Suicide by cop
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Suicide-by-cop is a suicide method in which a person deliberately acts in a threatening way, with the goal of provoking a lethal response from a law enforcement officer, such as being shot to death.
While the phrase is colloquial ("cop" being American slang) and primarily used in the United States media, it has become the most popular name for the phenomenon. Other names include death by cop, suicide-by-police, officer- (or police-) assisted suicide or the more technical Victim-Precipitated Homicide.
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[edit] Overview
The idea of committing suicide in this manner is based on trained procedures of law enforcement officers with the use of deadly force. In jurisdictions where officials are so armed, there are usually set circumstances where they will predictably use deadly force against a threat to themselves or others. This form of suicide functions by exploiting this trained reaction. The most common is pointing a firearm at a police officer or an innocent person, which would reasonably provoke that officer or others to fire on them in defense. However, many variants exist, for example attacking with a knife or other hand-weapon, trying to run an officer or other person down with a car, or trying to trigger a presumed explosive device.
The factor that the entire phenomenon hinges on is the person's state of mind, and their desire to end their own life. This can be difficult to determine after the fact if they have died. Some cases are obvious, such as pointing an unloaded or non-functioning gun (such as a toy gun or starter's pistol) at officers, or the presence of a suicide note. Some suspects brazenly announce their intention to die before they act (see below). However, many cases can be more difficult to determine, as some suspects with the desire to die will actually use deadly force on and even kill people before being killed (often romanticized by the expression "to die with one's boots on"). Many law enforcement training programs have added sections to specifically address handling these situations if officers suspect that the subject is attempting to goad them into lethal force.
[edit] History
While only formally studied in late 20th century, the concept of deliberately precipitating one’s own slaying by the provocation of judicial officials may span back to the late Roman Empire. In 4th century northern Africa, a Donatist sect known as the Circumcellions (or "agonistici") emerged that held the concept of martyrdom to be very sacred. On occasion, members of this group would assault Roman legionnaires or armed travelers with simple wooden clubs, in order to provoke them into attacking and martyring them. Others would interrupt courts of law, and verbally provoke the judge so that he would order their immediate execution (a normal punishment at the time for contempt of court). [1]
[edit] Research
The phenomenon has been described in news accounts from 1981, and scientific journals since 1985, although this particular phrase did not become common until the early 1990s. The phrase seems to have originated in the United States, but also appears in an article in the British newspaper The Guardian, dated May 10, 2003. The report states that a jury in a police-shooting inquest ruled it a suicide because on the scene, the subject reportedly stated "better get your guns out lads, I'm coming out" and a suicide note was later found. Some say that the 1976 death of Mal Evans, road manager, assistant, and a friend of the Beatles, was an example of this phenomenon. Some historians believe that Giuseppe Zangara, the man who killed Chicago mayor Anton Cermak in a possible attempt to assassinate then President-Elect Franklin D. Roosevelt, might have been attempting suicide by police.
Some of the first research into suicide by cop was completed by Sgt. Rick Parent of the Delta Police Department. Parent completed his doctoral thesis at Simon Fraser University, School of Criminology, Burnaby, British Columbia in 1996. It was titled "Aspects of Police Use of Deadly Force in North America: The Phenomenon of Victim-Precipitated Homicide." Parent's research of 843 police shootings determined that about 50% were victim precipitated homicide. Parent defined victim precipitated homicide as "an incident in which an individual bent on self-destruction, engages in life threatening and criminal behavior in order to force law enforcement officers to kill them."
[edit] Examples
- Aramoana massacre
- Leeland Eisenberg, who took hostages in one of Hillary Clinton's campaign offices in December 2007, claimed afterwards it was an attempted suicide by cop
- Kip Kinkel, a school shooter, attempted suicide-by-cop but was subdued by pepper spray instead
- Chris Penley
- Kirkwood City Council shooting
- Charles Whitman, the University of Texas tower sniper
[edit] In fiction
- In the end of the film Tell Them Willie Boy Is Here, the title character (played by Robert Blake) tries to shoot down his pursuer, Sheriff Cooper (Robert Redford). After killing the Paiute outlaw, Cooper checks his gun which turns out to be unloaded. He preferred to die rather than be captured.
- In the closing sequence of the 1970 film The Family aging mob hitman Jeff (Charles Bronson), after killing his ex-girlfriend (played by his real life wife Jill Ireland), provokes a rookie police officer to kill him.
- The 1993 film Falling Down starring Michael Douglas, ends by his character provoking Police to shoot him by threatening to have a gun, when in reality he was only carrying a toy water pistol. He chose to end his life that way so his family would still collect on his life insurance policy, which would have otherwise been voided had he committed suicide on his own.
- In the book "The Outsiders", Dallas Winston takes out an unloaded gun in front of the arriving police, and is immediately gunned down.
- Tibor Fischer's collection of short stories 'Don't read this book if you are stupid' contains a short story from the perspective of a man who is preparing to die of 'suicide by cop'.
- In the 2007 film Reign Over Me, Adam Sandler's character, torn by grief over the death of his family, uses an unloaded gun in an attempt to provoke two NYPD officers to kill him.
- In a season 4 episode of The West Wing, Evidence of Things Not Seen, shots are fired at the White House. The assailant is later revealed to be a mentally unbalanced man attempting suicide by cop.
- In an episode of NCIS, Kate shoots a man who points a gun at Gibbs, who calls it "classic suicide by cop".
- In the 2002 film The Recruit, Walther Burke (Al Pacino) is revealed as a traitor by CIA rookie James Clayton (Colin Farrell). He turns his back to the responding S.W.A.T. team, says 'Good-bye' to Clayton and then aims an unloaded pistol at the S.W.A.T. team, causing them to shoot and kill him, believing him to be a threat.
- In Season Two of the American TV show Prison Break, former Chicago Mob Boss John Abruzzi played by Peter Stormare, acting on false information about the location of the mob informant Fibonacci is lured in to an FBI trap. He refuses to heed Agent Mahone's (William Fichtner) call to surrender and raises his weapon at the FBI team in a threatening manner. The FBI officers open fire and he is killed instantly.
- In the 2004 film Paparazzi, Actor Bo Laramie played by Cole Hauser and his wife & child are involved in a car accident brought upon by a group of paparazzi. In a revenge plot he plants a movie prop gun in one of the paparazzo's car & calls the police stating "there's a guy waving a gun". This in turn leads to the paparazzo being pulled over, he attempts to produce his license but unknowingly pulls the prop gun out of his coat pocket and is gunned down by police. A newscaster later describes the incident as 'suicide by cop'.
- in the 2004 film New Police Story, the main antagonist, named Joe, faces several hundred police officers as well as Officer Chan, played by Jackie Chan. He and Chan engage in a race to put their pistols together first, and Chan wins. Joe's father, a police captain, steps forward and screams at Joe, who first began killing police officers because he hated his father. Joe looks at Chan, and in an act of reparation, helps Chan; he then places the unloaded clip of his pistol into the gun and points it at Chan, who knows it is unloaded. Chan shouts for the officers not to shoot, but the SWAT officers shoot and kill him.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- Lindsay, M. & Lester D. 2004, Suicide by Cop: Committing Suicide by Provoking Police to Shoot You. Amityville, NY: Baywood Publishing Company. ISBN 0-89503-290-2
- Parent, Richard 2004. "Aspects of Police Use of Deadly Force In North America - The Phenomenon of Victim-Precipitated Homicide," Ph.D. thesis, Simon Fraser University.
- ^ Gibbon, Edward (1993). The History of the Decline and Fall of The Roman Empire - Vol 2 – Chapter XXI – Part VII. New York, NY: Everyman's Library. ISBN 0-67942-308-7.
