For sake of argument, apparently up until 1985 it was legal to shoot a fleeing felon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fleeing_felon_rule https://en.wikipedia.org

For sake of argument, apparently up until 1985 it was legal to shoot a fleeing felon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fleeing_felon_rule https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fleeing_felon_rule So at least some of those movies may have just been accurately portraying the practices of the time.