The facts are slow in emerging, and I’m still agnostic on the PlayStation3 shooting (an alleged PS3 thief was killed after police had to break into his house), but here’s a scintillating bit of information:

“Authorities have not yet said what exactly prompted the shooting, but according to the arrest report when police were trying to serve the warrant on Strickland another suspect in the robbery, 20-year-old Ryan Mills, showed up at Strickland’s house.

“The report doesn’t go into detail, but we know officers believed Mills was armed and dangerous. There were even pictures of him posing with an assault rifle on his internet webpage.

“Mills’s surprise arrival may have contributed to the chaos that left Peyton Strickland dead.”

The cops are, not surprisingly, being careful in what they release to the media:

“All across the board it has been like pulling teeth to get information in this case, the kind of information that the law enforcement routinely discloses to us in other cases.”

Aside from the dumb, loaded wording, my issue here is whether Freedom of Information laws require faster disclosure. It hasn’t been long since the shooting, and most laws allow a certain amount of time for governmental bodies to digest and prepare documents for public consumption. In a severe case like this, I don’t think it’s unreasonable for an agency to fact-check and investigate the details a little closer than it normally would.

Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.