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Not to be outdone by it’s more famous neighbor, New Jersey cops shot an unarmed mentally disabled man six times who failed to stop for a routine traffic stop.
Mr. Avigliano said the events began around 10 p.m. on Sunday when officers in Garfield, where Mr. Kubasta lives with his parents, tried to stop his Toyota Corolla during a seat-belt check on Route 19.
Mr. Kubasta, who the police said was not speeding, did not stop, and officers followed him into neighboring Clifton, where three patrol cars joined the pursuit, Mr. Avigliano said.
He said that Mr. Kubasta stopped his car near Broad Street. As officers approached, Mr. Avigliano said, Mr. Kubasta’s car lurched into reverse, in the officers’ direction.
“At that point, the Clifton police officers opened fire,” Mr. Avigliano said.
“The only way I can describe him is like Forrest Gump,” Eileen DeNobile, Mr. Kubasta’s aunt, said in a telephone interview on Tuesday. “We can’t comprehend how this happened. How do you justify shooting into his car? We want answers.”
“If he didn’t stop, he didn’t understand,” Ms. DeNobile said, sobbing. “He doesn’t know how to do anything wrong. He knows love.”
Umm, I think that may be your answer right there. There was a reason Forrest Gump was sitting at a bus stop waiting for the bus and not tooling down the road in an El Camino.
Not that we’re saying the dude deserved to be shot six times but part of having a driver’s license is “understanding” what to do when you get pulled over by the cops.
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5 Comments
1. Sean
2. James
3. Sean
4. Sean
5. James
Want a neat little picture by your comments? Get one here.“There was a reason Forrest Gump was sitting at a bus stop waiting for the bus and not tooling down the road in an El Camino.”
The reason being that you don’t get to sit and tell your life story to strangers if you’re tooling down the road in your own car. Which, given the boat and military equipment Gump operated, he was perfectly capable of doing.
But do you really want to base your opinion of what an actual mentally disabled person is capable of on a movie, even a well-regarded one?
Yes, a driver should be able to understand what to do when stopped by the cops. But I’ve seen misunderstandings arise between people in full possesion of all their mental faculties. And Kubasta wasn’t pulled over. Perhaps the cops weren’t clear in their gestures (or whatever they were using to siglal they wanted him to stop). Perhaps it looked like they were waving him on.
Who knows? The article doesn’t say and I wasn’t there.
Even so, I’m left wondering why it took four cop cars and six bullets to stop someone who wasn’t speeding and (an assumption on my part but it’s a reasonable inference from the description given) not taking evasive adction.
Posted Wednesday, June 6, 2007 at 1:24 pm | Permalink
Geez, I bet you believe in the single bullet “theory” too.
Just kidding. I totally agree, I was mostly being facetious. The fact is this guy took six bullets for not wearing his seatbelt. Pretty sad.
Posted Wednesday, June 6, 2007 at 2:36 pm | Permalink
Nothing in the article says he wasn’t wearing his seat belt. Only that the cops wanted to check.
So he took six bullets because the cops didn’t make themselves clear that he should stop, couldn’t stop a car for “miles” despite the car not speeding and the cops having four cars in pursuit, and couldn’t figure out a way to handle a stopped car that lurched short of firing on the driver.
Posted Wednesday, June 6, 2007 at 3:07 pm | Permalink
At bit more from
http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/jersey/index.ssf?/base/news-7/1181109751185750.xml&coll=1
There were more than 6 shots: “In all, between nine and 12 bullets were fired” [How could they not know exactly? Can’t the cops count the number of empty chambers in their guns? Would seem to me this would b standard procedure after a officer-involved shooting.]
The NJ judiciary continues the hard line response: “…faces charges of criminal attempt, assault and eluding police, authorities said. His bail was set yesterday by a Passaic County Superior Court judge, with no 10 percent payment option for release.” [As if he’d be going anywhere with 3 bullets still in him.]
He did collide with a cop and a police car once he stopped: “…As police officers approached his car, Kubasta put the vehicle in reverse, striking one of the police cruisers … Kubasta also struck Officer Mark Bekier, who was on foot. Bekier and Officers Bruce Lawson and Charles Kazmir then fired on the motorist.”
Posted Wednesday, June 6, 2007 at 3:26 pm | Permalink
I hope at some point we get to find out what Kubasta was thinking.
Was he in fact confused? Scared?
Who knows what the truth is.
These kinds of massive police shootings are always shocking to me. It’s like the mob (no, not that mob) mentality, only with people who should be trained to know better.
Posted Wednesday, June 6, 2007 at 5:56 pm | Permalink
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