Friday, August 05, 2005
Police RhetIraq: Chiefs of Police & Muslim Comment
Who: International Association of Chiefs of Police & Ibrahim Hooper (Council on American-Islamic Relations Spokesman)
Source: Washington Post
Quotes: The International Association of Chiefs of Police, which represents the heads of police departments in the United States and across the world, has issued new guidelines saying that officers who confront a suicide bomber should shoot the suspect in the head.
The police group's guidelines also say the threat to officers does not have to be "imminent," as police training traditionally teaches. Officers do not have to wait until a suspected bomber makes a move, another traditional requirement for police to use deadly force. An officer just needs to have a "reasonable basis" to believe that the suspect can detonate a bomb, the guidelines say.
The Israeli training of British and American law enforcement officials makes some groups ask whether the police are going too far. The tension is especially pronounced among Muslim community leaders, who are deeply suspicious of Israel because of the country's long-standing conflict with the Palestinians.
"The London situation where an innocent man was shot and killed was based on Israeli procedure, and I don't think that we want to be replicating the actions of a foreign government engaged in a brutal occupation of another people," said Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. "It sends the wrong message to the Muslim world."
Source: Washington Post
Quotes: The International Association of Chiefs of Police, which represents the heads of police departments in the United States and across the world, has issued new guidelines saying that officers who confront a suicide bomber should shoot the suspect in the head.
The police group's guidelines also say the threat to officers does not have to be "imminent," as police training traditionally teaches. Officers do not have to wait until a suspected bomber makes a move, another traditional requirement for police to use deadly force. An officer just needs to have a "reasonable basis" to believe that the suspect can detonate a bomb, the guidelines say.
The Israeli training of British and American law enforcement officials makes some groups ask whether the police are going too far. The tension is especially pronounced among Muslim community leaders, who are deeply suspicious of Israel because of the country's long-standing conflict with the Palestinians.
"The London situation where an innocent man was shot and killed was based on Israeli procedure, and I don't think that we want to be replicating the actions of a foreign government engaged in a brutal occupation of another people," said Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. "It sends the wrong message to the Muslim world."
