Crazy! Retired 71yo cop kills a moviegoer over TEXTING!

Parent Cafe
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<p>Actually, it seems he was breaking the rules as every report has stated the theater clearly had a sign prohibiting firearms on premises and according to the following:</p>

<p>[18</a> U.S. Code § 926C - Carrying of concealed firearms by qualified retired law enforcement officers | LII / Legal Information Institute](<a href=“http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/926C]18”>18 U.S. Code § 926C - Carrying of concealed firearms by qualified retired law enforcement officers | U.S. Code | US Law | LII / Legal Information Institute)</p>

<p>specifically this part:</p>

<p><a href=“b”>quote</a> This section shall not be construed to supersede or limit the laws of any State that—
(1) permit private persons or entities to prohibit or restrict the possession of concealed firearms on their property; or
(2) prohibit or restrict the possession of firearms on any State or local government property, installation, building, base, or park.

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<p>retired cops would not have been exempted from that theater’s ban on carrying of firearms as their private property rights to restrict firearms on their premises takes precedence.</p>

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<p>The retired cop may have a regular case of “old codgeritis”. This area of Florida has a lot of retirees who move here to get away from kids and younger people. It is not uncommon for old goats around here to shoot neighbors who walk on their lawn, or heaven forbid, their neighbor’s dog poops on their lawn…they march right over to offender’s front door and shoot 'em on the spot. The retired cop might have popped his cork with the younger couple fussing with one of those new fangled smartphones right in front of him and he just couldn’t take it…a generational gap thing mixed in with other stuff annoying the shooter.</p>

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<p>Ridiculous, isn’t it? But entirely plausible…</p>

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<p>Lots of speculation here. Is he a control freak? Demented? Mentally ill? Power hungry? Maybe we should wait and see…</p>

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<p>^^^I was thinking the same thing! Lots of folks on here I wouldn’t want sitting on my jury…</p>

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<p>While your point is well taken, the following report of a woman who was similarly told to stop texting and then was glared at and later, even followed to the restroom by the retired cop in question a few weeks previously is accurate, wondering about his control freak power-hungry tendencies is legitimate. </p>

<p>[Florida</a> theater shooting: Couple had tense run-in with Curtis Reeves - CNN.com](<a href=“http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/15/justice/florida-movie-theater-shooting/]Florida”>http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/15/justice/florida-movie-theater-shooting/)</p>

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<p>Lots of folks on here I wouldn’t want sitting on my jury…</p>

<p>lol…</p>

<p>Well, hopefully those of us on a jury would be basing decisions on facts and not on early speculation. Speculation is all that exists right now based on the reports from witnesses and the shooter’s actual own words. And, many of us do speculate when an unusual action has been committed by an unlikely person. A retired cop shooting someone over (as far as we know) texting and popcorn is going to generate a lot of “why’s”.</p>

<p>this guy probably has a perfectly clean record…maybe not even a speeding ticket. At 71 to commit a “first crime” (assuming it is a crime) and for it to be such a serious one is very strange, indeed.</p>

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<p>following report of a woman who was similarly told to stop texting and then was glared at and later, even followed to the restroom by the retired cop in question a few weeks previously</p>

<p>I think this is being investigated. The theater may have cameras. I don’t think anyone knows for sure if this was the same person, but is could have been.</p>

<p>the person who may know a lot is his wife (about the above event or even any recent strange behaviors), but likely she’s not going to be forthcoming about anything that would make things worse for her H.</p>

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<p>Especially if the speculations about the possibility that not only her personal interest in her spouse, but also her own economic interests are at stake in the event the victim’s family decides to launch a wrongful death suit against the retired cop and the possibility his pension from being a veteran cop may be terminated if he’s convicted of this crime. </p>

<p>Don’t know if the latter is possible, but it has been discussed in some reports and comments under those reports.</p>

<p>There’s also the spouse of the victim who was herself, wounded by the same gunshot. However, she understandably is also not an unbiased party. </p>

<p>Fortunately, there are 25 other witnesses who were there and saw/heard the entire incident.</p>

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<p>*possibility his pension from being a veteran cop may be terminated if he’s convicted of this crime. *</p>

<p>wow…is that true? Interesting. </p>

<p>you’re right that she does have a vested interest in minimizing a wrongful death lawsuit. I wonder which “take” she’ll likely have: 1) he’s been acting totally normal/sane lately…or…2) he’s been acting touchy/explosive lately. </p>

<p>Interesting…their off-duty-cop-son was supposed to be at the theater, but was late with his arrival. He arrived JUST after his dad fired his gun. Sad…if he had been there, he may have been able to stop this whole thing by getting his dad to calm down or move to another seat.</p>

<p>there was a off-duty cop sitting several seats away (not sure if same row). He was the one who disarmed the shooter after he fired his gun.</p>

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<p>And more speculation. </p>

<p>Police officers and many security guard agencies require pre-employment psychological screening, so even if the records from the Tampa PD are long gone, perhaps there are records from his hire at Busch Gardens. If they exist, whether they are released is unclear, though they belong to the agency who requested it, not the client completing the evaluation (HIPAA does not apply).</p>

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<p>Here is a good recounting of the events,including some from a witness: [Curtis</a> Reeves, Movie Theater Shooting Suspect, Allegedly Shot Chad Oulson For Texting During ‘Lone Survivor’ [VIDEO, PHOTO]](<a href=“http://www.ibtimes.com/curtis-reeves-movie-theater-shooting-suspect-allegedly-shot-chad-oulson-texting-during-lone-survivor]Curtis”>Curtis Reeves, Movie Theater Shooting Suspect, Allegedly Shot Chad Oulson For Texting During 'Lone Survivor' [VIDEO, PHOTO])</p>

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<p>I have to leave this state ASAP…</p>

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<p>^^
lol…I really don’t think that in this case, the fact that it happened in FL makes a real difference. I don’t think being a retired cop from Florida made the difference. This guy could be in any state and would likely have had this same strange reaction.</p>

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<p>How comparable are psychological screenings from his earliest days of employment as a cop during the mid-late '60’s? How much bearing/applicability would they have considering he retired from law enforcement more than 20 years ago?</p>

<p>Also, can one rule out the possibility this incident may not have been due to mental illness/disability/diminished capacity, but was due to simply feeling entitled to telling others what to do in public and losing his temper when the other party refused to comply during his desired timeframe? </p>

<p>I’m wondering as I’ve observed plenty of folks growing up and a few even in past workplaces who had short fuses and would start yelling or even damaging/destroying institutional property when they lost their tempers because they didn’t get their way at all or quickly enough. </p>

<p>The ones from my childhood ended up serving time at Rikers and other prisons and the ones at work were either strongly counseled/disciplined or terminated in short order.</p>

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<p>As I said, its more likely that the more recent eval before hiring on at Busch Gardens would be what is available. And either eval, were the earlier one still to be available, would be a source of comparison, or baseline data. Some testing evaluates personality/character traits, which tend to be pretty stable over time.</p>

<p>And yes, the question of personality style, culpability vs diminished capacity can be evaluated through a forensic evaluation. </p>

<p>And I’d put more credence in comparative psych testing from a few decades ago than the those often irrelevant anecdotal stories about HS and cousins or what happened on the NYC subway decades ago. Just sayin.</p>

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<p>*I’m wondering as I’ve observed plenty of folks growing up and a few even in past workplaces who had short fuses and would start yelling or even damaging/destroying institutional property when they lost their tempers because they didn’t get their way at all or quickly enough. </p>

<p>The ones from my childhood ended up serving time at Rikers and other prisons and the ones at work were either strongly counseled/disciplined or terminated in short order.*</p>

<p>I don’t know about those particular folks, but in my experience…when I’ve experienced people who behaved like that they’ve had Dx’d disorders like Borderline PD and/or alcoholism.</p>

<p>I was once called a nasty name by an alcoholic at work. I had rebuffed his advances and was called the c-word. another employee overheard, went to our boss and the guy was fired.</p>

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<p>I mentioned those anecdotes to show some data points on how bad tempers with few exceptions tend to become a normalized part of our daily lives, especially with people we don’t know very well outside of family and close friends. </p>

<p>Having a short temper and losing it doesn’t necessarily mean one has mental illness/disability/diminished capacity. It could be a personality/character trait as you’ve mentioned, whether dormant or deliberately kept hidden for a while.</p>

<p>As an aside, what do you think of the effectiveness of anger management classes for defendants who were sentenced to take them as part of their sentences? What do you think of opinions in some quarters that they’re ineffective in reforming folks with long past histories of violence or tempers?</p>

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<p>Out of curiosity, how would you happen to know about someone’s diagnosis?</p>

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<p>*Having a short temper and losing it doesn’t necessarily mean one has mental illness/disability/diminished capacity. It could be a personality/character trait as you’ve mentioned, whether dormant or deliberately kept hidden for a while.</p>

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<p>The range for normal angry behavior may be wide. But, when people are “losing it” at work (breaking things, punching walls, shoving people, etc), that seems (to me) to suggest that a person could be outside the range of normal. Everyone gets annoyed, everyone gets angry…but violent or violent-like behavior seem to be outside the normal range. </p>

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<p>As an aside, what do you think of the effectiveness of anger management classes for defendants who were sentenced to take them as part of their sentences? What do you think of opinions in some quarters that they’re ineffective in reforming folks with long past histories of violence or tempers?*</p>

<p>I wonder what goes on in anger mgmt classes. Anyone know?</p>

<p>Out of curiosity, how would you happen to know about someone’s diagnosis?</p>

<p>Who are you asking? If it’s me, then with the alcoholic at work, he readily told me. He also told me that he was on some kind of medication that was supposed to make him very ill if he drank (I have no idea what that was.) The person had the office next to me. When he was hired, he told me about his alcoholism. He was friendly at first, but when I turned down his “advances” (and I was married at the time, so he shouldn’t have taken it so personally!), he became kind of scary (got right in my face and yelled at me), so I asked him to leave my office. He got even more angry and called me the C-word as he was walking out (and another person overheard). </p>

<p>If it’s about the BPD person, that was a relation by marriage to H’s sis. His Dx wasn’t a secret. He openly admitted to it as did his (now ex) wife (H’s sis). He punched holes in walls, was extremely jealous over NOTHING, expected complete “obedience”, didn’t tolerate any opposing opinions on any issue, etc.</p>