{"id":1098,"date":"2012-05-29T17:58:31","date_gmt":"2012-05-29T22:58:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/?p=1098"},"modified":"2012-05-29T17:58:31","modified_gmt":"2012-05-29T22:58:31","slug":"suicide-by-cop-the-sequel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/?p=1098","title":{"rendered":"Suicide by Cop; The Sequel"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>One of the first blogs written by us [Fawkes-Lee & Ryan] (two years ago) was entitled \u201cSuicide by Cop\u201d.\u00a0 It garnered more comments than anything we have written since.<\/p>\n

The blog is about three incidents in which law enforcement came close to emptying their ammo cartridges on a particular suspect.\u00a0 One of those suspects was Randall D. Kimsey, 50, Ogden, IA.\u00a0 This past week his family filed a lawsuit against the police who killed him.<\/p>\n

In 2010 we wrote:<\/p>\n

This past May police were called to a residence in Ogden, IA after a neighbor accused the man in the residence of making harassing phone calls.\u00a0 When police arrived at the residence in question, the accused answered the door with a handgun.\u00a0 The reactive police force went into panic mode and cordoned off the house, evacuated neighbors, and after a ceremonial waiting period, entered the house.<\/p>\n

\u201cRandall D. Kimsey 50, had been suicidal in the past and authorities were worried that he had taken prescription drugs,\u201d The standard operating procedure for a suicidal citizen appears to be what occurred next.\u00a0 A SWAT team entered his home in full gear and shot Kimsey to death.\u00a0 Police took the moral road of shooting Kimsey to protect him from committing suicide.<\/p>\n

In a recent Des Moines Register article, more facts come to the surface.\u00a0 When a sheriff\u2019s deputy went to the door to make the contact about harassing phone calls, Randall Kimsey was asleep. The deputy \u201cdemanded\u201d that Kimsey\u2019s wife wake him up.\u00a0 When Kimsey came to the door one of the officers yelled, \u201cgun!\u201d\u00a0 Kimsey went back to bed.<\/p>\n

This entire episode was ridiculous if it hadn\u2019t been for the death of Randall Kimsey.\u00a0 Kimsey\u2019s wife, who obviously didn\u2019t feel in danger, was persuaded to leave the house and \u201cwas taken into custody\u201d.\u00a0 The neighborhood was evacuated.\u00a0 Law enforcement attempted to negotiate with Kimsey.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 The man has every right to own a gun.\u00a0 All he did was come to the door with a gun in his hand.\u00a0 Maybe I\u2019m missing all the facts, but there was no need for law enforcement to enter the house (without a warrant \u2013 there was certainly enough time to acquire one) and set off percussion flash bombs \u2013 several, and expect a man to not be afraid for his life.\u00a0 I really believe anyone in that predicament might shift into a survival mode.<\/p>\n

The SWAT team went upstairs and deployed another flash bomb and Kimsey came out of the bedroom while \u201callegedly carrying a gun.\u201d\u00a0 He suffered 14 bullet wounds.\u00a0 \u201cSix officers left at least 33 shell casings at the scene.\u201d\u00a0 Maybe this is not a good choice of words, but it was definitely \u201coverkill\u201d!<\/p>\n

I hope Lori Kimsey wins this lawsuit.\u00a0 Probably, it will be settled out of court.\u00a0 But law enforcement training and decision-making needs improvement.\u00a0 The CATO Institute has published a booklet [white paper] entitled \u201cOverkill:\u00a0 The Rise of Paramilitary Police Raids in America<\/a>.\u201d\u00a0 I don\u2019t expect everyone to run out and purchase a copy, but the opening paragraph in the Executive Summary says most of what you may already know:<\/p>\n

Americans have long maintained that a man\u2019s home is his castle and that he has the right to defend it from unlawful intruders.\u00a0 Unfortunately, that aright may be disappearing.\u00a0 Over the last 25 years, America has seen a disturbing militarization of its civilian law enforcement, along with a dramatic and unsettling rise in the use of paramilitary police units (most commonly called Special Weapons and Tactics, or SWAT) for routine police work.<\/p>\n

There is so much wrong with this story.\u00a0 And the sheriff doesn\u2019t help himself by stating that he shouldn\u2019t comment at this point, but that he has \u201ca lot of things that come right to my head based on what you\u2019re telling me.\u201d\u00a0 It almost sounds premeditated.<\/p>\n

I said it in 2010, and I\u2019ll say it again:\u00a0 \u201cToday\u2019s modern police officer has a Glock in the holster, mace, flashlight, handcuffs, radio, tactical gloves, ammo, combat knives, and batons.\u00a0 SWAT teams are not afraid to use those \u201ctools\u2019 when communication breaks down.\u00a0 It\u2019s too bad that patience is not strapped to that utility belt as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 2010 blog is posted online yet at:\u00a0 https:\/\/iowappa.com\/?p=103<\/a> Suicide by Cop<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There is so much wrong with this story. Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[264,17],"tags":[399,402,144,401,400,36],"class_list":["post-1098","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fairness","category-issues","tag-suicide-by-cop","tag-cato-institute","tag-des-moines-register","tag-lori-kimsey","tag-randall-d-kimsey","tag-swat"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1098","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1098"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1098\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1347,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1098\/revisions\/1347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1098"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1098"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1098"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}