Monday, 19 July 2010

A Tale of Two Cities - Police Heroic Acts

These two recent incidents must have been the greatest heroic acts by the respective police force of the two cities.

While the woman detective from GuangZhou had obviously rescued a young hostage even though her motive for firing subsequent shots was questionable, what is our very young police officer from Singapore trying to prove and please?

Singapore - Police Force
During Flash Flood on 17 July 2010 Saturday

Abstracted From :
Straits Times Online
Jul 19, 2010
By Mavis Toh

The 57-year-old veteran Lianhe Wanbao photojournalist was snapping shots of the flood in the Bukit Timah area when he was told by a policeman to move away. Minutes later, he was handcuffed.

What happened before the handcuffs were used is a matter of dispute: Mr Goh said he was asked to go only once and was about to leave when the police handcuffed him. The police, however, said that they had repeatedly asked Mr Goh to leave before they resorted to using force.

Speaking to The Straits Times on Sunday, Mr Goh said he was standing on a manhole trying to get a picture of some partially submerged cars when he was told by an officer to leave.

A police statement released on Sunday, however, said that officers had repeatedly asked Mr Goh to move to a safe place as he was taking photographs in a dangerous position. But the man refused to comply and continued walking along the road divider, snapping pictures.

A spokesman said: 'As he was causing obstruction to the police officer in the discharge of his duties and causing danger to himself and others, the officers decided to restrain him and move him to safe grounds, but the man resisted and put up a struggle.' The officers then had to handcuff him.


Left : Lianhe Wanbao photojournalist
Right : SPF Officer


GuangZhou (China) - Police Force
6 July 2010
Dramatic Shooting Incident to Release Girl Hostage

The incident started around 8 p.m. July 6, after a botched robbery by an assailant wielding a pair of scissors.

The drama was broadcast live on Chinese TV in GuangZhou. The dramatic video footage of the hostage situation in China's Guangzhou city  ended when a plain-clothed policewoman shot the assailant dead from close range. The suspect, armed with scissors, kept police away by taking the hostage after having committed a robbery. He can be seen in the video stabbing the hostage with the scissors and forcing her to test the bottles of water he made police repeatedly deliver to him. Watch the tense end to the crisis below.


One Netizen wrote :-

"Am I the only one with any inkling of sympathy for the man? Most criminals aren't the kind of people who do it for a living. They're everyday people that were pushed to commit crime to keep themselves/their families from starving. This man didn't seem like some sort of triad hit man. I mean just look at the weapon he used. A pair of scissors. Not a knife, not a gun, but an office supply.

Even the way he was dressed made me think he could have been someone who had been out of work for months and woke up tired everyday trying to find a job in this country of over 1 billion people. I felt bad for him and he seemed like someone who just desperately needed money maybe to cure an illness that he or someone in his family has or to feed his family for just one more day. He didn't seem like some sort of crazed junkie, he didn't seem like a hardened career criminal. He just seemed like a regular guy that was pushed into dire straights.

Now I'm not saying that I think he did the right thing in that situation, but at the same time he is someone who was normal but had just gone mad with desperation. I'm sure in his mind he felt horrible every time he stabbed the hostage and just wished that the police would let him go.

As for the police woman, she did the right thing I guess, but I feel like she could have used a stun gun or mace to subdue him. Heck I think any one of those other officers had that option available to them but refused to take it. Pretty sad news story this all."

Some are disturbed that the cop shot the hostage-taker four times, killing him, even though he appeared to have been taken out of action by the first shot and was armed only with a pair of scissors.

But others are celebrating her as a hero.

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