Police Officer Preparation & Law Enforcement Resource - Archive

I will post more as it becomes available.

A man carjacked a lady this morning. They were hit by a cement truck on the getaway. Sadly the carjacking victim died. On a happier note, an armed citizen who wittnessed the whole incendent, shot and killed the carjacker as he tried to get away. Excellent.

UPDATE, damn that was fast! (www.11alive.com)

A suspected carjacker and his victim were killed and a major intersection closed to traffic Monday morning in Acworth. Police are continuing to piece together details of the wreck at Cobb Parkway (US41) at Acworth Drive and the suspected shooting of the carjacker by a citizen.

According to police, a woman driving a Toyota Tundra was carjacked Monday morning from a gas station at Highway 41 and Upper 92/Lake Acworth Drive in Cobb County. The carjacker sped away from the scene and, when he attempted to turn onto Acworth Drive, the SUV was broadsided by a cement truck. The young mother who remained in the SUV was killed at the scene.

The carjacker fled from the vehicle, but a man who witnessed the carjacking and followed the vehicle gave chase on foot. According to police, the citizen and the carjacker got into a gunfight at which time the citizen shot and killed the carjacker.

The citizen, who has not been identified, has been taken into custody for questioning by Cobb County police. Authorities from Acworth were at the scene to investigate because the carjacking suspect fits the description of a man wanted in a rape case.

I need more details before I decide if I am pleased with the actions of the citizen. As I understand this case, the car-jacker was just trying to get away. That the article says a 'gunfight' broke out - which of course means that the suspect was armed with a firearm.

I think it is extremely dangerous for a citizen to give chase to an armed criminal. Hell - it is dangerous for a cop to do it sometimes. ;)

If the citizen saw something like the car-jacker headed toward an occupied vehicle, and acted to aid those that might be in danger, I have no problem with that type of involvement - as long as the citizen knows and accepts the risks.

If the car-jacker didn't seem to pose an immediate threat to anyone, the chasing of him by someone other than law enforcement seems at best foolhardy and dangerously close to vigilantism.

In any event - even if the armed citizen is found to be in violation of no laws and local law enforcement determines that he acted properly, the mainstream (anti-gun) media will bury this story quickly. If the citizen ends up charged with a crime of some sort, the media will point to it as a reason why people shouldn't own guns.

I wish he had been there at the beginning when the lady was being car-jacked .... rather than at the end, after she was dead.

I need more details before I decide if I am pleased with the actions of the citizen.
Well put!

I'm glad the fool will no longer take up time and taxpayers money for his trial and incarceration, though.

I fail to see how this thread could POSSIBLY be labeled as "Excellent!".

I fail to see how this thread could POSSIBLY be labeled as "Excellent!".


Carjacker and possible rapist smoked is pretty excellent to me.

You know how this is going to play out though.

If the car-jacker didn't seem to pose an immediate threat to anyone :confused:

:confused:I know his action of car-jacking puts people in terrible jeopardy and he is certainly a threat while in the commission of that action. What I am talking about is that the accident has happened, the woman has been left behind either dead or dying and he is trying to flee the area.

The fact that he just got done committing an illegal act that was very dangerous to all around him, does not necessarily mean that he is curently an immediate threat to anyone. It all goes back to Tennessee v Gardner for cops. You can't simply shoot a guy for what he has 'done' - you have to be able to demonstrate that he is currently an immediate threat.

Since the citizen, well intentioned he might be, chose to act like a police officer, I personally would hold him to the same regulations that govern the police's actions. If he were running after the guy to get a better description and a good direction of travel, and maybe even to see where the suspect was going ...... all with the intention to notify the police and have the guy apprehended, and the guy turns and shoots at the citizen, I think he is OK to return fire (that is an all new "immediate threat" and has to be viewed seperately than the car-jacking) But if the car jacker is running in the direction of a corn field with no one around and the citizen pulls a gun and hollars, "Stop or I'll shoot." and the car-jacker turns and shoots at said citizen, the issue is not as clear cut.

Carjacker and possible rapist smoked is pretty excellent to me.
A carjacking and horrific accident and, rather than being a good witness and rendering aid, he followed the guy and got into a shootout with him. Alone. That's not excellent. It just meant he spent 8 of his 9 lives, as well as put the lives of others around him at risk.

I fail to see how this thread could POSSIBLY be labeled as "Excellent!".


Dude, just saw the avatar, and for a QUICK, BRIEF SECOND I THOUGHT YOU WERE......oh, never mind.

Dude, just saw the avatar, and for a QUICK, BRIEF SECOND I THOUGHT YOU WERE......oh, never mind.
:p
What ever are you talking about big boy?

I think it can be articulated that the citizen saw the carjacking and the gun and it was probably reasonable to believe he would carjack again. That is probably articulable as an imminent threat.

If a cop did it I don't think it would be a problem. Since it's a citizen who isn't responsible for apprehending carjackers he may be in some legal trouble. Did he do the right thing? I think so without a doubt. Was it the legal thing to do? Possible and especially dependant on his state's laws. If it goes anywhere I hope a grand jury kicks it.

The fact that he just got done committing an illegal act that was very dangerous to all around him, does not necessarily mean that he is curently an immediate threat to anyone. It all goes back to Tennessee v Gardner for cops. You can't simply shoot a guy for what he has 'done' - you have to be able to demonstrate that he is currently an immediate threat.I assume you meant Garner, not Gardner.

Regardless, Garner was (and is) primarily looked at to determine the constitutionality of using deadly force to prevent the escape of an apparently unarmed suspect, not someone that was just witnessed carjacking someone (a life felony here, on it's own), fleeing, causing the death of his victim, and then who KNOWS what else. We KNOW the suspect was armed. In Garner, Hymon was 'reasonably sure' that Garner was NOT armed, prior to shooting.

Officers can not resort to deadly force unless they "have probable cause ... to believe that the suspect [has committed a felony and] poses a threat to the safety of the officers or a danger to the community if left at large." [471 U.S. 1, 7]

In this case, did probable cause exist to believe that the ARMED fleeing felon posed a threat of serious injury or death to others if he was allowed to escape? You bet. He already carjacked someone, which resulted in a death.

Yes, I understand we weren't referring to an officer here (it was a citizen shoot), but I'm addressing the Garner/fleeing felon angle.

Then again, neither of us were present, so all bets are off :) Could have been an over zealous citizen, or it could have been a legitimate shoot. Time may tell, who knows.

Dude, just saw the avatar, and for a QUICK, BRIEF SECOND I THOUGHT YOU WERE......oh, never mind.


Yea, I did one of these..... :eek:

Better update from WWW.AJC.com

Kimberly D. Boyd took her son to preschool Monday morning, then dropped by a bank before heading to her office in north Cobb County.

Minutes later, her routine was shattered, and sometime before 9:30 a.m. she was struggling for her life with a carjacker as her Toyota Sequoia raced south on U.S. 41. The kidnapping ended with the 30-year-old Acworth woman dead and the carjacker fatally shot by a passer-by.

Boyd died instantly when her SUV was broadsided by a cement truck, police said. Within seconds, the man driving Boyd's car was also dead — shot by Shawn Roberts, 31, who had seen Boyd fighting the man and followed the car, police said.

"She was fighting for her life," Roberts, who lives in Acworth, told WAGA-TV.

Roberts told police he was driving north on U.S. 41 about 9:30 a.m. when he saw a man beating a woman outside the SUV, just south of the Lake Allatoona bridge. He stopped and turned around on the four-lane road to help the woman, said Cobb Police Cpl. Dana Pierce.

The carjacker pushed the woman back into the SUV and took off, with the doors still open. Roberts followed about two miles to Lake Acworth Drive, where the crash occurred, Pierce said.

As Boyd's car turned east on Lake Acworth Drive it was struck by the cement truck.

Witness Bobby Williams said the truck had just started away from a traffic light and was traveling no more than 10 mph when it hit the SUV.

Williams, owner of A2Z Auto Service at 4356 North Cobb Parkway, said he saw Roberts get out of his 2004 black Dodge Ram pickup and run toward the accident scene wearing a leather shoulder holster.

"He looked official," Williams said, explaining that he thought Roberts might be a plain-clothes police officer. "He hollered at [the carjacker], 'Stay where you are. Stay where you are.'"

The carjacker ran toward a Raceway gas station on the corner and Roberts chased him. He told police the man turned a gun toward him, and he had to do something.

"I shot and killed a man today," Roberts told WAGA-TV. "I don't feel good about it, but if I hadn't have done something somebody else would have died."

Williams said he heard at least four, perhaps five, gunshots.

"He [the carjacker] was five feet in front of me when he got hit," Williams said. "On TV, all that flailing around that goes on is not what happened. He dropped like a sack of potatoes."

Monday night Cobb police identified the dead man as Brian Clark, 25, who has family in Acworth. Police did not say whether Clark lived in the area.

No charges were filed against the cement truck driver, who was not identified.

Police questioned Roberts, who they said was not an off-duty officer, before releasing him without filing charges.

"All I can say right now is to offer my condolences of the family of the woman," Roberts said when reached at his home Monday night in Acworth. "I'm postponing any comments just for a few days," he added, saying he was acting on legal advice.

Boyd's family could not be reached Monday.

Police are still unsure where the carjacking began, Pierce said. They are tracing possible routes from Allatoona Truck Rental, the business Boyd operated on Cherokee Street in Acworth, according to public records. Police said she left her office shortly after arriving there Monday morning. The first 911 call on the crash and shooting came in about

9:30 a.m.

Police also were investigating the possibility that the carjacker's gun had been taken in a robbery, rape and carjacking in Acworth last Tuesday, said Cobb robbery squad Lt. Tom Arnold.

"We're looking into that and whether the suspect in this assault is the same as in last week's attack in Acworth," Arnold said.

Acworth police spokesman Wayne Dennard said his department also is investigating the possibility that the man killed Monday morning was the suspect in a rape last Tuesday.

In last week's attack a woman was assaulted as she left home and was forced inside, where she was beaten and raped before being forced to drive to a nearby bank to get money from an ATM, Dennard said. The woman instead ran inside the bank and her assailant drove away in her car, which was later found abandoned, he said.

Late Monday, Boyd's SUV was driven on a flatbed into the Cobb crime lab impound building next to the medical examiner's office where the bodies of Boyd and her assailant were taken, Arnold said.

Fingerprints were taken from the dead man Monday, Arnold said. Autopsies on Boyd and the man are to be conducted today. Police will compare the dead man's fingerprints and DNA to evidence recovered from last week's attack, he said.

Staff writers Clint Williams and David A. Markiewicz and staff researcher Nisa Asokan contributed to this article.

I fail to see how this thread could POSSIBLY be labeled as "Excellent!".

Love the avatar! Thanks for making me laugh this morning. I owe you rep. I hafta spread it first.

Lily

I'm agreeing with RO56 and Valor on this issue. Rep sent.

I really need to read the whole reply. :rolleyes: :D

Ironhead said:

If he were running after the guy to get a better description and a good direction of travel, and maybe even to see where the suspect was going ...... all with the intention to notify the police and have the guy apprehended, and the guy turns and shoots at the citizen, I think he is OK to return fire (that is an all new "immediate threat" and has to be viewed seperately than the car-jacking)

According to Cobb County Police, that is exactly what happened. If you would like, I will relay a personal experience with the local media here via PM.