[T]he scenario he teaches does not include what a cop should do when encountering an armed citizen defending himself and others around him. The short-sighted chief I addressed earlier had the primary worry that seeing an armed citizen might prompt his men to shoot the wrong person. Now that we have 48 states with some form of "legal" carry provisions, to not be anticipating this, and preparing and training for it, amounts to nothing less than criminal negligence.With concealed and in some cases open carry becoming more widespread, what are police departments doing to provide for the eventual scenario where officers arrive at a shooting scene involving an armed citizen defending himself?
Right now, the prevailing noises coming from "The Only Ones" brass is they'll have no way of knowing, and somebody's going to get killed.
That's not good enough. It's their job to figure out the dynamics of the society they're paid and expected to operate in, and to just throw out predictions so they can come back with an "I told you so" when they self-fulfill is unacceptable.
What training are police and sheriffs' departments doing to prepare officers for such an encounter? How many simulator programs anticipate an armed citizen with a shoot/don't shoot decision point in their scenarios? What instructions are officers given, and what opportunities do they have to practice for such eventualities?
And importantly, if there is anything out there along these lines, how effective has it proven to be? Who's got the best developed methodology and what mechanism exists to impart lessons learned across the policing community?
That's why this really ought to be a top-down effort. National police groups and major departments ought to be developing such training in coordination with national groups representing armed citizens. Are they? Who? And what?
If there is such a national effort already in existence, and I don't know about it, I submit many others probably don't either--and some public education is in order.
If there isn't, why not? What are we waiting for--a prophecy to come true?
11 comments:
While everything you said is logical and unassailable on a moral plane, we must bear in mind that to this point, police haven't been trained to not shoot unarmed innocents.
I don't hold out much hope for them advocating or even agreeing with any program that requires responsibility from them. From their viewpoint the present system where there are no penalties for shooting and killing the unarmed non-criminal citizen is far superior to a system where they become responsible for making life altering decisions under more difficult circumstances. And were such a system of education, training, and responsibility put in place, what happens to their de facto immunity from legal repercussions when they kill an innocent?
No, I just don't see the law enforcement community, in general, being accepting of such a plan. Perhaps a few who have not yet succumbed to the ubercitizen mentality of most LE agencies, but in general, I think we will see nothing but determined and vicious resistance to any such plan by law enforcement.
If this is to come to pass, it will be forced on them. They will never willingly accept it.
I agree that it would be nice to know what (if any) training is in place for when LEOs run into a citizen defending themselves. But in fairness to the article linked in the linked post, I think the writer assumes his active shooter scenario is that way because there is no resistance. See this bullet point in his list of stats and stuff:
"They strike “stunned, defenseless innocents via surprise ambush. On a level playing field, the typical active killer would be a no-contest against anyone reasonably capable of defending themselves.”"
As such, I'm guessing that if someone there was capable of defending themselves, the writer feels there probably wouldn't be a massacre to respond to. If there was someone there to do so and it was, the situation wouldn't realy fit into the typical "active shooter" category. Be it due to the goblin dying before police arrive, or because a good guy simply had the shooter pinned down (a la Trolley Square).
If the latter, and assuming someone called to tell the police two people were shooting at each other, the response should be different from a massacre either way. Not only because it might be an average person shooting back in self-defense, but for all the responders know, it could involve two bad guys or a bad guy and some other LEO (again, like Trolley Square).
That said, surely most police forces train on what to do if they approach a gunfight which may involve a plainclothes officer of some sort, no? In theory, this shouldn't be much different than dealing with an armed citizen. Much like a cop, the armed good guy would likely lower his weapon and identify himself; as opposed to turning his weapon on the officer and/or shooting more random people then himself in the head.
Illspirit, I can think of at least two cases where cops shot other cops because they were seen with weapons and confronting bad guys.
I don't think they do any of that sort of soul-searching. To admit to having trained for it repeals the defense of "followed department procedure", which has resulted in so many guilty cops going unpunished. I do not believe they will ever willingly surrender that free pass.
As long as LEO's can hide behind the hideous docterine of Sovereign Immunity nothing will cnage.
America has become a Free Fire Zone, and it's citizens have become collateral damage.
Illspirit, I can only base my speculation on what the overwhelming law enforcement mantra is on the subject of armed students and faculty on campuses--that the reason they are against it is because they will not know who the bad guy is when they arrive on scene. My extrapolation is, if that's true on campuses, it ought to be true anywhere. So if the official position is they have no way of knowing, the same would hold true for locales in society at large. And if that is the case, we are all in jeopardy for defending ourselves, not only from an attacker, but from the people we are relying on to ultimately secure the site.
If that is truly the case, based on their protestations, then it would seem some formal training to address the "problem" would be in order.
As for the speculation "surely they must train," if that is the case, then why are all the LEO officials introducing this "concern" into the debate as a way of discouraging armed citizens? Have they in fact anticipated the concerns I raise and are just lying to ensure their agenda wins out?
One cannot rely upon the LEO community to train responding officers to react correctly in the situations y'all have described. At least not until enough CCW citizens have been killed by LEOs and enough civil suits have been filed and enough money has been spent by the State to defend and/or pay for the inevitable lawsuits.
How about CCW instructors teaching armed citizens how to respond when approached by a LEO after or during a shooting incident?
Of course there may be others like myself who will refuse to submit to, apply for, or pay for a CCW course and license as I have real problem with having my 2nd Amendment rights taxed, licensed, regulated, or otherwise infringed.
I guess we'll just have to take our chances.
With the simulator shown here, it would be quite easy to build scenarios you are describing.
Cops get hands-on training
U.S. Marshal Supervisory Inspector James Ergas explains why a computer simulator is so valuable to training.
http://tiny.cc/GiKBJ
I'm afraid the correspondents who suggest that the police receive no training to deal with "armed innocents" situations are quite wrong. I have nearly two decades of police experience which ended in 1998. Even in the 80's and 90's, every police officer in the nation practiced "shoot/don't shoot" exercises that included armed innocents. The message? Everyone with a gun is not a bad guy and you can't shoot people just because they're armed.
This is in fact a fundamental part of police training from the basic to advanced levels. The law does not allow police officers to indiscriminately fire at anyone who is armed in their field of view, and every competent police officer knows this. Each and every competent American cop knows that they will come into contact with armed people every day and it does not bother them in the least. Why not? The police know they have nothing at all to fear from honest armed citizens. And so they are alert and careful, and they aren't trigger happy.
Yes, there is potential for accidents in such situations. Yes, officers can and do make mistakes. But this is an argument for better, more specific training, not for disarming the public.
When a police chief or sheriff moans that his troops are going to kill armed innocents, local citizens are faced with one or two scenarios: He's lying in pursuit of an anti-freedom, gun control goal, or he really isn't providing his troops with the minimum training necessary to protect the public, to say nothing of the lives of the officers. In either case, this is someone who should not be in a position of public trust.
Straightarrow, I can think of two cases (in the same city!) where police shot sleeping people for no apparent reason. This doesn't necessarily mean they're not trained that shooting people while they sleep is bad. As if one even needs training for that. But, like shooting another cop, it can often be proof that some people just can't absorb training. ;)
But, yea, even if they do train, some will probably never admit it.
David, as Straightarrow said, they probably just don't want to give up the excuse in case they do screw up. And, yea, they probably also find it a convenient excuse to push an agenda.
It's also likely that lots of departments without many undercover officers don't spend much time planning for good guys who aren't in uniforms.
Whatever the case, we should be calling them on this training card whenever they play it. Why, I can almost see the smoke coming out of the ears of someone like Miami Chief Timoney now..
anti chief: "If we see armed people in regular clothes, we might mistake them for the bad guy!"
us: "So does this also mean you don't train your officers how not to shoot detectives who might be working with them? What kind of department are you running?!"
anti chief: "Well, ummm... Press conference over!"
uh huh!
Exactly, Illspirit, and Mr. McDaniel confirms it.
Let's shove this in their faces every time they use it.
Post a Comment