Before Officer Stephen Rankin fatally shot 18-year-old William Chapman, when an autopsy found the first unarmed man he killed was shot 11 times, residents of this city in southern Virginia voiced their dismay on the website of a local newspaper.
Talk to the men and women in our armed forces who face people with weapons every day, wrote one. You dont use deadly force against unarmed citizens ever.
One commenter, however, stood out for his combative endorsement of Rankins actions during the April 2011 encounter with Kirill Denyakin, a 26-year-old Kazakhstani cook.
Whats the difference if it was one round or 11 rounds or 111 rounds? he wrote, using the screen name yourealythinkthat. When I was in Iraq, that would have been a good shoot, he said later. In fact, nobody would have really given it a second thought.
Speaking under oath six months and 246 supportive comments later, Rankin, a US navy veteran, admitted that yourealythinkthat was him.
