Police shoot 6 rounds at unarmed teenager

Randy_Quench

Active member
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/07/tyler-comstock-shot-dead-police-iowa-state-university_n_4234039.html

On Monday, police in Iowa shot dead an unarmed teenager after a family dispute, and his relatives are now demanding answers.

According to The Associated Press, Tyler Comstock, 19, of Boone, was fatally shot the morning of Nov. 4 after a car chase with police ended on Iowa State University's Central Campus.

Explaining how the teen found himself in a face-off with police, Comstock's family says that the events of that fateful morning had been triggered by an argument between the young man and his father.

“He just wanted a pack of cigarettes, and his dad wouldn’t buy him a pack of cigarettes and he freaked out,” the teen's mother, Shari Comstock, told the Iowa State Daily.

After the feud, Comstock reportedly got into his father's car and took off.

That's when his dad, James Comstock, decided to call the police to report his vehicle stolen.

“He took off with my truck. I call the police, and they kill him,” James Comstock told the Des Moines Register. It is believed that the truck belonged to the lawn care company for which the father and son both worked.

After James Comstock's call, police were soon on the teenager's tail. Comstock, however, reportedly refused to stop his vehicle and rammed into an officer's car. Police then pursued him to Iowa State University's campus in Ames.

Eventually surrounded by cops, Comstock finally came to a stop on the school's Central Campus, but the young man reportedly ignored orders to turn his engine off.

It was then that a police officer named Adam McPherson is said to have fired six shots into the truck. The teen, believed to have been unarmed, died from two gunshot wounds, per the AP.

Comstock's family is flabbergasted as to how a minor family dispute turned into an unspeakable tragedy.

“So he didn’t shut the damn truck off, so let’s fire six rounds at him? We’re confused, and we don’t understand,” Comstock’s step-grandfather, Gary Shepley, told the Register.

According to dispatch audio obtained by the news outlet, an unidentified police staffer suggested on two different occasions during the chase that officers back off their pursuit of Comstock. (Listen to the dispatch at the Des Moines Register.)

“I don’t understand [why this happened] when I blatantly heard them say, ‘Hey, we know who this is. It’s a kid, back off.’ I don’t get it,” Comstock's mom told the Iowa State Daily after listening to the audio tape of the dispatch.

Police say Comstock may have put lives in danger when he drove through the university and that student pedestrians had to dodge his truck "to avoid being run over," per the AP.

However, his mother questioned the officers' actions and how they may have affected the situation.

“Why the hell would they chase him into campus with all the people?” she told the State Daily. “Tyler would never hurt anybody, ever. He was just a scared child. He’s pretty rational when he calms down.”

TL;DR

Kids dad calls the cops to teach his kid a lesson for taking his truck without permission- cops shoot 6 rounds at the kid because he refused to turn off the trucks engine.
 
Title is misleading, he was armed with a 3500lb vehicle which he apparently rammed police cars with. I demand a recount, OP.

 
I actually witnessed this happen. While it is a fairly ridiculous event - and extremely unfortunate that he was killed in the process, something needed to be done to stop him.

What the article left out, was that when the kid initially fled from the cops, the truck he was driving had a trailer attached with lawn equipment in it. He drove so aggressively that it unhitched the trailer and flung it at a pregnant woman waiting to cross the street. She was nearly hit. Then he proceeded on to campus, between class times. It's homecoming week on campus here, and we set up a lot of displays in central campus honoring the university, he tore through the central campus grounds where all the students walk and look at the huge displays. He hit a couple of the displays and nearly ran over several students, all the while ramming into campus security cars and Ames Police cars.

I can only imagine how terrible the guy's father feels - but the kid took it to an extreme when he fled.

 
Well the media is probably leaving out multiple details. He was obviously a hot head. Who's to say he wasn't going to drive into the police officers and kill them with the truck? Why should they die because this kid was an idiot?
 
Americans think everything must be solved by guns. It is not normal how many people are shot in the US every year, especially by the police.
 
Why do they keep calling him a "child"? He's 19. He wouldn't stop for the police, wouldn't turn off his car, rammed officers, etc which is pretty fucking stupid on his part but he definitely didn't deserve to get shot, sounds like the police officer panicked and didn't know what else to do.
 
Obviously not that well trained...

Guy was obviously a hot head. If your kid has to ask you to buy him a pack of cigarettes, he works for you and when you get into an argument he steals your truck...Not the best parenting...

But sucks that someone died and everything got so out of hand over seemingly nothing.
 
welcome to america.

someone rams me, cops ask wtf is going on here.

someone rams a cop, surrounded and shot.

i'm not about to say the kid was innocent, but he also didn't deserve to die. when the situation is diffused, there's nothing he can possibly do and zero threat, shooting to kill seems a little over the top.

doesn't make me trust what cops will do in a situation where there actually is a threat and innocent lives around that hang in the balance...
 
Thats why he got shot. The MULTIPLE cop cars that were chasing him thought he was dangerous, probably because he didn't pull over when there was only one cop car going after him. This could have been easily prevented if he didn't start a chase.

Btw cops aren't allowed to shoot at tires.
 
Thats why he got shot. The MULTIPLE cop cars that were chasing him thought he was dangerous, probably because he didn't pull over when there was only one cop car going after him. This could have been easily prevented if he didn't start a chase.

Btw cops aren't allowed to shoot at tires.
 
The police are really starting to get power hunger, there's no way he felt endangerment for his life unless he was in the car who got rammed and still 6 shots is ridiculous. They give police takers for a reason. This one pisses me off but not nearly as bad as the one when the cop killed the dog, will find & post video soon.
 
this is the most unnecessary, white trash, idiotic shit I've heard all week. it's awful that he's dead over something so fucking stupid, but then again what do you expect when you're in a truck ramming police cars... a lot more lives were at risk the second he decided to be a jackass.
 
that really sounds like GTA V

>accidentally bumps cop car

>gets out of car

>unarmed

>get shot at multiple times

>try to drive away

>get's 3 helicopters on me

>shoots out tires

>on highly dense highway

>shoots me dead
 
Grumpy_Cat-Good.jpg
 
Aren't police trained to use techniques to stop moving vehicles with their owin vehicles? This isn't a video game, but there's plenty of youtube footage of car chases where officers either cause a fleeing car to spin out by nudging it sideways or simply blocade a stopped car with their patrol cars. If the kid was already stopped they could have easily blocked him in, thereby taking away his capabilty to usr his "deadly weapon". Police cruisers are designed to take a heavy beating. They most likely weigh more than the truck the kid was driving. This situation seems pretty fucked up. You don't need to shoot somebody who's stopped and unarmed.
 
Obviously I don't know the situation but the pictures of the truck up against the woods. Couldn't they have pulled in behind him and blocked him?

If they did shoot his tires out how much damage is he going to do in reverse, on grass, with flat tires?

Again I don't know how it all went down. Whenever somebody get's shot by police there are people crying out about injustice even if the situation called for it. On the other hand, there are a shit ton of times the cops have over reacted and killed people they didn't need to.

 
I don't think they knew he was unarmed, I really hate seeing stories about police brutality like this, but a lot of the times it's just media making it look like they're the bad guys. Like in riots, people are retarded, they chant "fuck you" and push riot controllers and expect not to get tackled, but this really does seem like an incident where they had no right to shoot the man for no reason
 
You mean the video where the dog bite an officer, then even the owner said yeah my dog bit him so he got shot.
 
Obviously you haven't seen the video. And I never fucking said that you jackass? I simply said that one pissed me off me doesn't mean I value the dogs life more than a human at all
 
well who is the human you're referring to? I happen to value my dogs life over quite a few humans. I dont think that means I need help, it means humans fucking suck.
 
This is the new police video, from a different angle it is questionable. But the dog was protecting the owner if anything who shouldn't even have been under arrest to begin with. I just find it bullshit that they arm cops with tazers for situations like this and like the one op posted about. And it's bullshit they can freely kill our animals yet if someone kills one of theirs for coming at them it is considered murder of a police officer. I just believe it could all be avoided in both situations if police officers were better trained and there was more emphasis put on using their tazers or pepper spray. Both of which would have stopped this dog.
 
The owner even said I understand why my dog was shot, my dog jump at the cop this was already talked about on here. it's a rottweiler a huge dog, and it jumped up at the officer. I don't blame the police that was the owners fault he's shouldn't have been bothering the police during an armed robbery. Also the video agreed with me so I don't get why you posted it.
 
You said the officer got bitten which is not true. The dog did lunge at the officer that is true. He wasn't bothering them. He was filming what was going on which is not illegal to do on public land which he was on. Also I can totally see the officer wanting to protect his safety I agree but why use the gun to kill it when you can use alternative options and protect yourself and not kill the dog? I don't wanna argue more about it I'm just saying that police in generally have become much more trigger happy lately and there are plenty of examples of this. It just isn't right!
 
because I'm not the officer and I've never had a big ass dog jump up on me, so easy to sit there and say I would have done this. Also you are wrong that guy was clearly bothering the officers he was not just standing there filming.
 
What the fuck is this shit? He didn't turn off the truck so they shot six fucking rounds at him? I hope that cop looses his job, and goes to fucking prison.
 
soft. a kid had a knife out in Toronto, didnt hurt anyone, and the cops shot him 9 times. once he fell to the ground they tasered the shit out of him. google it
 
You don't know the full story. Would you change your stance if you learned that, after refusing to turn off the vehicle, the kid made a quick move for the glove compartment or raised his arms aggressively toward the officer when he approached?
 
I fucked up that post.

Anyways, no it wouldn't change my stance on this. The police were told to back off, and the poor fucker gets shot. That's fucked on too many levels.
 
and who are you to decide whether or not the approaching officer thought the kid may have had a gun? Who really gives a shit? Another deadbeat fuckup that was going nowhere is gone. You won't see me stressing over it.
 
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