Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, September 22, 1995 TAG: 9509220060
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A12 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CANDI REED
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
It's time for citizens to support the Police Department.
As reported in your Sept. 19 newspaper (``Forum on shooting death of man turns freewheeling''), the ``listening forum'' held on Sept. 18 gave Taylor's friends, family members and local residents the chance to voice their opinions on the shooting, and to ask questions they claim they've gotten no answers to.
It was said in the forum that ``it's becoming too commonplace for communities to be meeting over the deaths of black males.'' This isn't an issue of race, and it had nothing to do with the fact that Taylor was black. He had outstanding warrants against him for failing to appear in court because he had violated probation for a 1992 robbery conviction. That alone tells us he didn't abide by the laws in the first place.
It was brought up that Taylor wasn't a violent criminal. Well, assuming you could forget the '92 robbery and probation violation, Taylor became a violent criminal the minute he reached for and pointed a weapon at three officers.
This brings us to the next question: Why couldn't the officers tell that the weapon (weapon being anything not nailed down) was a BB gun, and not a real gun? They only had a split second to make a decision - their lives or his. A BB gun is sold in local stores and is quite popular because it's designed to look like a Desert Eagle semiautomatic handgun. The BB gun is nearly an identical replica of the Desert Eagle, and it was impossible to tell, until it fell, that it wasn't the real thing.
Why, they asked, did officers shoot 15 times, not just once or twice? Officers are taught that when a threat of this kind is posed and they're forced to open fire, they're to shoot until the suspect falls, the weapon falls or the posed threat is no longer a threat.
The 15 shots were fired, and then Taylor and his weapon fell to the ground. No reports indicate he was shot after he and his weapon dropped. This proves the officers were doing their job and following training, taking measures necessary to decrease the threat that was presented to them and others in the store.
Put yourselves in their shoes. They went to the store to serve criminal papers on someone with a criminal history and probation violation. When they approached Taylor, he produced and aimed this pistol facsimile at them for merely trying to do their jobs. I believe most people, if put in the same circumstances, would have ended up with the same results.
My questions are: Why couldn't Taylor abide by the law like the rest of us, and why did he aim a weapon at three armed officers?
The sad thing about all this is that Taylor's life had to be taken because of his own stupid action. If he had cooperated with the officers in the beginning, he would still be alive today. My heart goes out to his family because of their loss, but the answers to their questions are out there - they just don't want to hear them.
The Blacksburg Police Department is to be commended for how it handled the situation at the start and presently. Our officers serve a very important purpose in the community. Their jobs are very complicated as they're forced to deal with situations similar to this every day. They protect and serve our community with their own lives at stake, and we need to give them our support in return.
Candi Reed, of Christiansburg, is a senior nursing student at the College of Health Sciences.
by CNB