A criminal is a person who has committed a crime.

This man had committed crimes.

Mr. Scott had been arrested about 10 times, mostly for failing to pay child support or show up for court hearings, according to The Post and Courier newspaper of Charleston. He was arrested in 1987 on an assault and battery charge and convicted in 1991 of possession of a bludgeon, the newspaper reported. Mr. Scott’s brother, Anthony, said he believed Mr. Scott had fled from the police on Saturday because he owed child support.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/08/us...eath.html?_r=0

As mentioned prior;

Handcuffing shot suspects is protocol followed by all officers, this is no different to any other in America.

Don't disagree with the placing of the taser bit, but the can't be arsed to arrest him attitude was highly unlikely.

Maybe you should get your facts straight first, there is no self defense argument to make when the guy is running from you and he may have had warrants for non payment of child support. Your post is so full of misinformation its shocking

That's the point, i didn't say a single word about innocent people.

When you quote somebody, you really should quote them, not add words.

Ah.. thanks for the link to his heinous previous crimes.. The policeman obviously had no option but to take down this deadly violent criminal... Obviously he was fearful that the suspect would perform the mythical double loopback face kick and had to shoot him in the back instead of turning up at his house later and tasering him in the face as is more his style.

All gun crime is vile and shocking however when the person who should be upholding the law appears to be the one committing the criminal offense it is very worrying.

The question here that must be answered (by the policeman) is did he believe that the man running away posed a threat of harm to other people.

If he had just ran from and attacked a policeman, and possibly tried to take one of his weapons from him, well, i guess it is up to the courts now...

I'm so glad our police don't have guns, just imagine the carnage.
This poor man was murdered by a lying scumbag who deserves to get a life sentence at the very lest.
The cop had previous disciplinary warnings for using excessive force. He is clearly unfit for the job, he get what he deserves in prison.

Is there carnage in all the other European countries which routinely arm their officers?

Imagine all the abuses that arent recorded by passers by. bastards.

There have certainly been some similar recent cases in the Netherlands.

Surely that depends on whether or not he was covered as a driver by the previous owner's insurance. As I understand it, he had taken possession of the car only the week before & it was still insured in the previous owner's name. Hence "in the process of &c".

Other countries don't have the appalling crime rate that some areas of the US have nor have they a unacceptable percentage of police officers being murdered by gun toting crims of all ethnic hues and minorities.

It' would be interesting to discover the time in history when France, Australia and Sweden thought it prudent to arm all their officers, and at the same time Norway , UK and New Zealand thought it wholly unnecessary.

Thats a big assumption to make isnt it? The guy may have been well known among officers so even before a routine ID they wouodno his history

Would Slager then have casually turned his back and walked back to his car?

"Convicted violent felon"? He had a single conviction for assault & battery, which is not a felony, dating back to 1987, when he would have been 21 or 22 years old.

"...had warrants for his arrest". His family thought there might have been a warrant out for his arrest for non-payment of child maintenance. It now appears that there were in fact no warrants out for his arrest at the time that he was killed & therefore no reason for the police officer to think there was one.

Where is this "the self defence argument" that you think can be made for what happened? How would trying to disarm the officer signal an intent to kill him in your opinion? If I point a taser at you & you try to disarm me in order to avoid getting tasered, is that a sign that you want to kill me? (Or even if the weapon in question were a gun.)

"...questions would be asked. Why did you chose to allow a known violent fugitive who was wanted on warrant go away and interact with the public?" There was not the slightest reason to believe that Mr Scott was about to cause physical harm to members of the public. And indeed, if there had been any such reason, he would not now be facing a murder charge.

Of course we can't be 100% certain that evidence won't emerge subsequently that might justify a re-interpretation of the video but as of this moment I fail to see in what way "there is more to this than meets the eye".

Last time he was arrested, on minor charges, the cop would have been 9 years old.

So what if the policeman himself wasn't in any danger, there is still the possibility that this was self defence. It remains to be seen whether Scott's outstanding warrants were for trivial or violent offences, that could have influenced the decision to shoot.

How old is the officer and how old is Scott? At any rate it doesn't matter, police officers quite often do know lots of local people even if they haven't personally arrested them, it's part of their job to know the area and interact with the public. Of course this may not be the case here, I am simply pointing out that there are a few unknowns at this stage. Murder is arguably the most serious offence on the books, and I'm not going to condemn another human being for being guilty of it until I'm convinced beyond reasonable doubt he is guilty. From what I've seen it looks like he's probably guilty, but "probably" is not past the threshold of reasonable doubt and I also don't have all the available evidence.

For as long as black and white co-exist on this planet, there will never, ever be peace and harmony.

Please see #541 above. Mr Scott's police & court records are in the public domain. It is being reported that there were no outstanding warrants at the time of his death, whether trivial or non-trivial. His family surmised that there was a warrant out for non-payment of child maintenance but it appears that they were mistaken.

He had a single conviction for a violent offence in 1987, viz assault & battery, which is not a felony, & no documented history of violence since then. His court record has been mostly contempt of court charges relating to non-payment of child maintenance.

I think it is vanishingly unlikely that the police officer's decision to kill Mr Scott was in any way influenced by what is on public record of Mr Scott's forensic history. And, if the officer was in fact aware of something in Mr Scott's police record that we are not aware of & that rendered it necessary to kill him (in "self"defence) to prevent him from escaping, why is that officer now facing a charge of first degree murder?

Yes if you were a police officer legitimately pointing a gun at me and I tried to disarm you, you'd be completely justified in thinking that I was attempting to kill you.

How? Either he knew who he was or he didn't.
Situation a) he knew who Scott was and knew he had warrants for violent offences (of which he had none). Why then go back to your car calmly and not arrest on the spot? Dangerous and irresponsible. Also unlikely due to not having any outstanding warranys.
Situation b) he knew who he was, didn't know about any warrants. No cause to think you are at risk from someone running away so no self defence no reason to shoot to kill.
Situation c) he didn't know who he was. No cause to think you are at risk thus no cause to shoot to kill.

It will still be seen by the public as a cold blooded execution of someone who had done no wrong, by a trigger happy psychopath, operating on behalf of the state.

Which is exactly what it is, and why he has been charged with first degree murder.

Of course, handcuffing a corpse makes him look even more of an insane bastard than he did to start with. I think the protocol will be lost on any decent person with an ounce of human feeling.

Scott had outstanding warrants so let's not pretend that the officer walked up to a random person on the street and shot them. There were a chain of events that led to this, justified or not.

It is also likely he has been charged with first degree murder for a couple of reasons. Firstly to appease the public and secondly because it can be downgraded by the court whereas manslaughter can't be upgraded. A couple of us have suggested it will turn out to be the lesser charge, as its unlikely they will prove all elements of murder. Of course I could be wrong.

You can blame american police procedure for the handcuffing thing but can't blame the officer, as he was following protocol.