I almost think it's justifiable use of force. Physical altercation, stolen taser, run for it, shoots the taser in the direction of a pursuing officer.

Here's why I think the cops were in the wrong, and if my understanding of tasers is fundamentally wrong, tell me and I'll back down. Tasers are single-shot cartridges. After that cartridge is fired, the taser is rendered useless as a ranged weapon. It can still fry the living [BLEEP] out of someone if you pin it to their body, but based upon where everyone was and was going, that taser's potential to be a deadly weapon had passed. So now you're firing a few rounds into someone who has rendered their own weapon useless by firing it wildly, stacking the deck dramatically in favor of the guy with the gun and, imo, making it an unnecessary escalation. I don't buy for a second that race played into it. I think it was instinct, and that instinct was wrong. Again, if semiautomatic tasers are a thing now, I'll retract all of that and agree that use of deadly force was warranted.

There's no doubt the victim wasn't an angel. I mean, how many angels pass out drunk at Wendy's? But is running from the police and badly missing with a single-shot weapon grounds to kill someone? No, I don't think so. If the taser had been rendered useless as a ranged threat, using a firearm was a poor decision.

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