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Comment by InclinedPlane | Hacker News Reader

Would you mind pointing me towards the law showing which crimes, specifically, are capital offenses? And, if you would be so kind, under what circumstances a death sentence may be carried out on the streets without a trial for those crimes?

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> And, if you would be so kind, under what circumstances a death sentence may be carried out on the streets without a trial for those crimes?

If a man shoots at an officer for no reason.

I hate to break it to you but even in that case there is still something like due process to be followed and NO OFFICER HAS THE RIGHT TO EXECUTE THAT PERSON ON THE SPOT.

Sure they do, in the case of self defense.

For self defense there usually needs to be some proof of a credible threat. Recent events indicate that this burden of proof is for some reason lower for police officers than for citizens.

"What do we want?" "Dead Cops" "When do we want them?" "Now"

Sure, bombastic hyperbole. But... http://www.newsweek.com/police-line-duty-deaths-increase-201...

23 killed by firearms through June. Read the Vice article and compare those numbers to 23.

No, in that case they should do their damnest to arrest the person risking their lives if need be. If you're not prepared to do that then do not sign up for the police. As a police officer you definitely did not sign up to be judge, jury and executioner at the same time, 'Judge Dredd' is fiction, not an instruction manual.

Self defense doesn't give you the right to execute someone on the spot. On the other hand, what many in this discussion call "execution on the spot" might be legitimate self defense.

And that's the only circumstance where anyone is killed by police, right?

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