New York shooting questions remain...

I think it's almost impossible to come up with a scenario that could explain why that many shots were fired that night when Sean Bell was killed by NY police. However, there are still many questions that hopefully will be answered in the days to come. There are also a few things that don't make sense, especially considering some of what is known.

Take this CNN article as an example, it states:

Some in the crowd called for the ouster of Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, yelling "Kelly must go."

The police officers' group 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care said it was issuing a vote of no confidence in Kelly over the shooting.

Demanding Kelly's resignation seems a bit premature since he was not involved in the shooting. Considering that some of the officers involved in the shooting that night were miniorities, (black and hispanic) this does not appear at first glance to be racially motivated and it seems strange that a group of black Law Enforcement officers would issue a no confidence vote in Kelly when it has not been suggested how Kelly bears the responsibility for this shooting. Proper procedures appear as if they are being followed from everything I've read.

I understand the desire of people to protest and the desire to have one person to place the blame on, yet the ultimate responsibility of that evening is strictly on those who were there. As information on this case starts to come out, it does not quite appear to be a situation where there was no provocation, as stated in today's New York Times:

A person familiar with the case who knows the detectives’ version of events said yesterday that it was Mr. Guzman who asked for his gun, and that the first undercover detective on foot clearly identified himself to the occupants of the car and, gun drawn, told them to get out. Instead, the person said, they roared toward him. That detective fired the first shot.

In the ensuing barrage, one shot struck the window of a house, another a window at an AirTrain platform, injuring two Port Authority police officers with flying glass. It appeared that the Altima was struck by 21 shots, fewer than half of the number fired, the police said.

The whole thing most likely took less than a minute. The officer who fired 31 times could have done so in fewer than 20 seconds, with the act of reloading taking less than one second, Mr. Cerar said. The 49 shots that followed the undercover detective’s first may have been contagious shooting, said one former police official who insisted on anonymity because the investigation is continuing.

In the days to come more information will come out and it will hopefully be possible to get an accurate picture of what really happened, but for now, it seems premature to start assuming...