Rise of the Warrior Cop

[ripnbst]

We also have to keep in mind that "officer friendly" is at significantly higher risk of felonious death than a more tactically aggressive officer. Going home instead of the morgue at the end of every shift is drilled into officers routinely.

I can see both sides of the coin however I think there is a possibility to strike a balance between "Officer Friendly" and the heavy handed JBT. The "Go home at the end of the day" is something I've also become more aware of in recent history. I don't know if this catch phrase has been used for a long time or if it is newly popular with PD's but it cant be the excuse for use of excessive force like it apparently was in the Sarasota incident there is another thread about.

 

[Norman]

The concern I have is when justifications are made. The subject elected to commit a criminal act, therefore forefeiting the safety of his children. So as an (il)logical continuation, we can go point guns at everyone in his home in a high stress situation and if we percieve a threat, fire dozens (if not hundreds) of rounds into the uncleared interior of the home, because it's all the subject's fault.

Aw come on GTG, you know better than to build strawmen. And you stated how you would have conducted one of the three warrants. How about the other 2? Remember there were 3 warrants executed simultaneously.

 

[Gideon]

Your points are making no sense, If the guy had a weed farm in his basement, was a armed felon. How's that not a legitimate raid?

The goal was to search for contraband, not get shot at. They went into a situation they had no control over against an opponent on his home turf when they could have completely avoided the entire shootout. You don't need a SWAT team to make dynamic entries to search for a plant.

Do share in your expertise then, making vague references to your work, with out examples, proves nothing.

It's already been mentioned that I'm a correctional officer, I work for CCA (inb4 hurr durr private prisons are bad).
In the few years I've been doing this, I have searched more domiciles and made more "arrests" than most cops hopefully ever will. (Specifically, over 1,000 searches, and over 100 bad guys in cuffs.)
During the short time I've been doing this, we have responded to 2 riots in Oklahoma, one in Sayre, and one in Cushing, and assisted in the cleanup operation from another in Mississippi. These situations involved making dynamic entry in buildings and habitation areas that we had no control over, against opponents who knew we were coming, and who have no regard for their own lives. We employed every level of our use of force continuum short of deadly force (thankfully). We also recently held a company wide training operation in Watonga to prepare our staff for the more extreme response procedures, and to evaluate our policies on officer safety and the prevention of escalation.

THAT BEING SAID: I understand that my job is obviously far different from that of street cops, and I don't intend to talk about the day to day happening of that line of work.
However, this situation parallels my experience...
1.) They entered a living space to search for contraband, as I do constantly.
2.) They did so with very little intel, and with an unnecessary level of force. I'm not going to run into a prison cell in full riot gear and beat an inmate, just to find a bag of weed or a cell phone, when I could have just waited for them to go to lunch.
3.) They escalated the situation beyond their control by bringing deadly force to bear from the beginning, and it cost an officer's life. If you don't know what's in there, don't go, make them come to you. They are obligated to each other to reduce the risk of complications whenever possible, and they failed in this regard completely, opting instead to just ramrod everything and hope it worked out.

What does "swatting" have to do with any of my statements?

You said that criminals change tactics, this is true, and now they will change tactics to counter the ever increasing stupidity of door kicker cops. They can't counter good intelligence, they can't counter safe handling procedures, stop trying to out gun them and start out smarting them. It wasn't machine-gun toting FBI agents that brought down the mob, it was accountants.

The reason I ask is because you're a self proclaimed expert in tactics and law enforcement operations, and since you could only be doing it for 4 years maximum that would pretty much make you a savant.

I may be more of an idiot than an idiot-savant. It seems like you are advocating the use of deadly force and high level police assets for everyday police work, I may be wrong here, correct me if I misread or failed to understand your points. It doesn't take an expert to figure out how to not get shot at. It is true that LEOs need to be more aggressive tactically speaking to maintain safety, but at the same time they need to maintain a higher level of soft power and people skills, otherwise they're only making their job more difficult. Surely sometimes the police will have to make forced entry into unknown situations with full armor and arms to pacify a serious threat, but it seems like you're advocating these kinds of tactics for a simple drug bust that could have been done with 4 officers and no shooting.

What will make our LEOs safer: Teaching them to call in a helicopter and armored vehicles every time they make a traffic stop, or teaching them how to deal with these situations intelligently?

 

[Norman]

The goal was to search for contraband, not get shot at. They went into a situation they had no control over against an opponent on his home turf when they could have completely avoided the entire shootout. You don't need a SWAT team to make dynamic entries to search for a plant.



It's already been mentioned that I'm a correctional officer, I work for CCA (inb4 hurr durr private prisons are bad).
In the few years I've been doing this, I have searched more domiciles and made more "arrests" than most cops hopefully ever will. (Specifically, over 1,000 searches, and over 100 bad guys in cuffs.)
During the short time I've been doing this, we have responded to 2 riots in Oklahoma, one in Sayre, and one in Cushing, and assisted in the cleanup operation from another in Mississippi. These situations involved making dynamic entry in buildings and habitation areas that we had no control over, against opponents who knew we were coming, and who have no regard for their own lives. We employed every level of our use of force continuum short of deadly force (thankfully). We also recently held a company wide training operation in Watonga to prepare our staff for the more extreme response procedures, and to evaluate our policies on officer safety and the prevention of escalation.

THAT BEING SAID: I understand that my job is obviously far different from that of street cops, and I don't intend to talk about the day to day happening of that line of work.
However, this situation parallels my experience...
1.) They entered a living space to search for contraband, as I do constantly.
2.) They did so with very little intel, and with an unnecessary level of force. I'm not going to run into a prison cell in full riot gear and beat an inmate, just to find a bag of weed or a cell phone, when I could have just waited for them to go to lunch.
3.) They escalated the situation beyond their control by bringing deadly force to bear from the beginning, and it cost an officer's life. If you don't know what's in there, don't go, make them come to you. They are obligated to each other to reduce the risk of complications whenever possible, and they failed in this regard completely, opting instead to just ramrod everything and hope it worked out.



You said that criminals change tactics, this is true, and now they will change tactics to counter the ever increasing stupidity of door kicker cops. They can't counter good intelligence, they can't counter safe handling procedures, stop trying to out gun them and start out smarting them. It wasn't machine-gun toting FBI agents that brought down the mob, it was accountants.



I may be more of an idiot than an idiot-savant. It seems like you are advocating the use of deadly force and high level police assets for everyday police work, I may be wrong here, correct me if I misread or failed to understand your points. It doesn't take an expert to figure out how to not get shot at. It is true that LEOs need to be more aggressive tactically speaking to maintain safety, but at the same time they need to maintain a higher level of soft power and people skills, otherwise they're only making their job more difficult. Surely sometimes the police will have to make forced entry into unknown situations with full armor and arms to pacify a serious threat, but it seems like you're advocating these kinds of tactics for a simple drug bust that could have been done with 4 officers and no shooting.

What will make our LEOs safer: Teaching them to call in a helicopter and armored vehicles every time they make a traffic stop, or teaching them how to deal with these situations intelligently?

You are quite wrong in your assessment of my intentions. Do I think there was another way to handle the OP's article? Of course. Was the shooting justified? Yes. was it an "OH NOES THE MILITARIZED POLEECE!" incident? No. Could it been executed better in retrospect? Yes, IMHO.
The Guerena incident: could it have been handled better? Idk on such a large scale operation. Idk everything surrounding the case, so I won't make judgments on the big picture. Anyone who does is an ignoramus at best. Was the Guerena warrant/shooting legit, justified and reasonable? Of course, even if Henshman wants to smoke weed every day.

With that said and all due respect, being a CO is far more dissimilar to being a LEO than it is similar.

 

[loudshirt]

T
In the few years I've been doing this, I have searched more domiciles and made more "arrests" than most cops hopefully ever will. (Specifically, over 1,000 searches, and over 100 bad guys in cuffs.)

THAT BEING SAID: I understand that my job is obviously far different from that of street cops, and I don't intend to talk about the day to day happening of that line of work.
However, this situation parallels my experience...
1.) They entered a living space to search for contraband, as I do constantly.
2.) They did so with very little intel, and with an unnecessary level of force. I'm not going to run into a prison cell in full riot gear and beat an inmate, just to find a bag of weed or a cell phone, when I could have just waited for them to go to lunch.
3.) They escalated the situation beyond their control by bringing deadly force to bear from the beginning, and it cost an officer's life. If you don't know what's in there, don't go, make them come to you. They are obligated to each other to reduce the risk of complications whenever possible, and they failed in this regard completely, opting instead to just ramrod everything and hope it worked out.

Wow lots of fancy wording for searching prisoners cells and arresting them for fighting and taking food back to their cells. Clearing a one room cell is vastly different than clearing a house with unknown occupants.

Just so you know there are plenty of cops with over 100 arrests.

 

[Norman]

Wow lots of fancy wording for searching prisoners cells and arresting them for fighting and taking food back to their cells. Clearing a one room cell is vastly different than clearing a house with unknown occupants.

Just so you know there are plenty of cops with over 100 arrests.

I have a buddy who is an LEO here in Ok. Lower middle income town, and he had as of early this month 196 arrests FOR THE YEAR. All of them were legit.

 

[93 FOX]

This thread is awesome

 

[Gideon]

You are quite wrong in your assessment of my intentions. Do I think there was another way to handle the OP's article? Of course. Was the shooting justified? Yes. was it an "OH NOES THE MILITARIZED POLEECE!" incident? No. Could it been executed better in retrospect? Yes, IMHO.
The Guerena incident: could it have been handled better? Idk on such a large scale operation. Idk everything surrounding the case, so I won't make judgments on the big picture. Anyone who does is an ignoramus at best. Was the Guerena warrant/shooting legit, justified and reasonable? Of course, even if Henshman wants to smoke weed every day.

With that said and all due respect, being a CO is far more dissimilar to being a LEO than it is similar.

Ok good. My issue isn't so much the "militarization" of the police, as it is the improper use of that militarized power. I don't want my dog to be shot because they meant to hit the crackhouse down the street.

Obviously the jobs are far different, and I don't want the discussion to turn into a CO vs LEO thing.

I have a buddy who is an LEO here in Ok. Lower middle income town, and he had as of early this month 196 arrests FOR THE YEAR. All of them were legit.

Great that explains why they keep sending us more children to watch.

 

[loudshirt]

Coming next week The Rise of the Warrior Corrections Officer

 

[rawhide]

Military Arms Channel opinion on the topic:

Militarization or Modernization

Tactics change with the times and technology.