Argh yes.Saltyk said:Here's one that I've been seeing in recent threads here. On every single one of the recent "Was This Shooting Justified" threads someone exclaims that they should have shot the dangerous criminal in the knee. This bothers me so much. So, let's go over this.
#1. Shooting a person in the leg is not easy. The leg is much smaller than the torso and likely moving. Even trained marksmen don't go for the leg shot. No one shots for the leg. You can easily miss the leg and bullets don't stop. They keep going and could hurt someone else. Even if you did hit the leg, nothing says the bullet would stay in the leg. While the torso is larger, easier to hit, and more likely to stop a bullet.
#2. Shooting a person in the leg is just as likely to kill them as shooting them in the torso. The Femoral artery is a very large artery in your leg. So much as nicking that will cause a person to bleed out in a few minutes. If the bullet hits the bone, it could shatter and send shrapnel throughout the leg. Seriously, shooting a person in the leg is potentially just as deadly.
#3. Just because you shot a person in the leg, that doesn't mean it will stop them. Especially if they have a gun.
#4. Anyone who fires a gun accepts that they are shooting to kill. Especially trained people like police officers. There's a reason the police don't shoot running suspects. They always shoot to kill. Not to wound. Not to stop. Not to slow. To kill. So, if you're shooting to kill, you might as well shoot them in the easier to hit area anyway.
I've mentioned this on everyone of those threads. Yet, it keeps popping up. I'll make sure people stop making this claim eventually. Stop getting your lessons about weapons and human anatomy from movies and video games, people!
Oh, and before some brings up warning shots, one of the first things I mentioned was the potential to hurt other people by accident. So why would you willingly fire away from the dangerous subject and potentially hurt someone else?
Though, actually, police do sometimes shoot people in the legs, if they are wearing body armour say. This happened in the North Hollywood shootout, most offices fired centre of mass (as they are trained to do), but since they couldn't penetrate the body armour the criminals were wearing to any great extent, someone tried shooting one in the legs. He went down and bled out before the ambulance reached him. Even knowing the criminals were wearing body armour, though, everyone else kept shooting centre of mass, mind.
It was also how they got Ned Kelly and at least one of his gang way back when, though Ned survived and was executed later on.