Great post! I think also what gets lost is in almost all of these police shootings is in part to non-compliance to police officers orders. If you see the flashing patrol lights, you pull over immediately, wait for the officer to approach your vehicle, roll the window down and wait to calmly address the officer. When the officer gives you instructions such as "license and registration" you comply by giving the officer the information he/she requests. You do have the right to ask why they are pulling you over. If the officer gives you a citation, you have the right to either plead guilty and pay the fine, or plead not guilty and go to court and contest the ticket. Where problems arise is when people do not pull over and try to avoid the police, or instead of staying in the vehicle during the traffic stop, the person gets out of the vehicle without being instructed to do so (that is considered a threat to police). To give you a statistic, the minimum safe distance an officer has to be from a person with a knife is 21 feet. Another issue is running from the police. If people would comply with police, then there would not be police shootings.
Are there bad police officers and those that abuse their authority? Absolutely, but the same can be said in any profession. There are those that once they get into position of authority, they go on a power trip and feel they can treat anyone anyway they feel because of their position. What makes law enforcement different is their authority to use deadly force.