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Chicagoist has personally never had any big to-dos at Thanksgiving. The perennial holiday has not, for us, ended with anyone coming out of the closet, any drinks hurled into the fireplace, or the birth of sibling estrangements. We can't comprehend, then, being held at gunpoint by a psychotic criminal on a day for which one should be thankful.
By now everyone has heard about the tragic murder-suicide on South Jeffery. At around 1:30 a.m. Thursday, 21-year-old Lance Johnson became irritated when his neighbor's baby wouldn't stop crying. He fired shots through their front door, forcing the occupants to flee. All escaped unharmed except for 22-year-old Tasha Cooks, whom Johnson then took hostage once the police showed up. Johnson, an ex-con with mental problems, held Cooks for 23 hours in her apartment. At one point he let her call her family, to whom she reported that she was being beaten. Police tried to keep up a dialogue with Johnson, even fetching things when he demanded them, but to no avail. Just after 1 a.m. Friday morning, a gunshot came from within the standoff apartment. A flashbang grenade was employed to distract the gunman; all that served to do was mask the followup shot of Johnson taking his own life. When the chaos cleared, police found Johnson and Cooks both fatally wounded. According to neighbors, Johnson didn't have a previous beef with Cooks; he even played cards with her on occasion.
Now police are taking the heat from Cooks' family and friends for taking so long to act. They've countered the attacks by saying they were following protocol, and that Johnson seemed very unstable and hadn't taken his medication. Isn't that more reason to try to defuse the situation through any means possible? Surely there had to be someone on the police crew who'd tried to get inside his head. We want to know what he was thinking too. Now we'll never know.
Image via centreforsafety.org.
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"Isn't that more reason to try to defuse the situation through any means possible?"
Given that you don't know the details of the situation, this is a highly speculative, irresponsible statement.
you're right, i don't know all the details. i understand that the gunman was unpredictable. still, the rote response the police is giving is that they merely followed protocol, and following protocol ended up with two people dead. no one will ever know if there could have been another outcome.
Perhaps the police are providing the public with a rote response because they are still reviewing the case and the outcome? It's really easy to play monday morning quarterback, which is not to say the police should never be questioned, but at the same time, with the scant details we've been given, it seems a bit presumptuous to question their tactics at this point.
yes, it's the cops fault this moron went on a little murder spree. why didn't the police stop the baby from crying at the beginning? someone needs to be compensated for their incompetence
c'mon, now. this is a horrible tragedy, but not one of shannon's making.
first of all, this is not the first time 'protocol' has ended up in tragedy. we just had a situation this summer where the chicago police ignored a family's pleas to help a woman that was mentally ill and she ended up jumping to her death from a public housing project.
and now this terrible scene. i think what this goes to show us as a society, time and time again, is that large institutions generally have little instruction for dealing with the mentally ill. it's not to blame the police for one man's terrible actions, but it definitely illustrates a larger problem that is pervasive -- in schools, health care, jails/institutions and amongst the professions that are entrusted to deal with those populations.
i don't know what the answer/s are, but i know that the first step needs to be some sort of discussion and dialogue -- not a blanket denial of the problem, nor just trying to fit everyone into the same kind of protocol.
I really think that it's unfair to try and blame the author of this post. Isn't the point of the blogosphere to get someone else's opinion? And for you to be able to chime in with your own? If you just want raw facts, you can read the news. But if you want someone else's opinion, and the chance to kick in your own two cents, if not more, then you come here.
And yes, it is all to easy to play Monday morning quarterback, especially when there aren't a lot of details. But I fail to see how any of the statements in this post are irresponsible. It's not like the author is calling for massive demonstrations in the streets in an effort to overthrow the leadership of the CPD because of their actions in this case. That would be irresponsible. This is just another taxpaying citizen positing her opinions, and questioning the police, a responsibility all of us have in a democracy, even when we are wrong.
If you ask me, this is another example of how the holidays make people go insane. Maybe it's the tryptophan(sp?) in the turkey, but I remember I always used to turn into a wack job from right around Thanksgiving until January 1st (not to be confused with Januaryist, the upcoming blog from Gothamist LLC).
What cured me? Well for one, not freaking out, a la this guy, every time something doesn't go 100% perfectly during the Christmas season.
Anyway, if you enjoyed this POV (WARNING: SHAMELESS PLUG ALERT), be sure to check out my own weblog. It's like the Chicagoist, but with a bit of college humor in there.
It's called You Better Believe It!
http://settecase.blogspot.com
But what's the point of having HBT and SWAT teams at all if they just sit and wait?
all i got to say is that this is my cousin and i hated to see her die like that.The fureral was sad.and you news reporters and police are so rude,how dare you take pictures of her in her casket,that was so disrespectful.and next time this happens DO SOMETHING ABOUT I!!!!!peace!