This year the State of Ohio has once again mandated that all LEOs attend 24 hours of Continuing Professional Training (CPT). This can be done by watching 24 hours worth of State produced videos or agencies can send their personnel through State approved, in person classes. We chose to do the majority of our training in-house using approved in person classes. One of the topics we chose to do in person was responding to active threat (AT) incidents. Doing all the paperwork to get this class approved was a royal pain, but well worth it. The training was done in 4 hour blocks. Each block included a lecture and debriefs of AT incidents, some refresher work on clearing rooms and stairs, scenarios and then a medical component that included a refresher on trauma treatment and a refresher on our Rescue Task Force procedures. It was a busy 4 hours. 2 sessions per day, max of 12 per session. Since we have an excellent working relationship with our local Sheriff’s Office and these types of trainings are manpower intensive, we did this as a joint training of the 2 agencies.
I’ve been teaching AT response for quite a few years and one of the things that really stuck out to me this week was how AT training has changed over the years. I was working dayshift as a rookie fresh out of FTO that fateful day of 4/20/1999 and I remember watching the news thinking about how we would deal with that if it happened here. I remember the summer of ‘99 when we had our first AT training – learning the “Quad” system (4 man teams) and being told that 50% casualties were expected if we had to do this for real. I remember working the day of Virginia Tech and watching the news with my Drug Task Force partners and discussing the problems the VT police had getting into the buildings. I remember Ron Borsch’s advocacy of the solo officer response and the furor it created in some police training circles. In 2009, I remember when my agency had our first solo officer AT training. And in 2012, I was privileged to be asked to help create the State of Ohio’s Single Officer Response to Active Threat (SORAT) training program.
Those SORAT creation days were interesting to say the least. 25-30 trainers, predominantly SWAT dudes, arguing tactics. We eventually worked out what we thought were the best tactics and ran them in scenarios at Columbus PD’s Academy to see how they worked. Once we validated them, we ended up teaching them across the State as contract instructors for the Ohio Peace Officer Training Academy. The training was free of charge to agencies. Like many good things the State has done, the free SORAT program went by the wayside when the State realized how expensive it was (we used A LOT of Simunitions rounds in those classes). But the important thing was that the State of Ohio had bought into the solo Officer response and continued to offer those classes for a fee and created a SORAT Instructor program so agencies could do the training on their own.
During the first part of the training we did a lecture portion that included some debriefs of previous incidents. We also watched this version of the bodycam video released after the Nashville Covenant School shooting a few months ago. Prior to watching the video I asked everyone to keep a mental list of good and bad things they noticed about the NMPD response. Before going any further, let me say I think those guys did a great job. Although there were several things from the video we discussed, there were two key takeaways I wanted to cover with everyone. And each group noticed exactly what I wanted them to. First, everyone noticed how one Officer took charge and was pushing the fight and giving direction to other Officers. We had a discussion about being that Officer if need be. Second, every group commented on how often the Officers muzzled each other. Once they keyed in on that I took the opportunity to reinforce the real world application of the firearm safety rules and talked about stacking rule violations on top of each other and how that can (and does) lead to shooting people who shouldn’t be shot.
After the lecture, we split the group up and did a medical portion and scenarios. The scenario that we came up with for this week was this – active shooter at a local school. The shooter entered the school by shooting out a glass door and was last seen on surveillance cameras on the second floor (sound familiar?). When the responding Officer or Deputy entered the building they had to go up a flight of stairs. The stairwell had a landing halfway up and opened up directly to the second floor hallway with no second floor door. An awful stairwell to clear by yourself. Once they hit the second floor, they had to locate the shooter somewhere on the second floor. A combination of indicators (bodies, shell casings, etc.) and stimulus (gunfire and role players) led the Officer/Deputy to the bad guy. A second unit was sent into the building about the time the first unit would confront the shooter. The second unit would have to successfully link up with the first unit and work together to do whatever they felt was needed.
We’ve been doing AT scenario training for years, but this year we were able to throw in something new – elementary school aged role players. One of my training staff called me and asked if his son (11 year old) could attend and act as an injured student. I, of course, said yes. It worked out well. Extremely well. We eventually had two 13 year old girls and two 11 year old boys acting as injured kids. It turned out to be quite a gut check for many of the responding Officers and Deputies. As I followed each Officer/Deputy up the stairs I was watching their face to see when it dawned on them that the screaming victim at the top of the stairs was a bloody 11 year old boy. Fake blood, but still an 11 year old boy covered in fake blood and begging for help. One Officer sticks out in my mind. When he got to the top of the stairs and realization dawned, he stopped and stared for a few seconds before he moved on to look for the shooter. I could see the look on his face change from apprehension about the scenario to sheer determination to find the shooter and stop the threat. He moved on and then came upon the 13 year old blood covered girl screaming for help, but didn’t stop. The next 11 year old boy covered in blood that he came upon didn’t phase him and he did what he needed to do – move to the sound of the gunfire and stop the bad guy.
That scene was repeated time and time again this week. Throughout the week I made some notes about the good, the bad, and the ugly from these scenarios and thought I’d write them down and share them. Here they are, in no particular order:
CQB TACTICS: One of the biggest changes that stuck in my mind was the switch we’ve made from performing dynamic entries to now fighting from the threshold when we can. It is always interesting watching the difference between old school Officers who “grew up” on dynamic entry, especially old former SWAT dudes like me, and the younger guys who learned fighting from the threshold from the beginning. Old guys seem to have a tendency to revert back to that dynamic entry when it’s go time. The old guys all got the job done, but not all of them came out unscathed. Overall, I think fighting from the threshold is a better way to go if it’s an option.
RADIO TRAFFIC: People may disagree with me, but probably 90% of the radio traffic that the responding units put out was a waste of time and effort. Our County has a county wide AT protocol that calls for solo Officer response. Like many places, when that AT call goes out, everyone that can respond is coming. Debriefs from AT incidents show that time and time again radio traffic became a problem during these responses. It’s a certainty that it will happen and I’m not sure it’s avoidable. At least with our radio system. So we figured that into the scenario and planned for it. One of the trainers would act as Dispatch and clutter the air with radio traffic. One of the traps that many of the responding units fell into was in trying to update Dispatch on every “little” thing – victim in the stairwell, victim at the top of the stairs, victim in the hallway, blah, blah, blah. What’s the problem(s) with doing that? I see a couple of problems – when you can’t get on the radio so you stop what you’re doing and keep trying to get on the radio it wastes time. Precious time. It diverts your attention away from what’s important – looking for the bad guy. It takes one hand away from whatever weapon system you happen to be using, which is a real problem if your using a rifle or shotgun. As a solo officer responding to this scenario, there are only a few things I think you need to put out on the radio prior to stopping the bad guy: (1) you’re on scene; (2) what door you enter; (3) specific shooter location info when you know it (they’re on the second floor, etc.). Once the bad guy is stopped, more detailed information can be put out on the radio – bad guy is stopped, specific location bad guy was stopped, victim info, etc. One of the things we reminded everyone – your radio emergency button, if pressed, will lock out everyone on the channel but the person who pressed it and Dispatch. Which means it can be used to override all the radio chatter so you can update everyone with the important info. You just have to remember to reset it or have Dispatch reset it once you’ve put out the critical info.
WHAT’s IMPORTANT NOW: WIN. One of the issues we consistently saw was the struggle with understanding the WIN principle. Here’s what I mean – the solo officer’s primary goal is to find bad guy and stop him using whatever legal means they have at their disposal. That’s what’s important NOW. Once the bad guy has been engaged and is down, WIN changes. Now it’s time to SLOW DOWN, breathe and THINK. Quite a few Officers and Deputies charged right up to the bad guy they just shot and went to handcuff them by themselves. Or ran right up next to the bad guy to kick the bad guys gun away from them (thanks Hollywood). WHY? We don’t teach (at least we don’t) taking an armed/possibly armed felony suspect into custody by yourself unless absolutely necessary, so why do it now? We would ask them during debriefs why they did that and the answer was usually something like “I felt like I needed to do something”. Yes, you do need to do something. Several things actually. But I don’t think charging right up to bad guy is one of them. Breathe. Quickly assess the immediate area. Order able bodied people in the room out and to drag injured people with them (if they can). Get on the radio and update everyone on where you are and that shooter is down. Get a good position to monitor the bad guy and prevent a possible blue on blue with the next Officer in. Those are all WIN. When you have another unit or two, THEN move in on bad guy.
WHITE LIGHT USAGE: One of the things our bad guy role player was quick to point out during debriefs was the effectiveness of a PROPERLY used white light. It was evident that we need to reinforce this with all of our non-SWAT (or former SWAT) personnel. He was also quick to point out the drawbacks of an improperly used white light. Maybe 25% used the white light properly. 50% didn’t use it at all and the other 25% used it improperly – mostly by leaving it on and telegraphing where they were at.
OFFICER INVOLVED SHOOTING vs. GUNFIGHT: What am I talking about? The way I look at it, there is a difference between an Officer Involved Shooting (OIS) and an Officer Involved Gunfight. A gunfight indicates that at least TWO people are fighting with guns. Meaning the bad guy gets shots off as well. In an OIS, the good guy shoots and the bad guy doesn’t. Quite often, responding Officers/Deputies let an OIS turn into a gunfight. Still confused? Let me clarify it – if I’m the responding Officer and I have all the information I need to legally use deadly force against a bad guy that just shot up a school then I can probably use deadly force without giving a warning to the bad guy. The Supreme Court has never required us to give warnings before using deadly force in EVERY instance. Sometimes warnings aren’t feasible because taking the time to give them exposes the Officer and/or innocent victims to a continued threat. Stacking unneeded warnings or commands on top of an improper use of cover causes even more problems. Some Officers took rounds they shouldn’t have or had to back out and then try to retake the initiative because of unneeded verbal commands. There are at least two school districts in my county and at least one in a neighboring county that are arming certain non-security staff – admin folks, custodians, whoever. During debriefs with those Officers who gave unneeded verbal orders we asked two questions – did you have some doubt that the person you saw with the gun was the bad guy? If they had a doubt and were concerned that the person with the gun was an armed staff member, then a verbal command or challenge was understandable and the right thing to do. But NOBODY had doubts. Then we asked them why they gave verbal commands. It was usually one of three things: they didn’t remember doing it and it’s just from habit working the street; an improper understanding of case law/policy; or the worst reason – “it looks good on bodycam”. Let’s talk about that some more.
IT LOOKS GOOD ON BODYCAM: This statement came up in two different contexts – giving unnecessary verbal commands and providing aid to the bad guy they just shot. Each time we heard this we’d address the specific situation, but what looks good on bodycam and the fear of being second guessed or criticized because of what’s on the bodycam video is definitely a problem we didn’t use to have. Providing aid to the bad guy is something we must absolutely do when we can. But giving aid to the bad guy before giving aid to the innocent kid they shot is not what we want, expect or demand of them. This seemed to be more of a concern with the younger Officers. I’m not sure how we completely fix that problem.
I have to say, I was proud to see that not a single Officer or Deputy hesitated (beyond the momentary, “oh crap, that’s really a screaming blood covered kid”) once they entered the school. There was definitely room for improvement in some of the scenarios, but overall I was very pleased with the results. Believe it or not, there isn’t a dedicated AT block in the State of Ohio Basic Police Academy curriculum and not many Academies (there are over 60) add it as an extra class. So some of the rookies who attended the training had never had any real AT training prior to this. I was especially happy to see young Officers and Deputies performing well. I worry about the future of law enforcement, but our two agencies seem to have a good crop of youngsters.
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