I’ve posted on many police-related topics before but this one in which I have a particular interest, if not an expertise. I was on a SWAT team for years and currently train police recruits in many areas including response to an active shooter. Here is my take on what is being reported so far:
First, and I can’t emphasize this enough, initial reports are often inaccurate. Social media has compounded this problem. People tend to believe the first thing they hear on any given topic and getting them to change their mind can be almost impossible. The current state of politics in this country is evidence enough but it holds particularly true in the case of critical incidents. The police need to release information that they know is accurate but ensuring correctness of information takes time. It can be frustrating to the public to hear, “Its under investigation” when they want answers right now.
Edit: In the few hours since I started typing this a more detailed timeline has been released and is linked somewhere above. Within two minutes, “cowardly” officers were at the closed and locked door to the classroom and two received graze wounds from shots fired through that door. In that two minute period the killer fired more than 100 rounds into one or two classrooms. Let me pause here to say that getting through a locked classroom door without breaching tools or a key is very difficult. Rifle rounds will pass through such a door and soft body armor with ease. Shooting the lock as depicted on TV and in movies without proper breaching rounds is a fantasy. Part of hardening our schools is making it difficult for a shooter to get into a room. Unfortunately, the door can’t tell the difference between good guys and bad guys.
I sounds like 16 rounds are fired between 11:37 and 11:44 in five distinct events. In the briefing, the spokesman says it is believed that the killer was firing at the door. Imagine being outside that room, unable to make entry and hearing gunfire and not knowing if he is shooting more children or shooting at you or others. (Although, I submit it would difficult to know where shots are going from a rifle being fired at close range from behind a closed door. Its extremely loud and you are probably trying to avoid being hit). What are they supposed to do? Fire blindly through the door? If they did that and ended up killing a child, they would be crucified. “Shouldering” such a door would be useless and expose you to more rifle fire. It may turn out that all the victims were shot in the initial 100+ shot attack and there was no one left alive in the room. That may never be known.
This is a no win situation for the cops. Killing may be going on right on the other side of a locked door and you are powerless to stop it. This isn’t lack of courage, its lack of options. It can be argued that it took too long to get a key to the team at the door. I’d agree with that. It is not cowardice on the part of the officers.
Now, on to the specifics of the response. Ideally, officers should go in immediately to stop an ongoing shooting and, in this case, they did. Yes, they get paid to put their lives on the line but that doesn’t mean standing in front of a door as someone is shooting at you through that door. What I’m saying is that there are limits to “Enter and stop the shooter”. A clear suicide mission is not a viable option. We don’t train to do human wave attacks on fortified positions.
When I train officers I ask them, “If your kid was in there, what would you do? Wait two minutes for back-up or go?” They all say, “I’m going in.” Then I say, “Well, now its somebody else’s kid and that’s what you get paid the big bucks for.“ The reality is that parents have a bond with their own children and will act out of emotion rather than logic. Apparently, an off-duty cop went in with a borrowed shotgun to get his own child and many others out of harms way. You might run into a building engulfed in flames to save your own kids but are you going to do that for someone you’ve never met? We expect and, in fact, demand police to act without emotion. For active killers, we attempt to train officers to change their mindset from “I might have to take a life, if necessary” to “I need to use deadly force as a first resort to stop a slaughter”. Flipping the switch from the (rightfully) publicly-demanded “de-escalate” to “hunter-killer” is no mean feat.
The training is that you go to the sound of the shooting as fast as you can and neutralize the threat. However, if the shooting stops, you slow down and proceed a bit more deliberately unless you are certain of the shooters location. There could be many reasons the shooting has stopped - he has fled, he is re-loading, his weapon has malfunctioned, he is looking for more victims, he has killed himself, he is setting an ambush, he is hiding or barricaded (with or without hostages). In the event of a barricade, the tactic has generally been to lock it down and begin negotiations. This is very rare in an active shooter situation. Until now, I can’t think of a single time (other than the Dallas ambush and there were no victims, alive or dead with him) that it has happened. If more killing is imminent or is happening, you go back to hunter-killer mode.
Yes, injured need to be rescued but not at the cost of more victims. The concept of a rescue task force is now being trained. This involves specially trained medics entering a “warm” zone with police providing security to triage and treat victims in place. It’s a delicate balance and easy to Monday morning quarterback.
Finally, behavior in critical incident can be contagious. Inaction breeds inaction and action breeds action. If the leadership in Uvalde failed, blame needs to be laid. However, it is best to wait until the facts are in and avoid speculation. We simply don’t know enough at this point to reach any conclusions. From what was released at the briefing, I don’t see a lack of courage on the part of police but more of an inability to breach the locked doors in a timely manner. Although, it may have been too late already.
There are plenty of people posting here about the failure of the cops. I’d like to know what you think they should have done. Don’t just say, “Gone into the room right away”. Say how.
P.S. – Its been announced that the shooter walked in through an unlocked/propped open door. That is a failure at the most basic level that happens every day at almost every school. I predict that the teacher that left that door unsecured is going to suffer rather severe psychological problems and likely get death threats and all sorts of other public ridicule from the actual cowards sitting behind their desks and typing away.
