L.A. County Sheriff mistakenly shot dead victim John Winkler.
L.A. County sheriff deputies mistakenly kill man fleeing assailant
(Reuters) - An aspiring TV producer who was being held captive by a knife-wielding man in West Hollywood was mistakenly shot and killed by Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies as he tried to escape his assailant, the sheriff's department said on Thursday.
John Winkler, 30, was one of three men being held and attacked by a 27-year-old man with a knife at an apartment on Monday night, the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department said in a statement.
He and another man ran out of the apartment to get away, but sheriff's deputies called to the scene thought he was the assailant and shot him, the department said.
"The apartment door suddenly opened and a male victim came rushing out," the department said. "He was covered in blood and bleeding profusely from the neck. Simultaneously, victim Winkler ran out of the door, lunging at the back of the fleeing victim."
Both men ran directly at the deputies, the statement said.
And therein lies the problem.
You can say what you want about the L.A. County Sheriff, but they are trained professionals. They mistook the victim for the assailant. If the NRA gets their way with arming more citizen vigilantes to make us safer, more people like John Winkler who 'had landed a three-day job filling in as a production assistant on the Comedy Central show "Tosh.0," a spokeswoman for the network told Reuters.' will be mistakenly killed.
Do we really want more guns? Is an armed society really safer? I don't think so. If trained professionals are gunning down the victim, what will happen when untrained gun wheeling vigilantes bring their guns to schools and movie theaters.
I am really having a hard time seeing how guns are making us safer.
I really hate to write a brief hit-and-run diary like this, but I do have to leave. There was no open thread to post this in, but I thought it needed comment.