| by Doug Wyllie, !2/14/12, Police One.com Newsletter It is truly a dark day in America. In a nightmarish attack at least 20 elementary school children were slaughtered by a gunman at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Six adults were also murdered at that school. My heart aches. Merely writing about this incident is difficult. I cannot even fathom the feelings of the families of the victims and first responders now gathered at the tragic scene. My heart truly aches. Stopping Killers from Killing our Kids In the aftermath of this incident, there will undoubtedly be a lot of pressure put on politicians at every level to propose and pass more stringent gun-control laws. That’s inevitable, but in my opinion it’s also missing the mark on a much more important issue. I’ve written extensively on the subject of arming campus cops, which to me should be a no-brainer. Incidents such as the tragedy today at Sandy Hook make me wonder if we need to go even further, by training, certifying, and arming American school teachers. Every school in the nation conducts two or three fire drills per year, despite the fact that not one single child has died from a school fire anywhere in North America in well over a half a century. Yet, we almost universally ignore the threat which really is claiming the lives of our kids — active shooters like some 20-year-old asshole whose name merits no mention in this space. Given the budget strain on most police departments, and given the fact that even those agencies which have lots of money and lots of cops are scaling back deployment of SROs, do you think that at least one teacher on every floor of every school in America be armed, trained, annually qualified, and ready/willing to end a deadly threat in their school? I think it merits serious consideration. I’m not alone in this thinking. I asked these questions of my dear friends and PoliceOne colleagues Dan Marcou, Dick Fairburn, and Ken Hardesty— each of whom has taught extensively the topic of active shooters. Marcou was quick to reply, “Doug, I believe in facing modern threats with modern solutions. I believe in armed pilots, armed teachers, armed judges, and armed fill-in-the-blank. I believe we need good people — who are good shots — who are armed in today’s world.” Fairburn added, “In my opinion, the answer is more guns and more trained sheepdogs. But some people in our country will immediately try to ban guns — inanimate objects, simple tools — rather than understand we need more people standing ready to KILL the sick bastards who would prey on our lambs.” Fairburn wasn’t done there. “We don’t have enough police officers to protect every school or school bus at our recession-degraded staffing levels,” he added. “So, I vote for training/equipping volunteer sheepdogs to protect our lambs. How about a nationwide corps of retired cops? They’re already trained/equipped and background checked.” Hardesty said, “Americans can no longer depend upon legislation to defend them from all who intend to do them harm.” Hardesty added that while he doesn’t advocate in any way taking the law into one’s own hands, he does advocate for people taking personal responsibility for their survival and well being. “Robert A. Heinlein was correct in the statement, ‘An armed society is a polite society.’ "Gun-free zones" are an open invitation for homicidal maniacs. Armed civilians of any kind — teachers included — will no doubt be met with trepidation. I believe some of the fears can be assuaged through a comprehensive selection and training process. Individuals selected must be mature, motivated, and above all else, volunteers. Prior to arming them physically, they must be armed mentally and indoctrinated with not only up-to date use-of-force law, but also with the unwavering mindset that their immediate action in the face of evil is saving the lives of others,” Hardesty concluded. Let’s Do Something About This My friends, the tragedy in Newtown is the third active-shooter event in an American learning institution THIS YEAR. In February, 17-year-old T.J. Lane murdered three students sitting at a cafeteria table before school. In April, a former nursing student named One L. Goh opened fire at Oikos University near the Oakland International Airport, killing seven people. A college. A high school. And now, an elementary school. All in 2012. Fifteen years ago (1998), the total number of child fatalities in American schools reached what was then an all-time high — 35 children died that year in gun- and non-gun related incidents. The next year, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold murdered 12 classmates and one teacher (wounding 26 others) before killing themselves in the school’s library. In 2007, Seung-Hui Cho killed 32 people (and himself) on Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg, Virginia. The following year, it was Northern Illinois University. Yes, my proposal is provocative, and I do not make it lightly. The selection process should be rigorous and ongoing (the adage “selection is a never-ending process” applies here), and perhaps in the same way we arm our airline pilots, those involved in the program would be vetted volunteers. I ask you — should American law enforcement train and prepare civilian educators to take immediate action against armed attacks? Now that you have read the opinions of yours truly and some of my friends, add your voice to this discussion. Perhaps in 2013 we can create enough momentum on this concept that something actually gets done. |
Monday, December 17, 2012
Active Shooters in Schools: Should Teachers Be Trained by Police Firearms Instructors?
Newtown Shooting: Stopping The Active Shooter
| by SWAT Officer Dan Marcou, 12/14/2012, Police One.com Newsletter “We interrupt this programming to report there are possibly 27 dead at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown.” That’s what I heard this morning while I was updating my Active Shooter Power Point with the information on the Clackamas Mall Shooting for a presentation on January 10th at Iona College in New York. We’ve all come to know the names of places like Trolley Square, Fort Hood, Virginia Tech, Binghampton, Littleton, and Jonesborough... Like the Sonny and Cher song goes, “The Beat goes on and on and on and on...” Guns didn’t pull their own triggers on these innocents. Some red haired bully did not cause these people to die by pushing a smaller kid down on the play-ground in the fifth grade. These tired old themes serve as a smokescreen, and have never brought the country one centimeter closer to stopping a single active shooter. Pay Attention Updated tactics have saved lives. Police officers have gotten better at responding to these incidents. Officers arrive and engage these shooters as soon as possible. The problem is, the public does not understand it can play an important role in preventing these shootings. Administrators at businesses, schools, post offices, hospitals think if the post their facility “No Gun Zone” they have done their part. Problem solved. All they have successfully done in the case of the active shooter is to facilitate a higher body count by designating the facility as a soft target. Instead, citizens need to realize evil always has and always will dwell amongst us. They must understand before there is a manifestation of evil deeds shooters act, talk, write, post, warn, threaten, promise and sometimes even predict in a threatening manner. These evil people that are the active shooters can be stopped long before someone dies by understanding that most shooters pass through a fantasy stage, planning stage, preparation stage, approach stage and implementation stage. When passing through these phases these shooters say troubling things, exhibit trouble behaviors, while the gather troubling equipment. Someone has always been there to see, but few pay attention and fewer still call the police. Schools teachers, doctors, lawyers, therapists, judges, shopkeepers, neighbors, and yes, gun dealers need to pay attention. Many of these incidents can be prevented by the simple act of calling the police when something just doesn’t look, sound, or feel right. Officers need to continue to arm themselves off and on duty, while training for this incident. It seems more likely than ever that you will face an active shooter in your career. Citizens that are paying attention can make the difference with one well timed and well placed phone call to prevent the active shooting incident. Otherwise officers must prepare themselves on duty and off to take that well-timed and well-placed shot to stop the active shooter. No Imaginary Solutions to Real-World Problems Mere minutes had passed before some hack was on the air and wasting oxygen talking about disarming Americans. Forget about it. It’s not going to happen in the United States of America. As they say, “That dog won’t hunt.” Americans will not allow themselves to be disarmed. Besides, if this was exclusively an American problem that could be solved by gun control, how does one explain the 18 dead killed by Mark Lepine at Universite de Montreal? What about the 77 dead before the muzzle of Anders Behring Breivik at Utoya Island? What about the 119 killed in Mumbai? These mass killings were committed by shooters who managed to arm themselves for their killing day in countries which have such stringent controls on firearms that many police officers are not allowed to be armed off duty (and sometimes even while on duty!). Other talking heads go on and on trying to determine who didn’t properly love the shooter, or who bullied the shooter into their hellacious act? |
Tuesday, December 4, 2012
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