At 6:58 PM -0500 7/23/01, Jim Choate wrote:
On Mon, 23 Jul 2001, Sandy Sandfort wrote:
Oh really? Try that experiment on your own car.
Actually I've seen windows break (and broken my fair share) on cars multiple times. Some from wrecks, some from gunshot (a .38 will bounce off a windshield for example) some from other things. I even once had a D based rocket fired directly into the windshield of a 68 Cougar, it was much larger and going a hell of a lot faster than a fire exstinguisher. It didn't go through the window. Didn't even break it.
It's not size, it's Mass. What size was the extinguisher? It wasn't mentioned in any of the reports I saw, but I was picturing a rather large (25 pound PKP or CO2 sized extinguishers) one. If that is the case, it contains rather more energy, even when thrown, than a .38.
Side windows shatter into a thousand pieces at the touch of a center punch. A fire extinguisher is decidedly overkill for the job.
A center puch (which focuses the force into a small area) isn't a fire extstinguisher. And windows are DESIGNED to break into a thousand little
No, it isn't. It's a lot less force concentrated into a small area.
In any event, the test--at least in the US--for the use of deadly force includes the concepts of reasonable fear of death OR GREAT BODILY INJURY.
A fire extinguisher stuck in a window does none of the above.
Really. Ever been hit by one of them? Given the mass of one (assuming it was one of the bigger ones), it most certainly could cause bodily injury--but that isn't really the point. And let's not even talk about what could have happened would the neck of a pressurized extinguisher break. You are in a crowd of hostile people. You are there because you were ordered up by your government, not because it's part of your normal job. You are young. You are more than a little scared (ever been in the middle of a protest that is running up against police force? It's not a peaceful situation). Suddenly some masked nitwit throws something big and heavy at you. You don't know what it is. You've been hearing shit all day like "Revolution is the only solution", you have no idea what these people are up to. You've read shit on the internet about these "black blocks" and "street actions", and your nervous. And all of the sudden the window shatters (maybe you get hit with glass, maybe you don't, doesn't matter). Thing is, *you* didn't initiate force. The masked man did. And he's not wearing some sort of goofy holloween mask, he's dressed like a freaking bank robber. It is very easy to understand why a shit scared 20 year old started shooting. It's hard to understand why supposedly rational people condemn him and wish to excuse the actions of some idiot hooligan. Free speech stops with *THREATENING* others, much less any sort of initiation of violence. Did the kid in the Mask deserve to die? Yes. Not so much for throwing the extinguisher, but for terminal stupidity.
Believe it or not, being blinded by a swarm of glass shards is considered great bodily injury.
I doubt seriously anyone would be blinded (and I'm blind in one eye from being struck with a 2x4 so I can speak from 1st person, yes it's great bodily injury. It's not justification for lethal force).
It is at minimum because once someone in a protest starts something like that, it usually grows. Further more, getting glass in ones eyes *CAN* blind you, depending on the force with which it hits gets in, etc. Glass, expecially in the eyes, is very difficult for a doctor to find and extract, and it's *really* sharp, so if it gets to the back of the eye (where the nerves are), I can see it doing a great deal of damage.