Eh, some of you guys are a bit off about the role variation that military snipers versus police snipers. The reason why military snipers are trained center of mass is for a bigger target. A downed target, dead or alive, is all they are looking for. You'll also find a majority of people that were stopped that potentially had suicide vests, were shot through center of mass. The line, "one shot one kill" isn't really true for military snipers, who shoot quite (relatively, in comparison) a bit over distance.
As far as police snipers, engagements are nearly always close. A police sniper sets himself on a position with good potential firing solution. The reason why police snipers do headshots say in a hostage situation, is that T-zone shots will shut-down a person instantly, without them tightening up. In the case of a hostage situation (or even a button activated switch), a person will go slack instantly with almost no possibility of any retaliation (e.g pulling the trigger on his last breath). Coming back to the laser sight, the photographs show it was night time when whatshisface got caught. In a close range low-light scenario, a laser sight could/would be used if the sights in the scope of the sniper rifle doesn't show very well. It shows up nicely in low-light situations and as long as the laser is properly sighted with the rifle, its a pretty legitimate use of it.
As far as police snipers, engagements are nearly always close. A police sniper sets himself on a position with good potential firing solution. The reason why police snipers do headshots say in a hostage situation, is that T-zone shots will shut-down a person instantly, without them tightening up. In the case of a hostage situation (or even a button activated switch), a person will go slack instantly with almost no possibility of any retaliation (e.g pulling the trigger on his last breath). Coming back to the laser sight, the photographs show it was night time when whatshisface got caught. In a close range low-light scenario, a laser sight could/would be used if the sights in the scope of the sniper rifle doesn't show very well. It shows up nicely in low-light situations and as long as the laser is properly sighted with the rifle, its a pretty legitimate use of it.
