiable force even if deadly to her in stopping her ... regardless of her reasons and why ...

[MiniMe]

25. And the cops had no idea what she had in her car

For all they knew, she was saving the "gun" for the right moment. I'm sorry it ended the way it did, but I'm glad that nobody else was hurt, including the baby.

[wordpix]

44. video shows police tried to get her out of car, guns drawn, but Carey drove off at high speed

endangering officers and her child.

My main issue with the cops shooting is they could have hit innocent bystanders. OTOH, they didn't know what the woman would do next with her crazy driving or what she might have in the car (guns, bombs, etc). Clearly she was resisting arrest and at that point, police can use force to protect the president, Congress, and buildings.

[Imaginativeone]

3. Completely Unacceptable

Okay, NOW we know that if you approach the white house barriers in a manner that law enforcement deems "erratic" (in ANY way, apparently), you will be shot dead on sight. A little warning would have been nice. Hell, there are signs for everything else, why not a "you will be killed" sign?

[theHandpuppet]

5. Did you see the videos?

She didn't just "approach" the White House barriers. Sheesh, people, she wasn't just a tourist out for a sightseeing stroll.

[bigworld]

10. The police were lenient with her

Following the White House incident, she raced down Pennsylvania Avenue at 80 mph, ignoring red lights, and they boxed her in near the capitol, surrounding her car, asking her to get out. She didn't, and aggressively backed out of there. She had every chance in the world to stop it right there. Up until that point, no shots were fired at all.

I'm the first to slam police for overreaction,but these guys stayed cool -- they had no idea if they were dealing a suicide bomber, or a dental hygenist who simply flipped out.

It's tragic, but I can't blame the police one bit.



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Oh, and welcome to DU.

[Imaginativeone]

17. Thanks for the welcome :-)

"What occurred next was not clear. Ms. Carey managed to get out of the car, and was shot by several officers. According to a law enforcement official, she was not armed, and it was not known whether she presented an immediate danger." - New York Times

When the "weapon" (car to pedestrian) changed, the police had the option to change weapons too.

[indepat]

51. Sadly, in this age of terra, the trunk of the car could have been laden with high explosives

[Inkfreak]

16. Not what the police deem "erratic"

What everyone clearly sees as erratic. And what do you think the police were trying to do in that video?? They did try to warn her and stop her. A warning sign? Absurd.

[dgibby]

28. Factually wrong.

She was NOT shot dead on sight. She was shot dead after attempting to breach the WH outer perimeter, leading the police on a high speed chase in DC traffic, running into a secret service agent, using her car as a weapon, fleeing, and resisting arrest. Of course, if you're following the news or have watched the video, you'd know that.

[Ranchemp.]

32. There are signs signifying just that.

It's to be expected that if you try to breach the halls of our govt power, and then attempt to flee, deadly force will be used to stop the threat.

That, in my book, is completely acceptable.

[reddread]

34. not always thus

http://www.nytimes.com/1994/09/13/us/crash-white-house-overview-unimpeded-intruder-crashes-plane-into-white-house.html

[WilliamPitt]

37. Yup.

Because car bombs don't exist.

[reddread]

39. in this case for certain

but when they do occur in WDC, we let the culprits go, dont we?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luis_Posada_Carriles
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orlando_Bosch
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_car_bombings

and of course, we ignited the ongoing Car Bomb Derby in Iraq.

[gopiscrap]

38. Welcome to DU

[uppityperson]

40. Welcome to Du and good name choice.

[wordpix]

45. hyperbole, much? She did not just "approach" the WH, she smashed through the barriers

She was also ordered out of the car by policemen who surrounded it, guns drawn. She resisted arrest by driving the car through the officers, endangering them, her child and the public as she drove off at high speed.

She had warning when she went through a barrier and the police surrounded the car with guns drawn and told her to get out. Your little "report" there is baloney and doesn't mesh with facts shown by video.

[jessie04]

6. Where the hell were her sisters ...

In helping her mentally troubled sister?

[RKP5637]

8. Excellent question!!! n/t

[theHandpuppet]

11. It's much harder than you think

As someone who had a schizophrenic parent and deals with a sibling also afflicted with that illness, I can say that it is much more difficult than people realize to help family members battling severe mental illness, especially when those afflicted are irrational and/or delusional.
That said, I think the sisters may be feeling guilty and are deflecting blame. Sad all around because the true blame here should be assigned to the disease and the shameful manner mental illness is addressed (or should I say, NOT addressed) in this country.

[TheDebbieDee]

13. +1 As someone with several family members with mental health and addiction

issues in my extended family, those closest to the mentally ill can easily and quickly be worn down coping and dealing with their mentally ill loved ones.....

[theHandpuppet]

15. As the saying goes, "you had to be there"

Not only does mental illness carry a stigma left over from the days when the mentally ill were considered "possessed", those who grow up in homes with a severely mentally ill parent or child can be left with what I can only describe as PTSD.
I hope this woman's sisters won't hesitate to seeking some counseling.

[jessie04]

22. + 1000

thank you for setting me straight.

the true blame is he disease.

[theHandpuppet]

24. No problem....

We have a society in which folks are left ill-equipped to deal with such illness in a family, much less assist the afflicted person. We all want to blame someone when something like this happens but in reality no person is to blame, but a disease of the mind. Now the sisters themselves want to blame someone, probably because they feel guilty or are meant to feel guilty for their loved one's disease.
If you've ever tried the rational approach with an irrational person, you'd soon come to realize how you are caught in a Catch-22. When you're dealing with a severe mental illness of a loved one, you can feel utterly frustrated and fatigued by the struggle but you're not supposed to feel that way - or even angry - because you do know it's a disease and there IS no one to blame. A lot of folks in this situation either shut down emotionally or live in denial. It's a tough row to hoe, and perhaps the sisters don't really know how they are supposed to react right now. I hope they seek some counseling.

[reddread]

35. the true blame is the cure

earlier this year I had the misfortune of being home when a young (21?) neighbor recruited the local police department's assistance.
As he brandished a shotgun and threatened himself and/or responding police with it (while oblivious power walkers went by unscathed..) They determined the best way to end this attempted suicide by cops was to shoot him about 21 times.
I have never in my life heard such loud gunfire. Of course, were it a man-eating lion on the loose, a tranquilizer dart would have been deployed, presumably. My neighbor, an ex-cop from neighboring county town felt it was completely unjustified.
At least this way, the next desperately despondent individual will know exactly what to do,
call the Fresno Police Department's suicide help line.

[treestar]

27. It is also probably a lot harder than we think

to stop an out of control car before it kills someone else.

[theHandpuppet]

31. I agree

And as you will note in my other posts regarding this topic, I do not place the responsibility or blame for this tragedy on the police.

[wordpix]

46. +1, I have a mentally ill acquaintance

who rented a room from me in my home. I didn't know about her mental illness when I agreed to this. It was a very trying situation and she told me about the many times she had sought help and "didn't get it." She was also on meds. If the brain is not rational, it seems that no amount of counseling or medications can help. I spent hours talking to her when she was going on her irrational rants and I could calm her down and make her see the reality most of the time but not all the time.

[treestar]

26. Excellent point

too easy for them to just blame the police officers.

[Snake Plissken]

9. Unfortunately the police had little choice in this matter.

The way she was acting they couldn't take the chance that she was some Timothy McVeigh anti-government freak with a trunk load of explosives. She could have easily got her daughter killed along with her.

[reddread]

33. caltrops

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caltrop

[chelsea0011]

12. Of course they do. It's their sister.

[bucolic_frolic]

14. The High Speed Chase

gets officers' adrenaline flowing

I can't imagine going 80mph down the Washington Mall

That alone is dangerous, though she must have navigated well

was she driving that fast, or just the pursuit vehicles?

No other traffic?

If she was shot outside her car in plain view I think it was unnecessary

Backing up over the officer is not a way to expect a mild
response from police

No devices to point at a vehicle and stall it? With the amounts they
spend on security in this country, that might seem de rigeur at the
White House gates

[Imaginativeone]

18. EMP

EMP

I'll spring for it myself so cops can stop gunning folks down.

[Duckhunter935]

23. Go ahead

No one is stopping you

[snooper2]

50. That is one funny ass website ROFL

Civilian Intelligence Agency! Truthy to, power?

I love the ad in the middle of the page for some putz pimping his "book" ROFL-
Obama's Hidden Agenda, MORE THAN JUST YOUR GUNS!


Oh noes, he's going to take my gun and my ice cream! LOL

[Marrah_G]

19. Not surprising

It's their sister, they love her, they are grieving.

[bottomofthehill]

30. I will pray for her, her sisters and her daughter

It is a sad and tragic story. The sisters should second guess the police, they lost their sister. We should all look at what happened and come to our own realizations. The police, the public many who were there were scared, terrified. Did the police do the right thing, there was loss of life, but only one life. The life that was causing the terror. It is sad and tragic, but the police were in a difficult situation trying to minimize any loss of life

[Democat]

20. If she had killed people, the shooting would be less questioned

Because they stopped her from killing anyone, more people are angry that the police shot her.

It was a no win situation.

[randr]

21. Our police forces are being trained as paramilitary attack squads

and are losing their true mission-to serve and protect. How grown men seem incapable to handle so many of the situations we see them in where they go ballistic is beyond me.

[reddread]

36. who needs a death penalty

when you have death squads.

[EX500rider]

41. I would hope the security around the White House would be paramilitary..

.....instead of some rent-a-cops or Barney Fife.

[randr]

42. I hope they are well enough trained to assess a threat and

respond accordingly.

[EX500rider]

47. It appears to most of us that they did just that. n/t

[randr]

48. I will wait for an autopsy

of the young woman before I decide.

[DinahMoeHum]

29. The police are NOT mind-readers, folks. . .

. . .unless they were warned beforehand about a specific suspect, they have no way of knowing whether the driver is a terrorist, or mentally ill, or under the influence, or suffered a heart attack or a diabetic seizure, or even what sex.

They are trained to react to the action and the behavior taking place. Nothing else.

Circumstances are known AFTER the incident. Until that is known, it is wiser to reserve judgement.

[sofa king]

43. I'm surprised she got away from the WH.

There were three huge mistakes in that incident. Bereaved family members can say what they want, but that person used her car as a weapon, one which should have been treated as a far, far deadlier weapon than a mere pistol.

The first mistake was that White House security should have assumed that the car held explosives and that the breach was an attempt to get within detonation distance--that is why the anti-vehicle gates exist in the first place. From that assumption, if follows that no matter what, the weapon (the car) must not be allowed to get away to be used against an easier target--which, by accident, is exactly what the driver did, driving past dozens of softer but highly important potential bombing targets and actually making it onto Capitol Hill. I hate to say it, but White House security should have stopped her right there and then, by killing her if necessary.

The possibility that they held fire because they saw an infant in the car is a closely related second mistake, because now every car-bombing asshole in the world has seen how using a baby as a prop can give someone a second chance. So there's that.

But the third mistake was by far the worst of all. The anti-vehicle barriers on Constitution allowed the suspect to pass and spectacularly blocked her pursuers, destroying a police car in the process.
.
The goddamned anti-vehicle system aided the perpetrator, which is simply unforgivable under any circumstances, even very, very lucky circumstances such as these. That should be recognized as a career-ending, contract-ripping, expect-a-refund-for-the-millions-you-blew-on-that-piece-of-shit sort of mistake. But instead I'm sure the defense contractor that built it will get even more money to "improve" it from its worse-than-useless current state.

[hamsterjill]

49. Sometimes, things are simply a tragedy. This is one of those cases.

While I did not know Miriam Carey personally, I will give credence to the accounts of those who did know her and have explained that she had some mental issues. That said, I don't believe she knew what she was doing on that fateful day. I do not hold her responsible for her actions because of her illness.

HOWEVER, the police officers who were actively responding at the moment did not have the ability to know that about Ms. Carey. Her actions created an environment where they reacted, and they reacted accordingly.

Sometimes, there are simply tragedies without any real explanations and where there is no one, really, to be blamed. This is one of those instances in my opinion. A sad and terrible situation, and I'm betting one that the officers who fired the shots will have difficulty in living with for the rest of their lives. But they did what they had to do with the knowledge that they had available to them at the time.