Yesterday an individual somehow managed to get a weapon into a police interview room and apparently drew the weapon against himself, which lead to an officer involved shooting:
A man was injured after a police shooting inside Minneapolis City Hall Monday afternoon.
Police chief Medaria Arradondo said Minneapolis police personnel were interviewing the man, and then left him alone in a room.
“And he began injuring himself with an edged weapon. After attempting to subdue the adult male subject, officers discharged their weapons,” Arradondo said.
The man was rushed to Hennepin County Medical Center. His condition is not known.
One has to wonder how the individual got the weapon into the interview room but I digress.
The more I see the term “officer involved shooting” the more I realize how euphemistic it is. The first reports of this incident simply mentioned an officer involved shooting, which didn’t tell me if an officer was shot, if an officer shot somebody, or if all parties involved were shot. If you read a headline that says, “An officer involved shooting occurred at the Minneapolis City Hall,” you might be lead to believe that somebody shot a police officer.
Why can’t people use the far less ambiguous description, “An officer shot somebody,” or, “An officer was shot?” Why do so many people fell the need to tiptoe around what actually happened?