Arvada standoff & hostage, as paged

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jimmnn

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U/D: Suspect was shot by swat and 13 year old hostage has been released.

According to 9NEWS Reporter Will Ripley, the suspect involved in an 18-hour-long standoff has been shot and killed by SWAT team members. The 13 year old he was holding hostage in Arvada is safe.

Jim<
 
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natedawg1604

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U/D: Suspect was shot by swat and 13 year old hostage has been released.

According to 9NEWS Reporter Will Ripley, the suspect involved in an 18-hour-long standoff has been shot and killed by SWAT team members. The 13 year old he was holding hostage in Arvada is safe.

Jim<

This morning I listed to Westy Swat and it was very chilling, the commander sounded pretty stressed (obviously for good reason). This incident probably would have ended better if that nutcase had enough brains to let the kid go! It sounds like this guy was an absolute wacco, and at times he was apparently seen using the kid as a "shield" when walking near doorways or windows.

The SWAT team was very concerned that if they breached the outer perimeter they would encounter "second level" barricades of an unknown nature. The suspect was also making crazy statements about not caring what happened to the kid, "exchanging" the kid for someone else, etc. About ten 10 minutes before the final ending, the Commander instructed his team to take care of business (my words) if they got a clear shot, but to be careful because he might try to use the kid as a human shield. I can't even imagine how much stress those snipers must have been under...
 
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Denverpilot

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Arvada standoff &amp;amp; hostage, as paged

Family says he wasn't armed.

Don't get me wrong, I have no sympathy for the guy taking a kid hostage, but I always wonder if a para-military strike force weren't even available, if these things would end in suicide by cop as much as they do nowadays.

Many of the raids one reads about, nobody was armed inside, people get shot, cops "investigate" and the family sues if they even have enough money to get a halfway decent lawyer. Nobody is ever fired.

Oh well. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. Dude is dead because he was stupid.

"Take care of business" these days definitely doesn't include waiting until crazy agitated idiots calm down -- breach and shoot is the far more common "solution" judging by the news articles.

No idea if any agency tracks how often they used to call in SWAT in say, the 80s vs today.

Just an observation. I'd rather the cops come home alive than the alternative, in cases of extremely stupid violent people, for sure.

Train military urban tactics, and arm police to the teeth, and you're going to use those tactics and weapons more often than you used to, is all I'm saying, I suppose.

And there's scenarios where it's needed. The idiot with a knife to the lady's throat at the convenience store a couple weeks ago comes to mind. Whoever the officer was with the rifle made a hell of a shot.

At least in that case there was zero question the idiot holding the hostage had a deadly weapon and had it at someone's throat. These grey ones are a little more troublesome.

All someone has to do is say you might have a weapon and you might end up dead and the shooting called "justified".

Fascinating problem for our society. We paid to arm and train the equivalent of "special forces" operators and put them in place in every city in the country.
 

n0doz

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Well.... as an "insider," I'm glad we have them. Been in many situations where the extra firepower made sure we got home in one piece.
Don't get me wrong, I think police management uses SWAT for far too many purposes these days. But I think it reflects a distinct lack of trust that the average cop is able to handle situations without embarrassing the bosses, and that the (supposedly) more disciplined SWAT cops are more "trustworthy."
Just my admittedly biased 2 cents.
 

natedawg1604

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Family says he wasn't armed.

Don't get me wrong, I have no sympathy for the guy taking a kid hostage, but I always wonder if a para-military strike force weren't even available, if these things would end in suicide by cop as much as they do nowadays.

Many of the raids one reads about, nobody was armed inside, people get shot, cops "investigate" and the family sues if they even have enough money to get a halfway decent lawyer. Nobody is ever fired.

Oh well. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. Dude is dead because he was stupid.

"Take care of business" these days definitely doesn't include waiting until crazy agitated idiots calm down -- breach and shoot is the far more common "solution" judging by the news articles.

No idea if any agency tracks how often they used to call in SWAT in say, the 80s vs today.

Just an observation. I'd rather the cops come home alive than the alternative, in cases of extremely stupid violent people, for sure.

Train military urban tactics, and arm police to the teeth, and you're going to use those tactics and weapons more often than you used to, is all I'm saying, I suppose.

And there's scenarios where it's needed. The idiot with a knife to the lady's throat at the convenience store a couple weeks ago comes to mind. Whoever the officer was with the rifle made a hell of a shot.

At least in that case there was zero question the idiot holding the hostage had a deadly weapon and had it at someone's throat. These grey ones are a little more troublesome.

All someone has to do is say you might have a weapon and you might end up dead and the shooting called "justified".

Fascinating problem for our society. We paid to arm and train the equivalent of "special forces" operators and put them in place in every city in the country.

I guess I would agree with your sentiments more in the context of this case, if the guy wasn't holding the kid hostage. Also, the fact that he broke into a random house surely didn't help either...
 
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Denverpilot

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Arvada standoff &amp;amp; hostage, as paged

I think we all generally agree. I want officers (many of whom are friends) to go home to their families at night.

But, I also think *death* from a gunshot wound is a pretty big penalty to suffer for being a nutbag who has zero common sense.

Police didn't always have the tools to even have the ability to get in a building and escalate to a point where a nutbag could get shot.

With great power comes great responsibility. There probably isn't anything more powerful than the threat of death.

The old school model was, "If you didn't know if (s)he was truly dangerous, why did you escalate?"...

Now it's, "why didn't you assume (s)he was dangerous and take care of it?"

It's a difficult problem and solutions aren't going to fit in a sound bite on TV, that's for sure. People want all risk to go away or be fixed for them.

People want the police to be their personal bodyguards, negotiators, tire changers, babysitters, marriage counselors, you name it, people will call 911 for it.

We, the interested listeners, hear it on the dispatch channels all the time. We know how hard a job it is.

I always lift a glass to the men and women willing to put on blue nylon and black Kevlar and go deal with the stupidity out there, day in and day out. Heck I'll even buy them a glass. They put up with some seriously crazy crap!
 
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