"He was firing a gun at cops!" seems like such a lame defence to me. This is the US we're talking about, where someone can unload an assault rifle inside a school or a church and render the entire nation powerless, lest the issue be politicised. You don't see the cops rolling a tank through the school cafeteria to try and smoke the gunman out. Just imagining that is utterly absurd!
But this though... oh no.
A single guy with a pistol, in an area they could have evacuated, who would have inevitably tired himself out after standing off for the best part of a day, daring to face off against the almighty police force? Nah, you gotta go full Michael Bay on that shit. Bring out the armoured cars, explosives, tear gas...
There's literally no rational justification for this. The actual soldiers out in the middle east know better restraint than to go nuclear at the first chance. And they're dealing with people packing a lot more heat than this guy with his belts and a pistol.