Darwin Lives! (Bad Guy Dies)

Amazing shot cited as self-defense -- poop!
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer (one of the most egrigiously leftist newspapers in the nation, right up there with the LA Times) has inadvertently published a pro-gun article.

The SPD (Seattle Police Department) Band of Merry Men not only manage to shoot a shooter, not only shoot the gun out of his hands, but in doing so jammed the cylinder of his revolver so that it was incapable of firing a return round.


Let's see this in slow-action (text only):

At a news conference at police headquarters Wednesday, (Deputy Chief Clark) Kimerer said investigators learned that the gunman had had an argument with a female friend shortly before the shooting.

Afterward, Kimerer said, the young man walked down Broadway and got into a fight with another man. At some point, a gun he was carrying fell to the ground.

Kimerer said the gunman simply reholstered the weapon behind his back.

A merchant called 911, as did others.

Two East Precinct patrol officers arrived in less than two minutes, he said.

The two officers approached the young man near a bus stop. Though the man was suspected of being armed, the officers did not see a weapon, so at first they planned to restrain him.

When the man turned to face them, the officers ordered him to get on the ground and show his hands.

The warning, Kimerer said, was heard by several witnesses.

Instead of complying, "the suspect reached behind his back with both hands," he said.

Out came a revolver, police officers said.

The officers ordered the man to drop the gun. Instead, police said, he squared up against them. "The officers returned fire in response to that deadly threat," Kimerer said.

Both officers, armed with Glock .40 caliber semi-automatic handguns, fired. One fired four shots; the second, three shots.

One of those bullets ended up in the gunman's gun -- jammed into the cylinder of his revolver. The department released photos Wednesday showing the cracked brass of a bullet shoved out of the rear of one chamber.

Fire medics arrived but were unable to revive the man.

What lessons can we take away from this incident?

• Seattle cops can miss a man, whatever it takes, even unto hitting the gun instead of the shooter.
• You hit what you're looking at
• Seattle reporters are incapable of writing paragraphs consisting of more than one sentence.

Never mind that last. These guys write in two-inch columns; to them, one sentence LOOKS like a paragraph. Typical.

The thing is, they got their man and made good press. It's always important to look at The Big Picture, and here it is:

We're happy that the SPD managed to (accidently) take out the bad guy before he could kill anybody. And we're grateful to the P.I. for providing such interesting imagery and story.

It's probably petty to criticize the cops for hitting what they weren't suppose to be shooting at, and the paper for writing that's even crappier than mine.

But you know, that's what we call a 'target rich environment'. Some of us just don't have the discipline to let this trouser-load pass without comment.