Since the Michael Brown case in Ferguson, Missouri, that catalyzed the Black Lives Matter movement, incomplete evidence has been used in numerous high-profile shootings of black men to cast law-enforcement officers as race-inspired murderers.
But two anti-police protesters in Portland, Oregon, found out first-hand that the split-second decision many officers face – to shoot or not to shoot – when they are resisted by a suspect isn't so easy.
PJ Media's Victoria Taft recalled that in 2015, activists Fahyim Accuay and Jessie Sponberg agreed to accept the challenge of a Portland radio station to go through a shoot/don't shoot training session at the Clackamas County Sheriff's training center.
Taft noted she underwent a similar simulated training at the same facility "and can attest to the difficulty of doing the right thing when seconds count."
"I’m sure I was 'killed' several times," she said. "One time I tried to convince a perpetrator conducting a school shooting to put aside his bad ways and just stop shooting people. Yeah, that worked. I 'died.' I'd like another run at that simulated training."
Likewise, both Accuay and Sponberg, she said, "'died' several times thinking they could, like me, talk a perp out of harming others or that they could overpower the bad guy."
Replies