Police have seconds to make a decision

To the editor:

I'm tired of seeing police shootings on TV and in newspapers. Ninety-nine percent of police are good people. I know, I'm a retired officer from Indiana and still miss it.

Officers are put in bad situations on some calls and have seconds to make a decision. I was put in a few tight situations while working as a police officer. We were taught on certain calls to wait for back up, if you can. Especially on domestic calls. Officers have a lot of protection on their body, but it's best to have another officer or two with you. I don't care if you're green, black or white, I treated every person good, if they let me.

A lot of people don't like authority, especially police. It goes with the territory, doesn't it? If a bad person does what a cop tells them to do, there should be no problem. If I told a person to put their hands behind them to be cuffed, that's what I expected. If they did this, then this incident was over and there were no fighting involved.

I'll close by saying this, most police shootings are justified. Many people rush to crucify the police, they can't wait for an investigation, can they? If you weren't there how do you know what happened? That's the nature of the beast, isn't it?

Don Taylor

Cedar Rapids