Please keep the discussion on a higher level,
without personal labeling.

This is not about the "left" or the "right,"
of anything. This is not about pointing fingers
or accusations, or laying blame.

This thread is about asking for a review of
police training methods - so that a situation
like this one could be handled perhaps
differently in the future.

Anyway, I've said all I wanted to say.

Thank You for your comments.

And, before I leave, I would like to wish you all
a Safe, Happy and Gastronomically Satisfying
Festive Season.

See you again in 2009

There are people who use drugs, who drink plenty alcohol, people with mental problems, people out of control. All these people are dangerous not only for police men but for every one of us.
Do we kill a drunk driver who put at risk the lives of innocent people? NO. we try to help him to stop the alcohol, we try to convince him to take a taxi
Do we kill a person who holds a knife and wants money for his/her drugs ? No we give him/her the money and try to find ways to support the drug users
Do we kill a person with mental problems who hold a knife and threaten people or our self? No we try to calm him/her we try to disarm him/her, we try to save people's lives with the minimum cost on the person with the mental problems.
We do not kill the people with mental problems WE UNDERSTAND AND SUPPORT THEM.
How we calm a person with mental problems who hold a knife and threaten to kill us?
How can we disarm a person with mental problems who hold a knife and threaten to kill us? I supposed it is many times easier to disarm a person with mental problems, because he/she can NOT control him self well than any other person.
I will not tell you how to disarm a person, how to calm a mental person. These activities are basic and every police man/woman must know how to do them.
Three police men, instead to calm or disarm a young person send into his body 10? bullets!
Foxy I agree with you.. You know what happened to Greece when a police man killed a young person. I have written very often about it in Greek newspapers-forums 2-3 posts per day.
I do mot think a life cost very much in Australia.
Antonios Symeonakis
Adelaid

ColR are you becoming more sloppy with your arguments or is that just my imagination?

How does 'excusers of the left' bring anything to this debate? What on Earth does left or right politics have to do with this?

If you think for one moment that those three officers, no matter what the outcome of any enquiry, will come out of this unscathed emotionally and/or psychologically you have never ever had direct contact with people like police officers, ambulance paramedics or hospital workers who are confronted daily with other humans in situations that you wouldn't wish upon your worst enemy.

The concern is that those at the coalface will again bear the brunt. Either as scapegoats or that this 'goes with the territory' and as an officer you'd better accept that.

It is petrifying to be confronted and threathened by a person who is beyond reach. Not to 'freeze up' or 'lash out' when attacked requires training. It is not natural for most people to remain alert and cool headed in threathening situations. Most of us just react, not act.

Paul, have you have ever been attacked by a person you were called upon to tend to who was so paranoid and psychotic he could only act like a rat in a corner in mortal fear? It is pretty scary stuff. You'd be amazed what even a bit of training-actual physical mock up events-can achieve.

Remember, there were THREE officers. It would be interesting to know how much experience any of them had, let alone what training.

Col has spoken in the past about his links via work I think to police officers.
Some thing in security is it Col?
Your posts here highlight just maybe some should not ever be given a gun, a gut full of ? well I need not go on.
As some one who while often critical ,is a supporter of police, I assure you cops who think as you write are both a minority and in the wrong job.
Not a fearful bloke I have thrown myself on a man trying to kill a cop, both the cop and I got cut but we held the drunken idiot till he gave up.
Unlike the Col I see in print here, I and many would have done just that rather than kill this kid, in fact every weekend, some place in Australia cops do just that.
42 deaths twice NSW total in the same time why?
Let us hope not too many Victorian police think like Col rights.
Col just maybe you make me proud to be left of you, but then again almost every one is.

Sometimes psychiatric people are very hard to stop...almost impossible.
I remember many years ago at Central police station, Sydney when they brought in a young drunk, who had bashed a few people outside in the street.
As they were searching the man he flipped out and attacked the charge room Constable. The alarms went on and all over the building police came running.
One Constable got kicked in the groin, others got king hit in the head.
Many Constables had him pinned into a corner of the room but they couldnt stop his rage.
One police baton ended up bent over on itself... the policeman had hit him so hard. He wouldnt stop. That baton had a steel rod inside it. I had never seen such rage and such supernatural power. There must have been 10-12 police hanging off him until they finally subdued him and led him away to the cells. We hear stories of men doing heroic acts of bravery in time of war. Its like that. When the rage is up... little can stop a man.
Im not surprised police shot the offender 10 times or so.
It may have taken 10 shots to stop him.

ASymeonakis” Do we kill a person who holds a knife and wants money for his/her drugs ? No we give him/her the money and try to find ways to support the drug users”

Not sure what state you live in but a drug user doing that in Victoria would, rightly end up in one of the many “recovery centres”, run by the Dept of Corrections for a good long while… and be rigorously helped off their self-medicating regime through direct containment – in their prison cell and if they played up… in a ‘management’ cell, for closer observation.

And that is more support than any ‘off-your-face’ drunk or drug user deserves.

Belly your speculation was wrong, I have done no work for the police, although I have done work for the Dept of Justice a couple of years back but these days have moved on to the brighter pastures of the private sector… nothing to do with security.

As for the rest… did not realize you were a professional trumpet player…. You are certainly good at blowing your own…