i both agree and don't. on the one hand, yeah, the rioters are idiots but part of what the riots are about are the police's tendency to escalate situations rather than deescalate. whoever put that cop in that position is as much to blame for the risk to that officer as the rioters in my opinion.
I get what you’re saying. However, a cop is just a person. And the people blocking the road got in front of a couple thousand pounds of steel driven by a person. They then shouted threats and began smashing windows. Any reasonable person would take them at their word once that happened. Any reasonable person should have mowed them down without hesitation.
it was irresponsible of whoever was in charge of the police there to put that person in that situation. the protesters wanted to disrupt traffic, its reasonable to assume they'll disrupt you even if you have flashy lights on the top of your car.
whoever put that cop in that position is as much to blame for the risk to that officer as the rioters
What is the alternative? Not deploy any police to these often violent riots, or deploy the entire police department to quell the riot? If you just send 1 car to 100 rioters, then obviously the cop will have a bad time. If you send 100 cops to 100 rioters, but the rioters are belligerent, then obviously they are going to have a bad time.
tough situation with no good answers, I'd argue for keeping officers on foot and preferably leaving the squad cars behind a few blocks or empty them of anything lootable to use just as road blocks. putting them in a situation where they can be enveloped and the only way out is mowing people down is a tactical failure.
They should have gone to full acceleration and swerved to up their points.
The rioters are idiots and lucky they weren’t shot.