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Veteran shot 60 times by police
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Post by
ElhonnaDS
Helmetcam turned up.
OMG- I've totally seen the light. How could he possibly know that the people coming in his door in swat uniforms were the police, just by the uniforms and the blaring police sirens outside. I can totally see how a normal human being would take the opportunity to grab an automatic weapon in order to answer the door. I'm so glad we got such a good view of what actually happened in this footage too. No way to look at this, and not know with 100% clarity every move that he made when coming to the door with an automatic weapon was, of course, completely non-threatening.
On the up side, if the guy in the back had a helmet cam, I'm sure the ones in the front did too. Which means that the review board, and jury if it goes to trial, will be able to see exactly what Jose did right before he was shot. So we can rest assured that whatever decision is made will be made with video footage of the entire incident.
Post by
gnomerdon
if it's at night, it's a different story.
did the swat team even notify him? did they use the "mic"(forget what it's called) so that he can hear?
Post by
Atik
if it's at night, it's a different story.
did the swat team even notify him? did they use the "mic"(forget what it's called) so that he can hear?
Megaphone?
From the video, it looks like broad daylight. From what I saw they just walked up and kicked the door in...
Post by
Pwntiff
From the video, it looks like broad daylight. From what I saw they just walked up and kicked the door in...
They knocked.
Post by
Atik
From the video, it looks like broad daylight. From what I saw they just walked up and kicked the door in...
They knocked.
I had a hard time seeing what was going on. I didn't even notice they had the door open until they began shooting...
Post by
gnomerdon
I also heard sirens in the clip? I mean, it could be bad people. How long did they wait outside before entering? moar facts plz!
Post by
ElhonnaDS
I heard the sirens, and it was so loud I had to turn down my computer. I saw them knocking. I think I heard them yelling, but it was hard to hear. What I really think this proves is that there is probably video footage that hasn't been released, of the actual shooting. If the people making the decision have a full video, it will be a lot easier for them to make the right choice.
Post by
xaratherus
Helmetcam turned up.
Sadly, it's not terribly informative since the video is not from an officer who was inside the house.
A few things we can tell from the video, though:
The SWAT vehicle sounded its siren for several moments before the officers ever entered the home. Unless the home was a lot better constructed than the adobe structures in Phoenix, they aren't exactly soundproof. Then again, the siren wasn't readily-identifiable as a police siren to me; it sounded more like a car alarm. Regardless, I think the person inside the house would have known something was up.
Although the officers don't appear to announce themselves verbally at any time, they did knock on the door three-five times before breaching. But then again, I don't usually answer the door if I'm not expecting someone, without checking who it is first through a front window - and the length of time between the knock and the breach would have been barely enough for me to do so.
The breach occurs at 0:33 seconds. The shots begin at 0:41 seconds. The sounds of the shots fired all appear to be from the same time of gun, or at least the same fire-rate. So it doesn't sound like Guerena ever pulled the trigger, even as a warning shot.
Although it's hard to tell, it appears that only 2-3 officers enter the house. I can't find specifics but if Tuscon SWAT breach is anything like Phoenix SWAT, they carry H&K MP5s. Hi-cap on those is 30 rounds; this would indicate that two officers likely fired and emptied their clips completely.
The altercation didn't appear to take place immediately in the entry way. The officers who entered moved completely into the home and out of the frame of the doorway, and then two more officers moved in to block egress.
Linkin Park's "Waiting for the End to Come" either was softly dubbed over the video, or they were playing it in the SWAT vehicle where the officer with the helmetcam was sitting. :P Which sucks, because I really love that song, and now it's tied to those images in my mind for awhile...
I still think the whole situation smells. LEOs are trained to fire when they feel threatened by a possible assailant with a firearm, but that doesn't explain why the medicos were not allowed in until nearly an hour after the breach occurred.
My guess as to the immediate confrontation (not about anything that occurred afterward)? Guerena appeared with an assault rifle, one of the SWAT officers assessed the situation and opened fire; the sounds of the discharging weapon caused the second (possibly only other) officer to open fire as well.
Post by
ElhonnaDS
@ Xara- if you were a law enforcement officer, serving a warrant on what is thought to be a dangerous enough suspect to merit a swat team, and they appear at the door brandishing an automatic weapon, do you think your asessment would have been different? Would you have waited until they shot at you to fire back?
Post by
Skreeran
Helmetcam turned up.
OMG- I've totally seen the light. How could he possibly know that the people coming in his door in swat uniforms were the police, just by the uniforms and the blaring police sirens outside. I can totally see how a normal human being would take the opportunity to grab an automatic weapon in order to answer the door. I'm so glad we got such a good view of what actually happened in this footage too. No way to look at this, and not know with 100% clarity every move that he made when coming to the door with an automatic weapon was, of course, completely non-threatening.
On the up side, if the guy in the back had a helmet cam, I'm sure the ones in the front did too. Which means that the review board, and jury if it goes to trial, will be able to see exactly what Jose did right before he was shot. So we can rest assured that whatever decision is made will be made with video footage of the entire incident.I take it you're being sarcastic.
It was a semi-automatic weapon, by the way, and it was on Safe. If someone blew up my front door, I'd probably be going for the gun too. As you may not know,
Pheonix, Arizona is the kidnapping capital of the country
, and it's not unheard of in those parts for a cartel hit squad to break down your door and kill or kidnap your family.
On top of that, that's probably the worst dynamic entry stack I've ever seen. Even if they had reasonable expectation that Guerena was going to open fire, this Elite SWAT team acted more like a bunch of spooked sheep than the highly trained experts they're supposed to be.
Post by
xaratherus
@ Xara- if you were a law enforcement officer, serving a warrant on what is thought to be a dangerous enough suspect to merit a swat team, and they appear at the door brandishing an automatic weapon, do you think your asessment would have been different? Would you have waited until they shot at you to fire back?
No, I would not have. With training, I would have fired the moment that I felt reasonable threat with a deadly weapon. I didn't mean to imply that I would not have done so.
But a
review
of the available information from the perspective of a USAF veteran with SWAT experience makes me wonder if those officers should have ever ended up in that position in the first place. According to MikeM, the whole operation was handled with "amazing incompetence".
Finally, even if we assume that the men handled the breach correctly and were justified in firing, that still does not explain why medical professionals were denied entry into the home. "Clearing" a home of that size, when there is no suspicion of dangerous substances or possible explosives (and there's been no indication that such suspicions were present), should not take an hour; it should take a sixth of that.
By the way, from what I can ascertain, Guerena was not actually hit 60 times. 71 shots were fired, but the coroner's report indicates Guerena was only hit around 22 times - according to the linked report above, a fairly average amount for a SWAT shooting.
And it seems the reason that the SWAT team was deployed to serve the warrant to Guerena was, well, sort of odd. There were suspicions that Guerena was drug-trafficking, but that alone doesn't seem to warrant a SWAT incursion. But two men, related to Guerena by marriage, were suspected in a double homicide in a home invasion here in Arizona, and so Guerena's warrant was SWAT-served by association.
Post by
Atik
1.The SWAT vehicle sounded its siren for several moments before the officers ever entered the home. Unless the home was a lot better constructed than the adobe structures in Phoenix, they aren't exactly soundproof. Then again, the siren wasn't readily-identifiable as a police siren to me; it sounded more like a car alarm. Regardless, I think the person inside the house would have known something was up.
Something up from a car alarm?
Where I live, we just ignore them. Nine times out of nine and a half, it is a cat getting into someone's open window or something similiar. Hell, we have a tendancy to chew out the owner for setting their car alarm and leaving their windows open.
Post by
Skreeran
As I've said before, I've severely biased on this topic, because this could very, very easily have been my own house. My dad's a veteran with PTSD, and owns several guns for home defense. One of his biggest fears is having a home invasion by cartel gangsters.
Part of what makes this seem so wrong to me is that a team of government officials weilding automatic weapons broke into a man with no prior conviction's home, shot him dead, and denied him medical attention.
I know they had a warrent, but does a civilian drug search of a single man's home really merit a fully armed no-knock home invasion?
On top of the team's fantastic incompetence, the whole thing just doesn't sit well with me.
Post by
xaratherus
1.The SWAT vehicle sounded its siren for several moments before the officers ever entered the home. Unless the home was a lot better constructed than the adobe structures in Phoenix, they aren't exactly soundproof. Then again, the siren wasn't readily-identifiable as a police siren to me; it sounded more like a car alarm. Regardless, I think the person inside the house would have known something was up.
Something up from a car alarm?
Where I live, we just ignore them. Nine times out of nine and a half, it is a cat getting into someone's open window or something similiar. Hell, we have a tendancy to chew out the owner for setting their car alarm and leaving their windows open.
That's true. The reason I mentioned it in that sense was because of something I read elsewhere: According to the review I linked above, the noises outside were enough to cause Guerena's wife to look out the window. She then told her husband that there were armed men in the front yard; he told her to take their son and hide in a closet, and then armed himself.
I know they had a warrent, but does a civilian drug search of a single man's home really merit a fully armed no-knock home invasion?
Just because they had a warrant doesn't necessarily mean that they had a warrant that merited a no-knock breach invasion, either. The police haven't released the warrant information yet. I'd be interested to know exactly what they thought they were going to find at Guerena's home - especially since after the firefight, they found nothing illegal at all.
Post by
Skreeran
After consulting wikipedia, it seem
this isn't the first time something like this has happened.
In that particular case, the team assaulted
the wrong house.
Post by
134377
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Skreeran
Unfortunately, this is what inevitably and eventually happens when you have a heavily armed populace, neccessitating even more heavily armed police. What the hell was this guy doing with an assault rifle, plus other weapons? If I was a copper, and broke the door in a drugs bust, and was confronted with a guy with an assault rifle, I'd probably %^&* my pants and squeeze my trigger too. I couldn't take the risk of me or my friends being shot. He should've just held his hands up, and gone in for questioning. Even if it was criminals, it's better to lose a few possessions than be killed or become a killer. He shouldn't have had the guns in the first place, let alone start waving them about.What about when it's not just possessions that are at stake?
The Mexican gangs down here are scary, and kidnapping is a very lucrative business for them.
Post by
gnomerdon
MExican gangs in Mexico or AMerica?
Post by
Monday
He's in Texas.
Post by
Skreeran
MExican gangs in Mexico or AMerica?They're in both, but I'm mainly speaking about in America. And to be clear, I'm talking about gangs FROM Mexico, like
Los Zetas
and
La Familia
, not just local gangs of Mexican-Americans.
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