Readers React: Hey, LAPD, why so quick on the trigger?

To the editor: The vast majority of Americans will never experience a moment of crisis requiring split-second decision-making, so we are not in a position to know what we would do or to judge the actions of police officers who have to pull their guns. (“Man with towel-wrapped arm shot by LAPD in Los Feliz was unarmed,” June 20)

That said, there are clearly too many of the instances like the one last week in Los Feliz, where Los Angeles Police Department officers shot a man who had flagged them down. Police are putting their safety first.

Even at these moments — especially at these moments — their first priority must still be the safety of others, of “us.” If they are not willing to make that commitment, they shouldn’t become police officers.

Joe Whitaker, Arroyo Grande

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To the editor: A man with a towel around one arm flags down an LAPD patrol car in a Los Feliz and seconds later he is critically wounded by the officers. Why the immediate use of deadly force (again) involving an unarmed person?

While on the ground bleeding from (at least) a bullet wound to the head, he was handcuffed — because, according to an LAPD spokesman, he “had not been searched and was considered a suspect.”

A suspect in what, his own near-fatal shooting?

Noel Johnson, Glendale

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