Hastings

The rack placement makes gives the car that "European look", if you ask me. On the other hand, all modern vehicles are European-like, so that may be the case.

The dog is cute. The car is not that much, but it'll do I guess.

I remember Leslie Benzies from the into credits of GTA SA, if my memory serves me right. So he reminds me of an extremely good game, one of the best R* ever did. Hope he'll get what he deserved for his job.

That's why you do only your job... If you're not police, you don't do force entries. Call for the police and wait -- AT LEAST when you don't see a person inside crying for help and clearly in need of it. Out here the number of assaults on the EMT personnel is increasing too. No guns thanks to our gun laws, but fists, broken bottles and iron bars are not better, considering our average EMT unit is 2 women (a doctor and a nurse), and a male driver who's not exactly trained to be a bodyguard. Under the law assaulting an EMT is like assaulting an ordinary citizen, no harsher penalties for it, and the investigation process is just as complicated. They proposed a solution here, providing EMS with private security assistance, maybe even armed. But that's too expensive for most of our regions.

On a separate note, why so many people complain about PA system? Isn't that normal to verbally order a vehicle to pull over? I wouldn't even notice a car behind me flashing lights in a complete silence. Or maybe I'm just used to the way people are pulled over in my country since there has to be a verbal order under the law...

I did not criticize the way the Americans use to police their own country, merely highlighted the differences in the approach. Myself, I like the way things are done in the common law system.

Shieet, my hard drive died yesterday evening, burying with him my Russian version of StBG with commentaries and all other useful law stuff I had been accumulating for the past 5 years. Make cloud backups, friends. Interesting though that here in savage communist Russia that would be an instant discharge from police service and an extremely high possibility of criminal prosecution. We have it our own way here, using guns is generally a huge 'no-no' and there must be a verbal warning and a warning shot. A wounded bystander is a silk path to jail. I believe this is the mindset more or less shared among European countries, while in the States, as our US friends here had demonstrated, officers' lives come first.

Making anyone change their opinion on the Internet? Hard to do. For me this thread has already been useful, because it prompted me to freshen up my knowledge about German law, and I actually spend half of last night going through different US courts' decisions to understand their approach to the problem here. So I wouldn't say this all is for nothing. We lawyers love to argue on things.

How does that make anything right? I'm definitely not the one who would act properly in a situation like that. Well, I've got sidetracked by the phrase "whose fault was that", and start thinking about civil liability for injuries of that woman. OK, lets address German criminal law. If my memory is correct, the StBG provides that a person must accept the danger if under a legal obligation to do so, and that includes specific professions such as police, FD, and others, where taking risks is a part of the job. Then a court must decide whether the danger in question was far more serious than the damage caused. I believe since you reside in Germany you are good in German. Perhaps you could look up some additional information regarding this case, it would be interesting to see the development. Uhmm, why? I find this discussion really interesting.

If he'd shot that person having a LOS on him, that's by the book. If you don't have a LOS, you don't know who are you shooting at, therefore you don't shoot. Germany is a civil law country, and German BGB and French Napoleonic Code are the foundation of many civil law systems around the world, including Russian. That is why I believe there are more similarities with Russian law than with American. I'm assessing this situation the way I was taught to asses such situations and the way I've seen them assessed. In Germany, granted, they might do that differently -- no one of us apparently knows. Like I said, I understand this reaction and with all honesty I would probably act the same way. And that's why I consider myself unfit for police service. Actually that's a difference between the civil law and the common law. In common law systems courts care less about the formal side, and more about how people feel and act, from what I've learned. You would make a good defence attorney by the way, I believe.

It's really weird that so many people call that a reasonable decision. I would have no arguments if it was called 'an understandable reaction', 'self-defense instinct' or whatever, but saying it was legal and reasonable and not reckless? I'll try to explain it one more time and then give up, because that's going nowhere: an officer of the police force has an obligation and must care about other people lives and property. That is the nature of the job. He fired a shot through the door not having a slightest idea who else might be inside, or in other words at that moment he didn't care. Therefore, that officer failed to exercise due care and therefore his actions were reckless. It's that simple - even despite the fact he had a reason to believe the gun was real and fear for his life. Just like they would do in court. (only they'll be a hundred times more professional) * * * * Afternight UPD: I might be assessing that situation as a lawyer/prosecutor rather than an officer. On the one hand I'm sure the officer acted recklessly and is liable for damage caused (and I would present that position in court if it was up to me). On the other hand we lawyers are not liked by the police officers because we live in our world of theory. What shall prevail -- the law or the reality -- is a topic too global to be discussed in this thread, so nolle prosequi.

Well it is under the very definition of 'being reckless': Lata culpa est nimia negligentia id est non intelligere quod omnes intelligunt. Civil law systems are much the same when it comes to liability, so comparing the US law with the Germany legal system is not correct.

Wow that I never expected to hear from an American. Usually it's our Russian Putin lovers who dismiss whatever shit happens in Russia with the words "Ah fuck it, worse things have happened in our time and we keep going, you wouldn't want to blame Putin for it". It's a really weird way to close eyes at problems. The officer who fired a shot, at least under the law I studied. One who causes damage is liable for that damage unless acting in accordance with the law. One of the grounds for said liability is being reckless (meaning that the person could have reasonably predicted the negative outcome but neglected to do so). If firing a shot blindly through the door is not reckless per se, when I don't know what is. As I've said before, there's a huge difference in accidentally hitting a bystander on the street while shooting a suspect, and blindly firing through stuff hoping to get some bad guys. The first situation is truly an accident. Police has eyes on the suspect, they have good aim, but accidentally a civilian gets in the way. Shit happens. The second is -- plainly -- being reckless, and an officer can't afford being reckless. That's why they are highly trained professionals trusted to do an extremely dangerous and demanding job. oh yeah and please note I'm not defending the original shooter. Firing blindly at those who knocked at your door could probably even be classified as an attempted homicide. However, I guess that in some US states even that would be treated as a legal self-defense. A fair play you know, you fire at cops, they fire back, old Wild West days, the one who stays tells the tale. That's why I love America (no joking, I really do)

Misunderstood you then.

How come it's good, could you please elaborate for those who, apparently, can't properly evaluate the situation? No illegal activity was seized as a result of this weapon usage. No danger to civilians was eradicated as a result of that shot. No criminals were hit by that shot. So just what makes it good? Quick reaction? Aiming skills? Courage? The only one who was injured was a bystander. So that almost certainly makes it bad, unless there's something that I still missing. Because I might be the next person injured by a blindly-fired shot, I'd like to know for certain why this would be good.

This all would be right if not for the wounded bystander. All situations have to be assessed separately, and in this particular situation I believe that the best solution was different. of course it's best seen afterwards, and it's always easier to judge when you have all the information.

Yes, and if a shot was fired through the door by the suspect I'd say there is the reason to fire back, but not the other way. Of course officers can't be blamed for protecting their lives, but the specifics of the job demand to put others' safety first. I'm not too much of a shootout veteran myself, but as a citizen, I think, I have a right for an opinion.

Yeah well that's why most people are not suited to be police officers. It's perfectly understandable if there's a person with a gun who tries to point it at your direction, and you gun him down. Here there is a different situation. After the door was closed there was no direct threat for officers (as I believe the gun owner did not try shooting through the door). So now you have a person with a firearm behind the door in an apartment possibly with civilians hostage. Here others' safety must come first.

I acted like that in Counter-Strike and Battlefield, a nice way to clear the room behind a closed door. IRL that situation looks weird at least. Even in my book this is an example of a very poor assessment of the situation. Reflexes like that are useful when you're scouting an occupied city full of armed insurgents, when you have to fight for you life and kill every one who looks at you the wrong way, but in a situation like this it would probably be proper to back off and back up. Hystery summed it all up, though.

I play with RDE and (in those rare instances my game session runs longer than 7 minutes) didn't notice any drawbacks connected with how cops behave. RDE used to spawn a lot of gang members everywhere, but they fixed this problem. I value RDE for the amount of vehicles they added and some other stuff they did.

The US always had much more serial killers and maniacs compared to other countries (where is enough verifiable data), and most of them didn't use no firearms. Something with mentality... So if I were to live in the States, as I hope one day, I'd rather own a weapon.

Will do that, thanks for your help.

Then that still sheds no light on the reason of my shitty performance. Hmhmhm

Oh, no, that's a DVD drive, my mistake, the HDD one is in the lower corner. I examined the place, there's a compartment for a fan, but no actual fan installed. Hmm, might be the case. One last question, could you tell if 69 degrees is a normal temp for a CPU under load?

Huh, that's not good, it's cheaper to replace a graphic card than an CPU :D To answer in order: 1. Guess it's stock, I put no new coolers on it myself. Looks like a simple fan to me. 2. Umm HDD? To tell the truth I never thought those things need cooldown too, I don't even see any fans there! It's in the upper corner of my PC (below an image) 3. Again no clue. Could you please tell me where I could look it up? I didn't do it, that for sure.