Jemel Robeson
Jemel Robeson courtesy Twitter

Chicago’s south suburbs can be almost as rough as the city’s south side. A fight broke out in Manny’s Blue Room Lounge in Robbins early Sunday morning and a group of drunks were asked to leave. One of them then came back and opened fire in the bar. Four people were wounded.

Security returned fire, and according to witnesses, 26-year-old armed security guard Jemel Roberson apprehended one of the men involved outside.

“He had somebody on the ground with his knee in back, with his gun in his back like, ‘Don’t move,'” witness Adam Harris said.

The security guard was Jemel Roberson, a good guy with a gun who stopped an indiscriminate shooting in the bar. Then Midlothian police arrived.

Soon after, witnesses said, an officer responding to the scene fired at Roberson — killing him.

“Everybody was screaming out, ‘Security!’ He was a security guard,” Harris said. “And they still did their job, and saw a black man with a gun, and basically killed him.”

It isn’t clear what, if any, verbal warnings were given to Roberson by police when they rolled up.

A spokeswoman for the Cook County Sheriff’s Office said Roberson had a valid FOID card, but did not have a concealed-carry license.

In a statement, Midlothian police confirmed two officers from the department responded to the scene of the shooting and that one of them opened fire.

“A Midlothian officer encountered a subject with a gun and was involved in an officer-involved shooting. The subject the officer shot was later pronounced deceased at an area hospital,” Chief Daniel Delaney of the Midlothian Police Department said in a statement.

Predictably as the sun rising in the east, the incident, which is still under investigation was immediately used to argue that civilians with firearms is inherently dangerous.

Yesterday, Roberson’s family filed a lawsuit in federal court against the still un-named officer and the city of Midlothian.

It’s a tragedy no matter how you look at it. Roberson no doubt saved lives with his quick action in stopping the shooter. And it cost him his life when a police officer reacted to a situation he didn’t understand.

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

115 COMMENTS

    • BTW the young black man shot by a white cop had a vest on AND a “SECURITY” shirt over it. Murder most foul…

      • I think it’s unfair to call it murder.

        That does not mean it is excusable. But instances like this make me question why there seems to be a pervasive belief in certain LEO circles (training, personalities, I don’t know) that an officers life is more important than anyone elses.

        Private citizens cannot get away with preemptively shooting people who aren’t visibly carrying a weapon under the guise of “my personal safety” (rightfully so) or even if they have a gun but aren’t threatening with it, but the numbers of such instances are only going to grow if police are allowed to shoot at the sight of a gun, much less the fear that there MIGHT be one in someones pocket, as the numbers of concealed carriers continues to increase.

        • The numbers of concealed carriers may increase in your neck of the woods, but for large metro areas, you know they won’t.

        • Clearly marked as a “Good Guy” and you think it’s NOT murder? There is NO excuse for this…. If I were the DA I MIGHT put it down as Man2, but nothing lower. COPS more than anyone HAVE TO USE THEIR BRAINS BEFORE they shoot. If they are Sooooo FEARFUL that they shoot first and ask questions after …. they need to look for another line of work. As a civilian I would be charged with murder for shooting a plain-cloths officer who was sitting on a person with his gun in their face. Why should the rules for cops be any different?? They are supposed to be “professionals”, THINKING BEFORE KILLING innocent civilians, especially those wearing SECURITY ID-entifiers. Would YOU get a free pass for shooting a uniformed officer holding a person at gunpoint? SAME RULES SHOULD APPLY. NO ONE IS ABOVE THE LAW, ESPECIALLY COPS.

        • It is murder. All incidents involving a person intentionally killing another is murder. The difference in court is this: Is it “justifiable” homicide, or not? Basically, justifiable homicide is that assigned to validated cases of self-defense, and LEA action based on legal valid response to a crime.
          This question will be 1) Did the officer violate training standards (were there any) 2) Did the officer violate department policy?
          So in essence, the question is will this be justifiable homicide or plain homicide (of whatever degree)?

          • “All incidents involving a person intentionally killing another is murder.”

            Not sure there is a legal basis for your claim. One human killing another is labeled “homicide” (as opposed to “suicide”). The question at trial is “justifiable homicide”, or not. The matter becomes “murder” only when a guilty verdict is rendered (which may be labeled as “negligent homicide”, in some cases) . If I remember correctly, a “negligent homicide” is a situation where one human killed another without direct, prior, intention to cause death, sometimes called “accidental” (this is getting further in the weeds than is probably useful).

      • Wrong. Dressed all in black with no markings of security on the clothing, also refusing commands of police.

        • Refusing police commands?

          Like he said “no way” or “go f* yourself”?

          Inquiring minds want to know!

      • Good point. I’m looking forward to the “camera shot” of it. I went to Brian Carey training center. It’s easy to be caught off guard trusting that the bad guy won’t shoot you. BUT, it’s also easy to think that everyone is the bad guy. Was there too much noise to hear the cop saying something? Did the security guard point the gun at the officer? Was the cop too anxious? What was said to dispatch on the first 911 call? Was it “man with a gun” or “security guy has gunman on floor”?

      • Typically, in this tragedy the racialist have to do what they do and point out that a black man was killed by a white cop. In a reverse situation, these facts are never noted, because it does not serve the racist motive to create racial animosity at every opportunity.

        The only hearts not breaking over this tragedy are the bigots who see opportunity to further their racist narrative.

        May God grant comfort to his family and to those that know their actions caused this tragedy. This being human thing carries with it way too much ability to just screw up big-time.

    • The only items that appear to be worth commenting about are:

      1) From the above quoted (paragraph four) passage”

      “In a statement, Midlothian police confirmed two officers from the department responded to the scene of the shooting and that one of them opened fire.” End quote

      The responding officer that did not open fire –what did s/he see –or– not see, compared to the officer that did fire.

      2) No mention of body-cam footage; if any.

      Not enough data to begin an intelligent/informative discussion about this incident.

  2. It’s situations like this that make you wonder if we should go back to the days before police where each community policed itself and Sheriff’s didn’t carry arms. It would teach a whole lot more personal responsibility! I’d stand my watch!

    • “It’s situations like this that make you wonder if we should go back to the days before police where each community policed itself and Sheriff’s didn’t carry arms.” No, but it does show the needs for everyone to assess a situation before charging in. Conversely, the first LEO on scene at the Thousand Oaks shooting was quickly and easily taken out by the shooter. Again, it’s impossible to train for every situation but a second or two longer to assess would be a good idea. Sort of like typing responses to TTAG postings… 🙂

      • Well Craig, I don’t know if it could be any worse if people policed their own communities. I bet they’d recognize their neighbors, know who the good guys are and figure out who the bad guys are by everyone shooting at or pointing their fingers at the bad guys. Apparently, police can’t be bothered to train up to the level required to do their jobs as you pointed out so beautifully. I didn’t just come up with this idea. It was a process over years. I know I’m not the only one. It’s about Freedom and personal responsibility. It was a working system before and it would work again.

        • ” It was a working system before and it would work again.” -Texican

          So much this! Police are a recent invention. We did have “law and order” before they were created despite what some may say.

          Part of the problem is police are so isolated from the community while they drive by in their cars. They should be walking a beat like they used to. Then they’d get to know the area and the people not just the criminals they see when they are called after the fact like now.

    • Thats what I keep saying, yet when this suggestion is made the response is like saying all black people are thugs or all white people are racists. No touchy. Stay away, but where are we at this point in relations between LEO and the communities they police? How do we rebuild trust? In this discussion people keep forgetting that all law enforcement personnel are other humans, subject to the same whims and mistakes humans make.

      • I guess that depends on the community in which you live- Law/Community relations around here are pretty decent unless you ask the bad and fringe people (of any race). It might also depend upon which Watch you are dealing with, on 3rd you either have a sense of humor or you don’t.

      • In all too many cases, police don’t want to be “trusted”.

        They want to be feared and obeyed, and to be totally unaccountable for their actions.

        The only difference between Black Lives Matter and the police unions is whom they want to populate the unaccountable classes of violent felons they wish to create.

        • Not pointing my finger at Chris or anyone else in particular around here, but I have to wonder just how many of the police-hating posters actually know a real, live cop? I have regular interactions with more than a dozen, all from large city and county departments and it’s really difficult for me to place any of them into the scenarios that some here are portraying.

    • What’s going to bring us back to those days even faster are the unsustainable pensions LEO’s have. Illinois has a huge problem in this regard, as does California, but very, very few states have well-funded public employee pensions.

      You’re going to see more and more news on the pension front in the next five years. Taxpayers should NOT fall for any claims that they should make these pensions whole. The public employees dug themselves into these financial holes, and they can work themselves out. It wasn’t the taxpayer who made this mess…

      • You’re right DG, it wasn’t the taxpayers that dug that hole. It was the politicians the taxpayers voted into office that dug it. So why are employees who worked years and years in good faith supposed to be punished for the joys of politicians? That’s no different than Corrupt CEOs raiding their employees 401 K and profit sharing accounts then leaving them with little pension to live the remainder of their lives on. So I’m guessing you feel they should just suck it up too and say they earned what they got and should never try to get what is owed to them as well. Basically, you’re saying that the people on top get to do whatever they want to those who work in good faith for them and to hell with the little guy.

        • How many funds are in trouble because of giveaways to public service unions? Paying 90%+ of average of 3 highest earning years, letting people buy years/levels, counting overtime and maxing it the last couple of years, increasing benefits greater than the funds growth rate, etc. These fixed benefit plans are unsustainable. The Boomers got theirs and left the next generation holding the bag.

      • The pension situation in Illinois is a bit more complicated than that. Illinois has over 600 SEPARATE municipal police and fire pensions, each one administered by locally appointed pension boards. Some are well-funded, many are not. These are in addition to several statewide pension systems for teachers, state employees and local government employees. Again, a few of these are well-funded and many are not.

        Big city governments in Illinois (and the state itself) are controlled by union contributions to politicians. Reducing pension benefits is pretty much a non-starter.

  3. So what’s the score? 1,000,000 who haven’t been shot by cops to this poor guy who was?
    Of course those million are all outliers and this single incident is the rule.

    • So by your theory of life, each police officer gets one point for good performance for every citizen who he DOESN’T shoot on sight – and I suppose that he loses one point for each innocent citizen that he does shoot on sight without warning and without cause.

      • Anti’s call the “good guy with a gun” a myth and ignore every instance of this occurring.
        This one event here where a cop shot a good guy with a gun will be passed around in the anti’s and MSM circles for generations to come as though it is an everyday occurrence.

  4. If anyone ever deserved a payout for a police shooting it is this guy’s family. Let’s start taking it out of the cop’s union and pension funds. That will nip the problem in the bud pretty quick.

    • How about some murder charges? That’s what’ll change the indiscriminate use of lethal force. Holding LEOs to the same standards that everyone else is. That’s the only way this Republic shall be saved is an equal application of the ONE LAW for all. Otherwise, it’s Lords and vassals all over again.

    • Go ahead and take it from that villages pension fund. They have next to nothing in it. By the time this 4-year vet retires, this department will have been taken over by the CCSPD clowns in brown.

  5. They did what they’re trained to do – they shot a black man with a gun.

    Seems like maybe they should get different training.

    • Oh good grief. Did you seriously just write that? You actually believe that the police academies in major cities, virtually all, if not all, of which are Democrat-dominated and with near uniform black voter support, are teaching officers to shoot blacks?

      • They’re not training themselves to shoot black guys with guns, they’re training themselves to shoot everybody with guns.

        And then, when they murder the innocent, they’re just ‘following policies and training’.

        But when they shoot an on duty plainclothes officer, it’s a tragedy that must be prevented from reoccurring.

  6. Most, not all, cops need to learn to grow a set and assess the situation before opening fire. Their motto is “To protect and serve” but nine times out of ten it should be, “we shoot first to make sure we go home at night, f@ck the families of the innocents we slaughter as long as we are ok.”
    It didn’t used to be like this. I feel like a lot of people become cops these days just to work and retire after 20 years with 3/4 salary…they have no attachment or feeling towards the job like in the old days.

    • The police job has been destroyed by politics and incorrect public perception that race is the only driving factor for all shootings. Amazed there are still people signing up for the job.

  7. Did the security guard have a uniform?
    If the guard was dressed in plain clothes, it might have looked to the police like he is taking a hostage.
    Very unfortunate. The killing was friendly fire but the lawsuit will not be friendly.

  8. Instead of learning a lesson the TTAG commentariet would rather mouth off than self assess. It is a given that when the cops respond to shots fired they are going focus on the guy with the gun. This guy could have been an off duty cop and the result probably would have been the same. Don’t pay attention to the tacticool types. Holster your gun as soon as possible preferably before the cops arrive.

    • “…Holster your gun as soon as possible preferably before the cops arrive.”

      Yes.

      AND ALSO!

      Train the cops that “Gun! *bang* *bang* *bang*” is not an acceptable response to every situation.

      Good guys keep their weapon pointed at the suspect, or in some generally safe direction.

      Bad guys point their gun at anything (everything) that catches their eye.

      It only take a split second to see the difference, much less time than it takes to draw their weapon and do a mag dump towards anyone they see with a gun.

      Yes, I realize I am quarterbacking from the keyboard but the cops are supposed to be better, they are supposed to be trained, they are supposed to serve and protect someone/something other than their own pension.

  9. The cops have to learn that guns are legal!
    They can’t just execute anyone they see who has a gun.
    Murder charges are in order here

    • If you aren’t going to discuss this honestly, then why speak at all? Hyperbole adds nothing.

      The police didn’t “just execute anyone they see who has a gun.” That doesn’t even begin to characterize the circumstances here.

      That said, perhaps criminal charges are in order. Certainly training focused on responding to scenes with an armed good guy would be beneficial. Let’s not get hysterical, though.

      • All too often they are rolling up and shooting anyone they see with a gun, or a cell phone, or a spray nozzle off a garden hose, or they guy laying on the floor begging for his life while he tries to pull up his pants, or the care giver next to the mentally ill person holding a toy truck, or…….ad infinitum.

        This citizen was murdered by a cop, PERIOD.

        It is well past time we removed the privilege of government employees to carry weapons while they are in our employ. Give them a radio and a whistle.

      • I agree, murder charges are definitely due. To reiterate a cogent point: guns are not illegal.
        Cops must be held to the same standard that the rest of us are. Period.

  10. If he had a 1911 chambered 6.5 creedmoor he wold be alive today. Upon arriving to the scene the cops would have asked him about his grips and checkering on the frame because, 1911. Then 6.5cm is a given for any situation involving lethal force or oxygen.

  11. OK FIRST OFF Manny’s “Lounge” is in ROBBINS not Midlothian,IL. The 2nd poorest(after Ford Heights)suburb in Cook county. Midlothian is next door. The cops basically DID see a black man with a gun and murdered him. Robbins is pretty much identical to the Southside of Chiraq with almost zero infrastructure and basic services. A white guy was shot to death a few month’s ago taking a shortcut late at night. Probably caught in the crossfire of gangbangers. As expected the county or Midlothian cops are not happy venturing in Robbins(hometown of Nichelle Nickols of Star Trek fame). No excuse and I expect head’s to roll…

    • Correction they saw a black man with a gun standing over someone. Suppose that was you and the bad guy was standing over you. Would you want the cops to wait and sort things out?

      Newsflash. If you want to be the good guy with a gun you run the risk of getting killed by a bad guy, a good guy or a cop. If you don’t want to accept the risk than leave your gun for personal defense only.

      • OK, let’s assume the bad guy has you proned out with his knee on your back.
        Do you want the cops to start flinging lead in your direction unannounced, or do you want them to announce themselves and take control of the scene? Remember the mentally disabled guy with the toy truck? A cop shot the caretaker sitting next to him, with a rifle no less, in order to protect the caretaker from the toy truck.

        Or, let’s assume the you have the bad guy proned out with your knee on his back.
        Do you want the cops to start flinging lead in your direction unannounced, or do you want them to announce themselves and take control of the scene?

        • Gee. I don’t know. Where you stand is where you sit.

          Would you prefer that cops discover that he’s the bad guy only after he pulls the trigger?

        • Cop walks in, yells “Freeze”, BG shoots you, cop shoots BG.

          Yep, I’d prefer that to cop walks in, cop shoots good guy. Greatly prefer.

          You’re choosing a certainty of somebody getting randomly shot over a possibility of somebody getting criminally shot. Are you fucking insane, or have you been subjected to insane levels of LE training?

        • I think you are the one who is insane. And you been too much TV. Cops only yell freeze on TV or the movies.

  12. Very sad but the bottom line is when the police show up you need to holster your weapon stand back let them take over. That’s Training 101 and everybody knows it.

    At least most people do. Sadly this good guy with a gun did not know that or at least wasn’t thinking about it at the time.

    A similar case happened in Nashville Tennessee a couple of years ago. The good guy was a gun shot the bad guy. But when the police showed up and they told him repeatedly to drop his weapon he refused and was killed.

    If we are going to increase the understanding of gun civil rights in the United States then we as a community need to impart the responsibility that goes with that. Which means when the police show up it’s time to holster your weapon and cooperate with the authorities.

    Cases like this are outliers. There are simply too many successful DGUs where the good guy was not shot by the responding police. And there have been many good black people with guns who have use them in self-defense and not been shot by responding white police officers. We’ve talked about those cases TTAG in the past.

    • I hear a lot of TTAG “operators” talk about the importance of situational awareness but it just seems to be a buzzword they have learned on the internet. When cops roll up to shooting they have zero situational awareness. They can stand around getting it and if in the meantime the bad guy kills a bunch a people then TTAGers will bitch about lazy cops standing around while people are being killed or if they react like they did here the same people yell killer cop. This leads me to believe they really do not have sufficient understanding of the use of force and the conditions under which it occurs to be that good guy with a gun.

      Self defense is realively easy. It’s just you and the bad guy but once you throw in a more people into the mix it becomes complex. Some people are better at dealing with complexity than others. Just because you are cop doesn’t mean you are good at it or if you are just Joe Citizen that you aren’t.

  13. I keep hearing the “more training needed” mantra, but exactly how much more and what kind? On a related note, and this is anecdotal, but it seems to me that the majority of armed citizen responses are more calm, cool and collected than police responses, sans the “more training”! Also related, of all the real mass shooting and terror attacks that have lately been in the news, how many were thwarted by police and how many by citizens? I’ll bet the odds are not in favor of the police.

    The only 911 attack that was thwarted, was by passengers, not air marshals. The Texas church shooter’s sustained attack was thwarted by a citizen armed with an AR. The attack here was thwarted by an armed citizen security guard. Until the police arrived and blew it all. On and on the stories go. I mean, lets be truthful with ourselves here as a self defense community. If the end game is universal carry and we all more or less look out for ourselves and neighbors, which we do, then what exactly do we need regular police for?

    The reality, as I see it, is that more people do not come to the aid of others precisely because there are laws preventing then to do so that are ironically enforced by the police. For example, I can’t effectively prevent a stabbing or gang assault because where I reside it is illegal to carry even a stick to defend yourself. I can try, but I know I will die trying. I can choose to ignore the law, but the odds of me beating a lengthy felony prison rap are not good indeed. The reasoning for having police these days is so circuitous it’s making my head spin. I need police to protect me from threats because the police will prevent me from preventing those threats. Oy vey! The situation would actually be kind of funny if it didn’t end up costing me many tax dollars for salaries and pensions, potential prison time if I chose to ignore the law or not pay said taxes or perhaps my life.

    • Well said. And yeah, too often private citizens conduct themselves better in high stress scenarios because people like us know damn well that our actions will be put under a microscope and a misstep could mean massive prison time. Cops don’t have to worry about that; they know they are effectively immune

  17. I might tend to wait until I actually SEE the guy with the gun shoot somebody before I shoot him. Better he be the murderer than I be the murderer.

  18. A trigger happy cop. Or more then likely a poorly trained one. Yes a cop sometimes has to make a split second desicion. This sounds more like
    Small town poorly trained police. I came from such a town in rural NY. 2 full time 5 part time with minimal training.

    • The ones in larger towns and cities are just as poorly trained and have as little commonsense and good judgement.

      Until cops and their bosses (cop and political) are held responsible for these things, they’ll keep happening. They need to be held personally civil and criminally liable. They don’t pay a dime in these lawsuits, they must personally pay for it to actually get them to think before they shoot.

      • “They don’t pay a dime in these lawsuits…”
        perhaps. a civil suit can get pretty costly. and then there’s your life being ruined in any number of ways. lots of intangibles as well.
        bad shoot, should be held responsible. but i wouldn’t say they never pay.

  19. God bless Jemel Roberson. Thinking about his family and friends.

    Cops need to be accountable for every round fired just like non cops. This cop should face charges. This is disgusting. From what we know a great person is gone because a cop was trigger happy and shot without knowing who he was shooting at.

  20. This is either gross negligence of ROE training or it’s example of modern training as intended (ie. Shoot first, questions later).

    Either way, no bueno.

  21. Funny how cops in Illinoisistan have looser rules of engagement than combat troops in Iraq. Just more evidence of what happens when you outsource your personal security to overpaid high school dropouts with anger management issues.

    • I’ve been saying that for years, that we hold soldiers in active war zones more accountable when they kill the wrong person than cops patrolling our (mostly) peaceful streets. That’s completely insane

  23. I have no direct evidence about what happened in this instance, but I will say the following as a general statement.

    Dispatcher training must be elevated. Simply stating “man with a gun” is not good enough.

    First step is get the “in house” attorneys out of the way, easier to do in smaller towns than bigger cities.

    Next step is to train the public on how to make a 911 call and give important information without panic.

    The more information a responding cop has, the less chance of having to make a split-second decision when they arrive. 911 calls are a matter of public record as well and can be entered into evidence at trial…for both good and bad decision determinations.

    just sayin..

  24. I don’t think it was a lack of training, he got tunnel vision. That being said, people bitch and moan on here about police training all the time but don’t realize that it varies from department to department. Mine places a heavy emphasis on it, hence why we don’t have BS shootings, while others do not and the public suffers accordingly.

    You want better trained police? Have a federal mandate with a specific lesson plan and number of hours to go along with it, which is great, but be prepared to pay for it with federal grant money. Departments are under staffed and exhausting what budget they have. You want the training, then pay the piper. While you are at it, increase starting salaries to attract more qualified applicants and you won’t run into this problem as frequently either.

    I love TTAG, but damn the commentators on here love to sit back in their chairs and complain without offering any sort of solution. I just gave you one, but seeing how many of you love to complain about any sort of tax dollars going to police, my idea will go over like a lead balloon I’m sure.

    Also, if you’ve never been in a truly stressful situation involving gunfire, don’t be so quick to think that you would have done any better. I’m not saying you can’t tell a good shoot from a bad shoot, what I am saying is that you can talk a big game from behind a keyboard but you just don’t know how you personally will perform until you get there.

    • Training costs money and is the first thing to go when the city administration says, “Cut the budget.” Read what Greg Ellifritz (activeresponsetraining.net) has to say about the poor state of police training. He’s quite bitter about it.

      The NYCPD has 38,000 officers. Suppose the police commissioner wanted each of them to fire one 50 round box of 9 mm every month. I’m sure you can guess how the mayor and city council would react when he announced, “I need another $4 million a year for practice ammo so that my officers learn to hit the bad guys instead of thin air and innocent bystanders.”

      • That’s easy. You want to be a cop? You will furnish enough practice ammo at your own expense to become adequately trained to be unleashed on the public. The definition of “adequately trained” is another subject entirely.

  25. Charge them with murder. This is a much better test case for charging a cop than a career criminal with a knife.

    • Robbins is in CRook County. This is nothing more than agg battery. If it is more, Kimmesha Foxxxxxx isn’t doing the prosecuting.

  26. The episode should be an object lesson in understanding the risk of being mistaken for a threat. As someone noted, we seem to confine ourselves to events where we, the defender, endure a gunfight, we win, the perps are all dead, dying, or have fled. We than calmly call police, identify ourselves, and are decidedly non-threatening when police arrive. The reported incident highlights the caution that the legal defender could end up dead right.

    In the quiet of our homes, we should spin this scenario several different ways, and work out plans of how we could reduce or eliminate the possibility of being mistaken for the bad guy. Waiting until we are in a crowd, involved in a shooting, holding a captive until cops arrive may not be the most prudent approach.

  28. Let’s get rid of that red herring first:
    “A spokeswoman for the Cook County Sheriff’s Office said Roberson had a valid FOID card, but did not have a concealed-carry license.”
    Dude was at his place of employment, armed at his employer’s blessing. No Concealed Carry License required.

    [Sigh] For many, many years, the only people with guns in Chicago were cops and criminals. The very idea of non-LEO citizens lawfully carrying guns is a foreign concept in those parts, and shifting that paradigm is going to take a long time.

    • Well said Curtis…and the local TV stations are airing videos of him playing drums at local churches. Yes he did have a “security” shirt on…

    • “[Sigh] For many, many years, the only people with guns in Chicago were cops and criminals.”

      In Chicago, that’s a distinction without a difference.

      There’s no difference between Jon Burge and Klaus Barbie or Tony Abbate and Michael Brown.

  30. Shitcago is bad for your health, no matter what your race, color, or creed.

    Corrupt through and through.

  32. So, if I was an officer running into this situation, I might just wonder why there were people standing around the bar who were not panicking or trying to get away. At least, I would hope that I would notice that.

  34. If you want to know why our rights are eroding and how the “world’s most popular gun blog” has gone down hill just go through the comments. In the old days the emphasis would be on how to survive the aftermath of self defense in public. Now it’s all about the cops. If this is the public face gun owners show gun rights are doomed. This wasn’t about race. Remember the white suburbanite killed in aftermath of a DGU in Colorado a couple of months ago?

    TTAG’s value is dealing rapidly. Farago got out while the getting was good

    • It likely wasn’t about race… exclusively.

      The victim probably wasn’t shot because he wasn’t White.

      He was probably shot because he wasn’t a cop.

      Like the cop who shot Charles Kinsey, too many cops, and especially the police unions view citizens as nothing more than ballistic gel piggy banks.

      To borrow a line from Weird Al, the Chicago barmaid was “whiter than sour cream”. That didn’t stop Officer Tony Abbate from trying to stomp her to death, or the rank and file from lining up solidly behind him.

  35. If you want a capsule summary of how the police view the public, you need look no farther than the shooting of Charles Kinsey by the North Miami police.

    1. When shot, Kinsey was unarmed, lying on his back, his hands in the air.
    2. Kinsey repeatedly said that his patient was unarmed.
    3. The union claims that the cop who shot Kinsey did so to “protect” him from an autistic man “armed” with… a toy truck.
    4. The union claims that the shooter knew BEFORE “protecting” Kinsey with a 5.56mm bullet to the leg that he was completely innocent, yet have failed to explain why after shooting the innocent Kinsey, he handcuffed him and allowed him to bleed out without treatment for twenty minutes.

    Yeah, I’m totally baffled as to why so many people neither trust nor respect the police…

    • Trust is earned. Mistrust is also earned. Which is easier and more persistent? (That’s a rhetorical question)

    • This is an ugly story, always has been. Not that it matters, I think the cops identified the wrong person as a threat, but had to cover themselves after. Letting the victim bleed out never made sense, and I think they spent the time putting together their story (I have no proof). The worst that could be is the police intentionally let the victim die so there could be no alternate explanation of events.

      Not to engage in “cop bashing”, but incidents like the one you relate is why I do not trust police/law enforcement. I respect their power, and recognize they are professional targets (same as combat military), but I do not trust police/law enforcement.

      • I think that the North Miami cops cuffed Kinsey and let him bleed out without medical treatment for twenty minutes in the hope that there’d only be one story… THEIRS. He ruined that plan by neither bleeding to death nor going into shock and dying.

  37. If you are a Good Guy With A Gun, you may be killed, either by the Bad Guy or a Police Officer. You run this risk by helping others. Of course, you may not have been told of the dangers and accepted the risks, as Law Enforcement or Military have.

    Having said that, Jemel was a HERO who should NOT have been killed.

    Here are the facts. You tell me if this was a justified police shooting.

    “Jemel Roberson was wearing a cap and sweatshirt that had the word “Security” on them when he was fatally shot by a Midlothian police officer while Roberson was trying to subdue a suspect early Sunday at a Robbins bar, a man who said he was working with him at the bar told the Tribune.

    Dorian Myrickes, 43, who said he was wounded during the chaotic early-morning incident at the bar, also said the Midlothian officer did warn Roberson to drop his gun but fired at him within “not even five seconds” of the warning.

    But Myrickes, who spoke Thursday morning from a suburban hospital bed, said another officer at the scene rebuked the Midlothian cop after Roberson’s shooting.

    “One cop … he said, ‘Man, you didn’t have to do that, you didn’t have to do that. We know these guys. We told you they’re security,’’’ said Myrickes, who said he was close to passing out from his injury when he heard that statement.”

    – https://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/daily-southtown/news/ct-met-jemel-roberson-security-guard-shooting-witness-20181115-story.html

  38. Soooooooooooooo many comments. most well said. Any man with a gun in public has had these thoughts. What if….. Well , I am trying to come up with some fast and easy ways to identify myself as a “good guy” in case I find myself in a similar situation. Yet I wonder, will a cop take the time the assess the situation correctly? I am still a fan of common sense “cool” policing displayed by sheriff Andy Taylor of the Andy Griffith show. Yes I know it was the slow south and it was TV, but there was some real truth to life in his ability to handle potentially violent situations….without a gun…but with respect, awareness of surroundings, knowledge of the “beat” and doing so with no fear. The brain is supposed to be the most important weapon the cop has with him.

Comments are closed.