Miami police get OK for more firepower

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Miami Herald

Miami police get OK for more firepower
Miami's new policy reflects the growing trend of police departments adding firepower to compete with heavily armed criminals.
Posted on Sat, Sep. 15, 2007
BY JACK DOLAN
[e-mail]

Citing a dramatic increase in the availability of high-powered, semiautomatic assault rifles -- like the one used Thursday to kill a Miami-Dade County police officer -- Miami Police Chief John Timoney has for the first time authorized patrol officers to start carrying similarly lethal weapons.

A burgeoning ''arms race'' between police and heavily armed drug gangs forced him to sign the new policy earlier this week, Timoney said. That was even before Thursday's lopsided confrontation between four pistol-toting county police officers and a burglary suspect armed with what police are calling a ''military grade'' assault weapon.

Miami-Dade police Sgt. Jose Somohano died in the shootout; three other officers were injured. The assailant, Shawn LaBeet, escaped apparently unscathed until he was cornered and shot dead by heavily armed police in Pembroke Pines late Thursday night.

The doctor who operated on seriously injured Miami-Dade police Officer Jody Wright -- who was about 200 feet from LaBeet when he fired at her -- described the grapefruit-size bullet wound on her right leg as the type ``you would see in a war.''


Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/457/story/239248.html

[geomon666]

1. Aint this the truth.

Timoney, a longtime advocate of tighter gun control, blames the 2004 expiration of the federal ban on assault weapons for the escalation of firepower on Miami's streets.

''This is really a failure of leadership at the national level. We are absolutely going in the wrong direction here,'' Timoney said. 'The whole thing is a friggin' disgrace.''

[seafan]

2. Meanwhile, from clueless Fred Thompson in Miami this week, after these shootings:

Miami police get OK for more firepower, September 15, 2007

.....

The doctor who operated on seriously injured Miami-Dade police Officer Jody Wright -- who was about 200 feet from LaBeet when he fired at her -- described the grapefruit-size bullet wound on her right leg as the type ``you would see in a war.''

''This is a very, very different injury from the common handgun Saturday night special wound we see in urban trauma centers,'' Ryder Trauma Center orthopedic surgeon Dr. Gregory Zych said.

(Miami Police Chief John)Timoney, a longtime advocate of tighter gun control, blames the 2004 expiration of the federal ban on assault weapons for the escalation of firepower on Miami's streets.
''This is really a failure of leadership at the national level. We are absolutely going in the wrong direction here,'' Timoney said. 'The whole thing is a friggin' disgrace.''

One in five homicides in Miami this year have been committed with assault weapons, Miami Deputy Police Chief Frank Fernandez said. The number was 18 percent last year and up from just 4 percent in 2004.

Here's Uncle Fred putting in his two cents' worth in Miami after this incident:


September 14, 2007

Thompson also reaffirmed his pro-gun rights stance when asked about a man who used an AK-47 assault rifle to shoot four Miami-Dade County police officers Thursday, killing one. He said an assault weapon ban isn't the answer.

"We'll never be able to keep people like that from getting their hands on weapons and it does not result in a good thing to disarm law abiding Americans," Thompson said.

http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20070914/APP/709140731

(More in this thread)




Yes, it is a failure of leadership. It's time to drive the cursed War/Murder/Torture/Robber Baron Party out of office permanently.

[Paladin]

3. Incoming Attack From DU Gun Dungeon Activists In 3...2...1...

Brace yourself for the usual whiney diatribes on what constitutes a "high-powered" firearm, statistics about how rifles are hardly ever used in crimes, etc., etc., etc...........

[Mojorabbit]

4. The Miami

police are already almost paramilitary now as it is.

[lpbk2713]

5. Hollywood Fred went right from the scene of this police shooting to a gun show in Lakeland.

Link: http://www.theledger.com/article/20070916/NEWS/709160493/1039


Damned appropriate for Thompson if you ask me. Four officers were shot in the line of duty and Thompson goes and glad hands a bunch of gun enthusiasts.

"Fred Thompson is the only presidential candidate ever to attend a gun show in Florida. (Gov.) Charlie Crist goes to them all the time, but Fred is the first presidential candidate," said Bill Bunting, chairman of the Pasco County Republican Party and a member of the 2nd Amendment Association and the National Rifle Association. "He is as close to Ronald Reagan as any candidate I've ever met."

That statement speaks volumes as far as I'm concerned.

Thompson was scheduled to give a speech at this appearance but didn't do it after all. In light of recent incidents of "foot in mouth" on Thompson's part it was probably wise for his handlers to put the gag on him at this particular stop so close to a recent multiple police shooting.

[derby378]

6. Anyone ever think about taking on the "root causes" of crime in Miami?

Trying to ban certain rifles won't do a damn thing to reduce crime - just look at how well that strategy worked in Los Angeles, New York, and Chicago.

Besides, I don't want to outgun police. But I don't want them to outgun me, either. You know, "We, the People" and all that.

[Paladin]

7. Typical Gun Activist Talking Point, Used Over And Over

Tell us all where the billions of dollars needed to fix those "root causes" are going to come from. While you're at it, tell us where the political willpower to raise and expend those billions of dollars will be secured.

The fact is, having an almost unlimited number and variety of firearms intermingled with those "root causes" is the equivalent of dumping gasoline on a forest fire.

And the notion that law enforcement shouldn't have more-than-adequate firepower to deal with the guns out on the street is beneath contempt, no matter what sort of constitutional sloganeering you try to dress it up with. Not enough cops dying these days to suit you?

[derby378]

9. What, you WANT the "root causes" to remain?

Please tell me you didn't actually mean that. Those "root causes" are why those cops are getting shot in the first place. Our children deserve an America than the one that we've been saddled with, but they won't get it as long as we ignore root causes and go for the quick fix and the quack cure.

See you in Austin for the state convention next year?

[Igel]

8. That article left me confused.

Recently SEELangs had a long-winded discussion on how to translate the Russian term 'avtomat' (as well as some related terms). Various and sundry people dragged in dictionaries and chunks of statutes to make their case (before turning their attention to stylistics).

My understanding is that an assault rifle is an automatic weapon. Assault weapons have mostly cosmetic traits, along with larger magazines, often found with assault rifles. But automatic weapons have been mostly banned in the US for decades, and the assault weapon ban didn't alter their status in the least.

So is Timoney asserting that the criminals are using assault rifles that were covered by the assault weapon ban, or has the reporter decided that the minority use of the word 'assault rifle' to cover semi-automatic weapons is a good semantic shift?

Or is Timoney assuming something that the reporter doesn't get, such as, "If the assault weapons ban were in place it would make it clear that all weapons with a certain appearance are illegal, therefore confiscating those that are illegal would be simpler and there'd be fewer on the streets"?

Second, I don't see why a bullet with a certain set of characteristics would cause more damage coming out of an assault rifle than from a single-shot or semi-automatic. Did the assault weapon ban render certain types of ammunition illegal?

[benEzra]

10. You're quite right, and the chief is grandstanding.

The legality and availability of civilian AK lookalikes has not changed one bit compared to 1994-2004; police have been using small-caliber patrol carbines for decades, with a major trend of replacing patrol shotguns with carbines, primarily AR-15 pattern, since the '90s (the Miami department is very late to this party); the Feinstein ban didn't affect ammunition; and rifles aren't commonly misused, MSM hysteria to the contrary.

Chief Timoney in uniform...

[RockaFowler]

11. Palm Beach County Sheriff is doing the same thing

I wonder what this area would be like if the assault weapons ban was still in force. In the last month or so there have been more police officers killed in this area and south. This has been a very sad time in South Florida. The police officers don't deserve this and those of us that live here don't deserve it either.

[benEzra]

12. No change whatsoever, since the "assault weapons ban" didn't ban anything.

I wonder what this area would be like if the assault weapons ban was still in force. In the last month or so there have been more police officers killed in this area and south. This has been a very sad time in South Florida. The police officers don't deserve this and those of us that live here don't deserve it either.

No change whatsoever, since the "assault weapons ban" didn't ban anything; civilian, non-automatic AK lookalikes were as legal 1994-2004 as they are now.

I know, I own a 2002 model civvie AK ("ban" era), which I bought in Pensacola in 2003. I shoot recreationally and competitively with it.



If anything has changed, it's NOT the availability of civilian AK variants on the civilian market. I suspect the recent focus on rifles is as much the Von Restorff effect as anything; rare and unusual incidents get reported more widely and thoroughly than when an officer is shot with the usual .38/.357 revolver or 9mm pistol, and hyperbole not only sells papers, but justifies budget increases.

[SteppingRazor]

13. I can't speak for the rest of the country, but here in South Florida...

police getting shot is definitely happening way more often this year than last. There's been at least two officers killed and half a dozen wounded in just the last couple months. I don't think it has anything to do with the assault weapons ban, but I think there is a trend. Could just be a weird year, a bunch of tragedies just coincidentally happening back to back, but it's definitely there.

[benEzra]

14. I personally think the tanking economy and social unraveling can't be helping...

I agree that the overall violent crime rate is probably up (there are hints of that in the preliminary 2006 FBI UCR figures). It's hard to tell whether reports of rifle crime are just the result of the Von Restorff effect, MSM bias, and chiefs with political agendas, or if it is a real upswing. But the proportion of rifles used in crime could double and still rank behind fists and feet in the murder stats.