April 7, 2009
From TheKCGuy
Last week's meeting of the Prairie Village Citizen Police Academy was a great one. The topic was firearms, and the highlight was getting to use the simulator that the police use to simulate events in which they may need to use lethal force. Not only was it a bunch of fun, but it really highlighted how difficult it is to decide when a suspect absolutely has to be stopped, even if it means shooting them.
Before we go to play in the simulator, we were given a briefing on the conditions in which the Prairie Village police department is allowed to use physical force, and lethal force in particular. The discussion of the situations in which an officer may find himself was just another in the countless times during the course that I have thought to myself that I'm glad I'm not a cop. Not many of us deal with such a variety of threatening, confusing, and frustrating situations each day.
Next, we got a tour of the list of weapons available to the police. In addition to the handgun that each officer carries, the officers get a 12 gauge shotgun in each patrol car. The shotguns are loaded with "less lethal" bean-bag rounds. These are "less lethal" instead of "less than lethal" because they can still kill a person. They're just less likely to. They shoot what looks like a small sock filled with BBs. The police also have M4 rifles in the trunk, in case things in PV get a little out of hand. We also got to see a collection of flash-bangs and gas cannisters and such that they can unleash when the opportunity arises. I'm glad I'm usually rather well-behaved. Finally, They showed off a collection of "air-soft" guns that looked almost exactly like the real thing. Not only do the police use them for training, but they run across them in the field and can easily mistake them for the real thing.
Finally after all that wait, we got to head to the simulator in pairs. The cops have a really cool toy here, though they would call it a tool. It's essentially a big TV screen that knows when you shoot your toy guns at it. They show a scenerio on it, and you decide how to react. When they use it, they have all of their weapons available and rather complex scenerios. When we were put in it, we only got to use the handgun.
In the first scenerio, we entered a building where there were reports of a man armed with a baseball bat. When we turned the corner, we saw him beating a woman with it. I knew that I was authorized to use lethal force, since he was beating the heck out of this person and was going to continue unless I stopped him. I didn't immediately shoot him, though, because in that situation I like to think that would not have been my first move. In the simulation, there were a few officers there, so I'd think that we would have charged him and physically restrained him. My partner pretty quickly shot him in the back.
When the officer running the simulation talked with us afterwards, he confirmed that we were authorized to shoot him based on his behavior. Then he asked "How many times would you like to be beaten with a bat?" The perpetrator had gotten off two swings while we watched before he was shot, and a third before he fell. That's when I realized that in this game if we were authorized to shoot, we should.
The second simulation took place in a school building. There were reports of a person armed with a gun. As we walked down the hallway, we saw a student who had been shot and two others who were tending to him. As we continued down the hallway, just after we could start to hear the altercation, one of the officers in the simulation was shot. We rounded the next corner and were faced with a man holding a gun to a student's head. As soon as I focused on the scene, I opened fire. My partner did the same.
When we played back the simulation afterwards, it turned out that my partner shot first, hitting the suspect. Then the suspect shot the hostage. Then, I shot the suspect. My partner and I each shot a few more times as the suspect fell. This all happened in a matter of seconds. We were right to shoot, but it still didn't feel good. Things happened quickly, and making those kinds of decisions in that time frame is exceedingly hard.
As we left the simulation, the officer mentioned that we were one of the few pairs who had successfully shot both suspects and not any of the other involved people. I can understand how those kinds of mistakes can happen in the situations we were faced with.
Although they have all been great, this was one of the more interesting classes so far. It's also one that has pointed out most clearly how difficult the job of police officer is. We're about halfway done with the course, and I'm looking forward to the next class.
