I live in Des Moines. While I'm surprised these acts of violence took place here, I'm not surprised by the fact they are occurring. Earlier this year, a Des Moines officer was stopped at a red light on a main road, when a young man driving the car next to her put his car in park, got out, and proceeded to do a "Chinese fire drill" circling the car, while making crude comments and gestures toward the officers cruiser. He then returned to his car, drove away, while the officer followed with her lights flashing. After driving for several minutes without stopping, the young man stopped, got out of the car and began walking toward the officers window. Her windows were all raised, and her cruiser doors were locked. And instead of rolling down the window, getting out of the car to use non lethal force, or calling any of the several other officers within minutes for back up, (or, my personal favorite, just driving away) she unholsters her pistol and fires repeatedly, through her closed window, into his body, while he tried to run away from the gunfire. He was unarmed, and probably not mentally sound. This piece of news got almost no air play, while she was on paid administrative leave for a few months and is now back working in my area, for the same department that one of these officers lost their lives trying to protect. It's these events that cause rifts between a community and their police force. when we stop seeing the constant unjustified murders of our fellow man at the hands of police, just to watch them get paid leave and put back on the force within months, these events will start to happen less and less.