Where does line lie determining when/if police officer justified in using force?

Paul Bauer was a police commander who literally walked into an incident that put him in the line of sight of a man fleeing the Thompson Center state government building, with that man then pulling out a pistol and shooting Bauer dead.

'Hero' cop Bauer versus … 

While Jason Van Dyke is the patrol officer now rotting away in a jail cell in Rock Island County, awaiting sentencing on the criminal charges that say he committed murder of a teenager whom he tried claiming posed a physical threat to his life.

VAN DYKE TRIED to make much of the fact that the teenager whom he shot to death had earlier in the evening been kicked out of area fast food restaurants for his erratic behavior, had slashed the tire of a police squad car and may or may not have been waving about that knife with its three-inch blade in a menacing manner.

He would have liked it if the jury that decided his fate would have sympathized with his thoughts that he could easily have wound up in a situation similar to Bauer – who earlier this year happened to be near the state government building when he heard a radio report of a suspect, then saw that very same individual run past him.

A brief foot-chase ensued, followed by a struggle, with the suspect then firing seven shots at Bauer.

Now I realize Van Dyke’s incident occurred nearly four years ago, whereas Bauer’s incident was back in February of this year. It’s not like Van Dyke would have had a memory of what happened to the police commander – which was still just over three years off in the future.

BUT IT HAS me wondering about the legal fine line that exists for when a police officer is permitted to use deadly force on the job – based on the logic that he’s protecting the public safety by doing so!

There are those who argue that had Van Dyke waited a little longer, a colleague with a taser gun could have arrived at the scene, used that weapon to stun the teenager in that incident, and he could have been subdued still alive.

For all we know, he’d have been someone celebrating his 21^st birthday in prison, as a convict with a criminal record, instead of becoming a cause celebre who some will forevermore envision as an innocent-looking teenager in his bright-red graduate cap-and-gown.

… 'felon' Van Dyke -- how different are they?

Although I also suspect that many of the same people who have protested the teenager’s death would have protested just as loudly about what they’d want to view as merely another incident of police brutality.

JUST WHAT WAS the point that would need to have occurred before Van Dyke’s use of physical force would have been considered legal and justified.

Would the teenager have literally had to slash at the cop with his knife before a single shot could be justified from the Smith & Wesson 9 mm semi-automatic (the weapon that Van Dyke carried on the job)?

Would he have literally had to risk becoming the “hero cop” we now think of when Bauer’s name is mentioned? Would we have been willing to spare Van Dyke the public disgrace and humiliation he has endured if we literally had been able to hand his wife a medal for “giving his life” in the name of the people of Chicago?

Now I’m not trying to imply there was anything heroic about the way Van Dyke handled himself that night in 2014. If anything, his actions are more those of a man who gave in to his fear – with his over-reaction being something that he will now pay for with the next few years (if not several) spent in incarceration.

HE WAS TRYING to do a job, just as I’m sure Bauer all those months ago was trying to perform his own duties during his moment of truth that got his name etched in stone as a law enforcement tribute.

While Van Dyke awaits sentencing far from Cook County, out of the fear that inmates at our own county jail might have singled him out for abuse and brutality before he could ever have been sentenced to prison time for his crime. A fate that some may sickly believe is totally appropriate.

It’s a fine line that exists between use of force for protection and for abuse – one made all the more vague because the reality is we DO give law enforcement the authority to use force, and on occasion to kill.

Anybody who has a problem realizing that reality likely is just trying to support people who are just as much criminals as they proclaim Van Dyke to be.

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Is anyone really shocked the jail inmates cheered for the cop killer?

I really have a hard time believing that Cook County sheriff’s police officials could be shocked that jail inmates awaiting their day in court on Thursday would cheer for the guy who’s facing criminal charges for the shooting death earlier this week of Chicago Police Cmdr. Paul Bauer.

Defendant? Or anti-hero?

If anything, I’d be shocked to learn they had been respectful of their jailers, or the legal system that I’m sure many of them believe is railroading them into a few years’ residence within the state prison system.

NEWS ACCOUNTS FROM both of the major metro newspapers (Sun-Times, Tribune) indicate the sheriff, who runs the county jail and criminal courts complex, wants to identify the disrespectful inmates.

With their names to be turned over to the assistant state’s attorneys who are prosecuting their pending criminal cases. Their hope is that someday, those disrespectful inmates will have extra time added to their punishments because of their behavior this week.

While several of the inmates awaiting trial in Cook County may wind up finding themselves transferred to county jails elsewhere. They may wind up awaiting trial in some rural county jail where their legal proceedings will be far more complicated to carry out.

But a little bit of inconvenience is being deemed as warranted for acting as though Shomari Legghette were some sort of hero because of the half-dozen gunshots he fired when Bauer tried to catch him Wednesday at the Thompson Center state government building.

THE NEWSPAPERS ARE going along with this tone – the county sheriff provided video taken of a holding cell so we can see, and hear, crude images of the cheering inmates as Legghette is brought past their cell en route to the courtroom – where a judge decided that Legghette should await trial inside the jail without the option of bond.

Now I’m not saying I think these inmates were anything but buffoons in the way they behaved, or that Bauer (who will get the full-ritual police funeral on Saturday) is deserving of disrespect.

It’s just that I wouldn’t expect anything but tacky behavior from jail inmates.

No matter what legal basis there is for saying these men (including Legghette) are innocent until proven guilty, the fact is that many of them are misfits from the standard beliefs of our society.

WHICH IS WHAT led most of them to actions that would bring them under suspicion by police and prosecutors and cause them to have criminal charges pending against them.

Besides, there’s something about incarceration that would break the spirit of just about anybody – surround yourself with enough misfits, and you’ll find yourself starting to take on their ideals.

I remember one time I was inside the Stateville Correctional Center near Joliet (as a reporter-type person). As the group I was with was passing the roundhouses, we could hear the inmates taunting us – letting us know they regarded us as being as much a part of the problem as anybody else.

It was execution duty (back in the days when Illinois still committed homicide in the name of justice), and the inmates let me and others know we would “burn in Hell” as much as anyone else for being a part of the ritual.

I ALSO RECALL crude and vulgar threats shouted specifically at the prison staffers – letting them know how they would be “f---ed up” by the inmates if they ever wound up inside the prison proper.

With that kind of mentality, it wouldn’t shock me in the least to learn that some of the county jail inmates (some of whom are bound to wind up in the Illinois Corrections Department eventually) would think cheers and applause would be worthy of a man charged with the shooting death of a cop.

Could he be Cook County sheriff?

So to learn that aides to Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart are saying the inmate behavior is “disgraceful and despicable, just beyond the pale” has a familiar ring to it.

Something similar to that of Capt. Renault from “Casablanca,” when he uttered his now-memorable line about being “shocked, shocked to learn that gambling is taking place on the premises” of Rick’s Café. Both of them are worthy of an equally insincere sigh.

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Rauner remembrance of tragedy – an effort to divert public’s attention?

Reading Gov. Bruce Rauner’s formal address to present a state budget for Fiscal 2019, I couldn’t help but notice his opening bit.

RAUNER: Trying to redeem his pol priorities?

The reference to it being exactly 10 years since the day a former Northern Illinois University student felt compelled to fire off his weapon – killing five students before he turned his gun on himself.

THE NEWS EVENTS of the day even called for a last-minute rewrite, also offering a mention of the death Tuesday of Chicago Police Cmdr. Paul Bauer – the officer who tried to stop a fleeing suspect being chased by other police, only to get shot and killed.

Both tragic happenings. In the case of the DeKalb slayings a decade ago, I’m sure the memories remain as strong now in the minds of those who were there as they were back then.

But a part of me couldn’t help but wonder how much this bit of rhetoric was an attempt at misdirection.

Rather than get worked up over the details of the budget proposal Rauner wants the General Assembly to approve for Illinois government for the fiscal year beginning July 1, he’d rather we think of these other happenings.

BECAUSE IF WE think too much of budgetary matters, then we wind up touching on some sore spots of the Rauner era of state government.

Let’s not forget that Rauner, although in his third year of government, has never managed to get a budget proposal of his implemented into law. Heck, he’s never offered up anything that wound up becoming policy.

The only reason we have a budget in place now is because Democratic legislators were joined by a few Republicans willing to put the daily workings of government at the forefront to pass a budget that Rauner himself tried to use his veto powers to kill off!

Because Rauner is the guy who came into the governor’s post thinking he could strong-arm the rest of state government into going along with his vision – one in which organized labor and unions take a severe blow to their influence over Illinois.

THAT CONCEPT WAS more important for the past two years to Rauner than anything concerning the daily operations of the state, which does have responsibilities to fulfill – regardless of one’s ideological hang-ups.

The question we ought to be asking ourselves is whether Rauner is willing to get serious and try to put together budget proposals this year – or if we’re headed for another budgetary standoff.

The last of which stretched out over two years, caused serious complications for daily government operations and created financial problems that will take Illinois years (if not decades) to resolve.

You’d think that Rauner, facing a re-election cycle complicated by the fact that the conservative ideologues the governor is counting on to support him have their own partisan objections (being anti-union isn’t conservative enough for them), would want a straight-forward budget process. Something to ensure that he signs into law the Fiscal ’19 budget on or before June 30.

BECAUSE THE $37.6 billion spending plan for state government the governor put forth includes some serious changes to the way retired teacher pensions are funded – mostly by sticking them on the school districts.

Something I’m sure will tick off the Chicago Public Schools, where officials would actually like to have the state assume a larger share of those pension costs. Is the governor’s budget address merely another excuse to set up a political brawl with Chicago interests later this year?

Some reports made mention of the fact that Wednesday’s budget address, in addition to being 10 years since the bloodshed at DeKalb, was 225 days from the end of the budget standoff.

Will it also become the beginning of a political sequel – one in which Rauner will try to redeem his political self-image at the expense of the people of Illinois. Elections day are March 20 and Nov. 6; those dates can’t come soon enough.

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