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Lieutenant Michael Pigott, who ordered the fatal Tasering of an emotionally disturbed person, killed himself this morning. WABC 7 reports "Pigott reported to Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, where he took his life shortly after 6 a.m." and another officer "sustained a non-life threatening injury during the incident." Pigott had been stripped of his gun and badge after the Tasering, where Iman Morales fell to his death, and yesterday, the 21-year police force veteran had said he was "truly sorry for what happened." The Daily News suggests that Pigott, who turned 46 today, went to Floyd Bennett Field--where the Emergency Services Unit in headquartered--because there are weapons there.
Lieutenant in Fatal Taser Incident Commits Suicide
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i guess sometimes cops are people too.
Just when you thought it couldn't get any more tragic...
So, so sad. Another pointless death.
The one who killed the poor guy should do the same.
Hope youre happy now libs. You got what you wanted
Whaa??????
This is horribly sad.
Good job NYPD Psych Services!!!
Nobody kills himself over one bad decision. Nobody who's sane, anyway. So that is how it is.
The naked man dying was not tragic. And neither is this. Suicide is a selfish act, sometimes necessary, not good or bad. And it isn't looking for sympathy. None given.
"The naked man dying was not tragic. And neither is this."
Yeah, yeah it IS tragic. These are lives, MFer. You can impose your moral and political beliefs on to these people and the circumstances surrounding their deaths, but the fact is that these were human lives. These people were loved by family and friends, no doubt.
sad.
Man, that's sad. Everyone here was harping on the nypd guys even though they'd run the fuck away from naked flourescent guy if they ever saw him.
Sorry to hear, Tasering that man was a mistake, but not one worth killing yourself about.
"sometimes necessary, not good or bad. And it isn't looking for sympathy. None given"?
(sigh)
IMO, Never necessary, always bad and often looking for Sympathy.
"they'd run the fuck away from naked flourescent guy if they ever saw him."
babhitler,
have you ever had a mentally ill family member? yes, mental illness is scary and, yes, most strangers would run away from the naked man and call the police, but that doesn't mean the mentally ill man deserved to die. this officer also did not deserve to die.
what a coward.. typical NYPD'r
i don't like pigs but i certainly didn't want him killed or for him to commit suicide, it's very sad.
if his actions bothered him that much he should have started a unit to train other pigs on how to deal with the mentally disturbed.
both deaths are tragic.
Can someone refresh me as to why the taser use was unnecessary to begin with? I, too, think people are too quick to taser. But if someone was posing a threat to themselves and to others, you should be able to use lethal force to take them down.
Very sad.
This blog has become a forum at times for cop bashing. I've had several unfavorable run-ins with the cops, but realize they are human like the rest of us.
Better people think twice the next time they rant nasty here, or else call a crazy naked guy the next time you are being mugged.
Bottomless Chips, sometimes i think you just like arguing with people here, but i'll bite:
he was isolated on a store awning, the area was cordoned off, he posed no danger to anyone. maybe he posed a danger to himself because of the light bulb, but all the police had to do was wait him out and/or get someone to talk him down, it was 10 feet, had he not been tasered he could have hopped down without a problem.
the pigs were impatient & tasered him, his muscles froze & he fell on his head. understand now?
I blame the liberal media. This poor guy was never going to hear the end of this. It ruined his carrer, and life. Terrible :'(
I hope this provides a lesson for future police interaction with mentally disturbed citizens, and a lesson for how to care for a public servent who needed some support after the incident. Both deaths are tragic and could have been avoided. I count NYPD officers as some of my best friends and know that generalizations about the men and women who keep our street safe are based on a lack of understanding and empathy for the challange police face every time they go on duty. My condolences to both of these families.
n
Bottomless Chips - Zodak is right, but it boils down to the last point. Taser a person on a 10-ft. ledge and they fall limply. Fall limp from 10 feet, and you can easily die. He did.
That's unspeakably awful. RIP.
c'mon everybody get real. we're all guilty until proven guilty by the Fascist Security Forces (aka NY's Finest). the naked guy was guilty and properly terminated(murdered by a Fascist). the fascist(why am i not surprised)then terminated himself (the only right we have by the way). why? because he was guilty! wake up and smell the coffee, no-one is innocent. we're all guilty!
he did the right, honorable thing.
the guilt was too much and was haunting him.
now both can rest in peace.
This is really sad. There are no winners in all this. Well, except for the dead tazered guy's family after they sue the city.
Oh my god, this is absolutely devastating. I can't even begin
"You can impose your moral and political beliefs on to these people..."
STFU, Vanessa. Biggest hypocrite on Gothamist. No one tells other people how they should feel or speaks on behalf of others with more consistency or sanctimony than you.
I resent that remark as I was conciliatory in saying that I, too, think people are too quick to the taser.
But again, he was endangering his life so you use force in that matter, right?
A big to do was made over this, which is probably why he lost his badge.
Like I said, taser cases bother me, but not this one. If you're in that position, you have no idea what this guy is capable of doing to himself or others. Tasering college students at assemblies or drivers who get huffy over getting pulled over is quite different than someone standing on a ledge, naked, and holding a light bulb. Who knows his deal?
If that was my fire escape or awning, I'd push him off. You might be disturbed, but that's my property. You're trespassing. Get the hell off, or I'll get the cops to get you off.
The PC-ness over that guy's "rights" "pisses the shit out of me."
/bissinger'd
Trespass on an awning while naked, holding a light bulb...I think you're there at your own risk and peril.
someone post that story on the bride who was on a ledge and was gingerly taken down by the nice officers to her safety.
if they pushed him off he might have survived.
oh man, how sad! 21 years on. he could have retired last year, and this would never have even happened.
ugh. I can only imagine how i don't know if i would be able to live with myself if i was responsible for someone else's death.
devastating all the way around.
"But again, he was endangering his life so you use force in that matter, right?"
I'm not sure I understand this thinking.. he's on a ledge endangering his own life, so let's taser him?
"Trespass on an awning while naked, holding a light bulb...I think you're there at your own risk and peril."
That assumes the person in question is thinking rationally and can properly assess risk, no?
That truly is tragic. You know, as much as we all know there are jerkoff cops in NYC. The majority of police get treated pretty horribly all the time. It costs us nothing to just be nice to them when it's appropriate... and lord knows they could use a little support from time to time.
Takes a pretty empathetic person to get that bent out of shape over something like this. And in an NYPD officer, that sort of empathy is a rare gift. It's sad it would take a tragedy like this for the public to realize this and maybe go easy on the demonizing. Even decent people make mistakes occasionally.
My thoughts go out to his family. I am pretty sure they can be proud of him.
Let's see if Commissioner Kelly continues to hide behind the Blue Wall of Everything's A-OK. There's an unusually high incidence of suicide among the NYPD, in addition to the continued charges of brutality brought against cops (and captured on videotape), as well as cops being arrested for crimes such as drug dealing.
But Kelly will continue to pretend that everything is fine and that these ongoing incidents are merely isolated incidents. Maybe this tragedy will force him to drop the pretense.
Yes. The idea is that if you thought someone was going to endanger themselves on the ledge of building---and if you were to tackle the person to bring them inside a window or wherever, is that too much force? If someone's holding a knife and saying, "Leave me alone!" And you fire a rubber bullet at the person, is that too much force?
If the rubber bullet kills them, the tackle breaks their neck, or the taser has them fall on their head---do I feel bad for the person and blame the cops? No.
What? I could say the same thing while driving drunk. "Sorry. I cannot accept the consequences of my actions and you cannot touch me or arrest me, as I was not thinking rationally and could not assess the risk. So I think you should let me go freely, officer.
Now that's a good cop.
A dead bad cop.
Horrific, sad turn of events. I don't like the NYPD's tactics or attitude, but this news gives me a lot of empathy towards the Lieutenant and his family.
Damn! this police man should have gotten some useful psicological support! Probably he felt cornered and with infinite guilt. Tragic
This entire situation has been tragic and this only compounds it.
The majority of people commenting on this story are using it as a springboard for their continued RIDICULOUS argumentative trolling behavior.
the use of terms like: "liberal media, pig, fascists...etc just goes to prove my point BUT I guess its not the internet without a few people with personality disorders.
This is unbelievably sad.
no, it's certainly not.
as long as I can get on lolcats, I'm happy.
The extremes of opinion here are amazing. The people blaming liberals. MFer living up to his name. The crazies saying it's a good thing both guys are dead. Nobody should be dead. The cop made one hell of a stupid mistake. He should have paid for that, but the cost should not have been his life. This was not premeditated murder and he probably wouldn't have gone to prison, just kicked off the force.
It just seems Pigott followed one bad decision with a second. Maybe he really did need help, not just before he killed himself, but even before the Taser incident.
When you make a mistake, someone's usually there telling you that no matter how bad it will get, there's life afterwards. That wasn't true for Mr Morales, and apparently it wasn't true for Lt. Pigott. Some mistakes just go on claiming lives.
"Hope youre happy now libs. You got what you wanted"
Sounds like this makes YOU happy, you get to make a dumb comment!
"The idea is that if you thought someone was going to endanger themselves on the ledge of building---and if you were to tackle the person to bring them inside a window or wherever, is that too much force?"
The guy is endangering himself on the ledge. You could take an action that might bring him inside, but might very reasonably kill him. Is it worth that risk? I think not.
Drunkenness is obviously different because it is self-inflicted. Mental issues are not. Which is why drunkenness is not an excuse for criminal actions, and mental issues are. I've read nothing that says the ledge guy was drunk.
how quickly Gothamist forgets...
white woman described as beautiful and a "fallen angel" by cops, gently lowered to the ground by ladder....
http://gothamist.com/2007/07/21/park_slopes_run.php
hey, that's the story!
they were ESU, too.
Puss.
Cop or no cop, he's a human being. very sad. rip.
what the fuck
The fact is the police called for a special mat to catch Morales, but didn't want to wait. So, he was zapped and fell to his death.
But, suicide wasn't the right way. Imagine the pain that Pigott's family will suffer.
These two men had names, lives and people who cared about them. Don't forget this.
frankbooth, you obviously got things mixed up.
Cowards are people like you, who sit behind the computer thinking that they make a differece by making ignorant comments on a news blog, while these "typical cowards", who made a career decision to 'make a difference', deal with the worst of new york city on a daily basis.
That alone takes a toll on someone as it obviously did with this guy.
this whole story is tragic.
Another death that can be attributed directly to 0bama. And there will be many, many more.
actually the standard line/comments found on the interwebs regarding suicides are selfish and coward.
as in a selfish and coward way out.
See: It's a tough call. Do you let him stand there and just walk away? Do you wait hours? Or do you do something? It's not an easy call any way you slice it, so this is why I cannot vilify the cop using a taser in this instance.
How do you differentiate between the two? You can't. Someone who is distraught is distraught. It could be from years of drug use, it could be recent drug use, it could be a drunk, or it could be someone who is having a bad day.
My point---where I never said "yay, I'm glad ___ is dead" nor did I use liberal media, pig of facist---is that the situation was overblown.
at the time he was probably thinking he was doing a good thing - diminishing the situation through a safe and non-lethal means.
then all the shit goes south and the guy dies.
...and everyone is calling him a murderer.
Don't get me wrong, I hate the cops. But I feel really bad for this guy. So sad.
All,
I heard about the suicide and came to Gothamist in fear of the cop-bashing I'd read. In all honesty, of the 50-something comments, only a handful are retarded, and most seem to show sympathy for the man.
Even those who seem to be very anti-police had nice things to say here. Thank you.
RIP to him. It is a shame this has turned out the way it has since the beginning.
"Do you let him stand there and just walk away?"
Talk about a strawman... the debate over the use of the taser has been done to death, so I won't bother to continue on that point. Obviously we disagree.
"How do you differentiate between the two? You can't."
This is completely irrelevant. Let's revisit the earlier discussion:
ME: That assumes the person in question is thinking rationally and can properly assess risk, no?
YOU: What? I could say the same thing while driving drunk.[]
ME: [They're different situations]
YOU: [But it's impossible to tell the difference]Your original argument was that the victim is responsible for his death because he was on the ledge to begin with, and should have known that being on the ledge was dangerous. I believe that you cannot hold someone who is not of sound mind fully responsible for their actions, and you certainly cannot hold them responsible for the actions of others. This is generally how our legal system functions.
I never claimed you said "yay" anything, so I dunno what that last line is about.
See: It's a tough call. Do you let him stand there and just walk away? Do you wait hours? Or do you do something? It's not an easy call any way you slice it, so this is why I cannot vilify the cop using a taser in this instance.
This situation was quite simple. They had very little to gain and everything to lose by Tasering Morales. They had no way to grab him and the guy wasn't presenting a clear and present danger even to himself. If they had just backed off a little bit and tried to de-escalate the situation, it probably would have turned out fine. There's no reason the cop on the fire escape couldn't have just gone back inside. That should be basic ESU conflict resolution. Don't push the situation if you don't have to.
For all you lunatics glad that Pigott's gone, try thinking for a minute about his wife and three kids, who probably won't even get his pension. I know it's hard to get that into your tiny brains, but just try.
That is the second time today that preview has lied to me. The blockquote was supposed to go through the line, "YOU: [But it's impossible to tell the difference]".
the funny thing is that the cops will continue to bust chops and harass bikers during critical mass.
it's ingrained in their culture, you're not "them".
so you don't understand.
so don't think for a second a cop would have feelings like this for any citizen.
even the victim's family felt bad for the situation during today's funeral. did the police union say anything like that?
re soopaman:>>I blame the liberal media
You're commenting in a day and age where Murdoch owns WSJ. Why don't you just say you blame women's lib, or prohibition.
I blame Ford for his damn fancy motor buggies!
Now that's a good cop.
A dead bad cop.
heartless and sad!!!
You need to think about what would happen if you were on the corner, some savage walked up to you, stabbed you with a machete, stole all your money, grabbed your girlfriend, gang banged her in front of you, then walked away......who would you call? Your Mommy? NO!!!! You would call the police!
I feel so sad for both families. I am sure that little Shaquanda that turned in the video she took from her stolen cell phone would have no clue of drama that would come out of this horrible incident. Nor the mother who called 911 to get help for her son. The EDP who wanted to cause a scene because he clearly was looking to get attention by standing on the fire escape.
I feel sorry for the people that turned this comment into a rant to bash cops. It should be a rant to educate people about EDP's and post traumatic stress disorder. Both need to be handled with "kid gloves."