“My mind replays it over and over; it jolts you every time.”
“There is not a day that goes by that I don’t see her face.”
“No matter who pulls the trigger, no one wins in the end. The only thing I walked away with that night was my life.”
“I killed a man … I wonder if God will forgive me?”
Those thoughts haunt the men and women of law enforcement who have been involved in deadly force incidents in their careers.
And those comments are also featured in a new documentary that I watched last week. “Officer Involved” is a film that captures officer-involved shootings from the perspective of law enforcement.
Jon Thomas, business agent with the Teamsters Local 238, which represents a number of law enforcement officers in central Iowa, as well as Marshalltown Police Chief Mike Tupper, asked if I would sit down to watch the film with officers and their families during a screening in Des Moines.
It was an honor because the film proved to be an emotional journey – one that only a few could ever relate to – the trauma, the stress and the ramifications of killing someone while in the line of duty. The film humanizes police officers, giving us an insight into how the use of deadly force transforms these heroes in blue.
Patrick Shaver, the director and creator of the film, said the idea of making this documentary was simply to offer the law enforcement perspective on these incidents that are too often played out in the harsh light of the media.
Throughout the film, officers and sheriff’s deputies, some of whom have been involved in a recent shooting, others of whom were forced to make that split-second decision decades earlier, all recount their stories. The emotional toll is evident; many continue to be haunted, dare I even say tormented, by their actions. Not one of these officers took any pleasure in having to kill someone – they were doing their job, following their training. One officer said in his case he was “shooting to stay alive.”