Routine Shootings at US Schools and Universities Megathread.

[celedhring]

I can see a valid concern in not wanting to start a firefight in a classroom, potentially catching kids in the crossfire. But this gets close to dereliction of duty.

[crazy canuck]

It seems to me that if one person is armed with a weapon that scares multiple police officers, the public should be banned from having access to that weapon.

[crazy canuck]

I can see a valid concern in not wanting to start a firefight in a classroom, potentially catching kids in the crossfire. But this gets close to dereliction of duty.

That concern is only valid if shooting is not already occurring.

[Berkut]

Olivarez said the officers who arrived at the school quickly might have been shot had they attempted to take out the gunman alone.

Look, I know it is awesome to feel all superior. But he isn't saying that in the manner it is being portrayed. He isn't saying "If he tried he might be shot, and that would be sad for the officer, so he didn't try".

He is saying, and this used to be standard tactics in these situations, that if you go after the guy alone and get shot, now you've made the situation worse. Now there is another victim, and any information you have is likely lost, and a potential resource that might be needed is gone. 

That is not current tactics however - current tactics is that in an active shooter situation, you go. You don't wait. 

They fucked this up. But at the same time, lets quit pretending like any of us know what we would have done in that situation, even with their training. There is more that goes into all this then simply bravery or cowardice (although there is that as well).

[Berkut]

I can see a valid concern in not wanting to start a firefight in a classroom, potentially catching kids in the crossfire. But this gets close to dereliction of duty.

That concern is only valid if shooting is not already occurring.

Yeah, I walk through the timeline, and try to think "If I was there, with their training, at what points in this timeline would I act differently, or at least hope the act differently"?

There are a couple, depending on my role. If I am the guy in charge, on scene or not (actually, if I am not on scene and in charge I would think I would immediately delegate tactical decision making to whomever is on scene and senior, but lets put that aside for the moment), and I think a "barricade" situation has developed, then my instructions to those guys outside the classroom is not "Do not enter" it is "Do not enter yet, but prepare to go, and go without further instruction if there is any additional gunfire inside that classroom".

If I was one of the guys outside that classroom, and I was told "Do not go", I think I would tell everyone around me "OK, we hold off, but the moment I hear anything inside that suggests someone needs to be saved, we go orders or not - lets be ready to do that".

Of course, I was not there, so who fucking really knows what I would have done.

[Berkut]

My nephew, the deputy sherriff who was shot, called me yesterday to let me know that his attackers trial ended.

We talked about this, and he expressed surprise at the police response. He said "Well, they are damned if they do and damned if they don't - the public is going to hate them no matter what, and the public has no idea what being in a situation like that is like, or how fast the moment changes, and the right response changes. But yeah....that is definitely not a good look. Current training is to go after they shooter aggressively, with whatever you have in the moment. If that is just you, then you go solo. If the shooter is shooting at you, at least they aren't shooting at someone else. And if that means you are quite possibly going to get shot, then that is the job. If you aren't ok with that, find another job".

He really emphasized how much the training changed on this. Current training is basically to respond as aggressively as possible, immediately. Do not wait for anything while shots are being fired.

[alfred russel]

Olivarez said the officers who arrived at the school quickly might have been shot had they attempted to take out the gunman alone.

Heaven forbid a cop should be shot instead of a bunch of kids

There is an old saying that if you can't fight, wear a big hat. Those Texas lawmen do have some really big hats.

[Sheilbh]

He is saying, and this used to be standard tactics in these situations, that if you go after the guy alone and get shot, now you've made the situation worse. Now there is another victim, and any information you have is likely lost, and a potential resource that might be needed is gone.

That is not current tactics however - current tactics is that in an active shooter situation, you go. You don't wait.

Although from what I've read this hasn't been the approach since Columbine. So we're talking about standard tactics for the last 25 years. If a doctor was using techniques that haven't been used for 25 years, they'd be struck off -  or a fire department responding to a tower block fire was doing the same it'd be, rightly, called out as negligent (at best).

They fucked this up. But at the same time, lets quit pretending like any of us know what we would have done in that situation, even with their training. There is more that goes into all this then simply bravery or cowardice (although there is that as well).

I don't think it's about what any of us would do or the random man on the street but the standards for police and for a public service. I think 25 year old out of date tactics are below the standards the public have a right to expect - and 9 times out of 10 that may not really matter because it's just an inconvenience or a frustrating experience. But in this case it has just utterly heartbreaking consequences.

I think in particular if a town of about 15,000 is spending almost half its budget on law enforcement and they've decided to invest in a SWAT team then they are entitled to even higher expectations.

The only relevance of what we would do in that situation is, as I say, that it seems absurd to me to see politicians arguing that armed teachers is the response when the people whose job this is failed to respond appropriately. I don't know how anyone can expect teachers with guns to be better able to do police work than police officers. Obviously they just don't want to talk about gun control but it just seems a little Marti to me.

[HVC]

I read, but can't find it anymore, that the guy in charge was a emergency dispatcher before he was elected to the position. Seems less then ideal if true.

[Berkut]

He is saying, and this used to be standard tactics in these situations, that if you go after the guy alone and get shot, now you've made the situation worse. Now there is another victim, and any information you have is likely lost, and a potential resource that might be needed is gone.

That is not current tactics however - current tactics is that in an active shooter situation, you go. You don't wait.

Although from what I've read this hasn't been the approach since Columbine. So we're talking about standard tactics for the last 25 years. If a doctor was using techniques that haven't been used for 25 years, they'd be struck off -  or a fire department responding to a tower block fire was doing the same it'd be, rightly, called out as negligent (at best).

Theya re not doctors with a decade of intensive training. They are cops, and they probably have a few dozen hours of training in this kind of situation, at best. They are a social team, not individuals. The comparison to a doctor is poor.

Us sitting here critiquing them is more akin to us critiquing the actions of soldiers in combat, not doctors in surgery.

And I am pretty reluctant to do that as well. Not entirely reluctant, just pretty reluctant. And I am definitely cognizant of the twitter mob mentality of any criticism.

[Sheilbh]

Theya re not doctors with a decade of intensive training. They are cops, and they probably have a few dozen hours of training in this kind of situation, at best. They are a social team, not individuals. The comparison to a doctor is poor.

They're a public service who are armed and empowered to use force and detain their fellow citizens. It's entirely justified for the public to have expectations of a public service.

The reason I used the doctor comparison is they're also allowed to do things that in any other circumstance would be a crime and have life and death decisions, but it also works for nurses or fire departments. They're serving the public.

Us sitting here critiquing them is more akin to us critiquing the actions of soldiers in combat, not doctors in surgery.

And I am pretty reluctant to do that as well. Not entirely reluctant, just pretty reluctant. And I am definitely cognizant of the twitter mob mentality of any criticism.

I think soldiers are different than police - which is why I think it's normally a bad idea to use soldiers for policing/call in the yeomanry.

And I get the point about the Twitter mob mentality - from outside the US looks like it has one side on "abolish the police" and the other insisting on such levels of deference and special privileged treatment (show respect, the whole police card thing) as to almost make them a separate caste.

My view is just they are public servants like any other. Many people in the public sector have difficult and at times dangerous jobs - fire departments, nurses and care workers over the last couple of years. The police have slightly higher powers because they can use force and they can arrest people. As with any other public service we are entitled to have standards that we expect them to meet and from what I've read this force has failed to do that.

[Berkut]

I didn't say that soldiers were not different from police, I said the circumstances the police find themselves in during an active shooter situation is more like a soldier being in combat then it is like a doctor performing surgery.

I don't think that is a tough idea to get Shelf. 

[Sheilbh]

I didn't say that soldiers were not different from police, I said the circumstances the police find themselves in during an active shooter situation is more like a soldier being in combat then it is like a doctor performing surgery.

I don't think that is a tough idea to get Shelf.

Sure - and I don't disagree with that.

My point is the public's side of the deal is to provide the police with the equipment, training and resources they need to do their job and meet the public's standards - given the size of budget here that seems very much like it happened. The flipside of that deal is that the police, with their extraordinary powers, are accountable if they fail to meet those standards.

However difficult the situation 25 year old out of date practice is significantly below the standards I think the public are entitled to expect. It's not about bravery or courage or what any of us would do, but what we are entitled to expect from a public service.

[grumbler]

If I was one of the guys outside that classroom, and I was told "Do not go", I think I would tell everyone around me "OK, we hold off, but the moment I hear anything inside that suggests someone needs to be saved, we go orders or not - lets be ready to do that".

My thinking would be dominated by the fact that there were kids lying on the floor bleeding out, and that every moment of delay involves the likelihood that someone is dying who could have been saved if I'd just acted.  Go in both doors (it is absolute bullshit that they waited for someone with keys - classroom doors are just regular hollow-core doors and you can kick them in if you have to) and then you have someone behind the perp as well as in front of them.  Nothing is served by waiting while people die and the perp has more time to prepare for a police response.

If I was ordered to go in immediately, I'd go in.  If I was ordered not to go in, I'd go in.

Of course, I was not there, so who fucking really knows what I would have done.

There is, of course, that, as well as the fact that there may be more facts here that we don't know about.  But it sure has horrific optics to me.

[Berkut]

I didn't say that soldiers were not different from police, I said the circumstances the police find themselves in during an active shooter situation is more like a soldier being in combat then it is like a doctor performing surgery.

I don't think that is a tough idea to get Shelf.

Sure - and I don't disagree with that.

My point is the public's side of the deal is to provide the police with the equipment, training and resources they need to do their job and meet the public's standards - given the size of budget here that seems very much like it happened. The flipside of that deal is that the police, with their extraordinary powers, are accountable if they fail to meet those standards.

However difficult the situation 25 year old out of date practice is significantly below the standards I think the public are entitled to expect. It's not about bravery or courage or what any of us would do, but what we are entitled to expect from a public service.

I'm not arguing that there is a pretty clearly fucked up result here that is 100% a failure that must be looked at.

I am just disputing that it is oh so clear that the failure is one of a bunch of cops who didn't have the balls to do the job. That might be the case for some of them, but is very unlikely to be the case for all of them. I don't KNOW of course, but I suspect that if there were 15 cops in that hallway, at least some of them were probably saying "FUCK FUCK FUCK LETS GO!"

What I find objectionable about the mob response is that it immediately goes to whatever the mob gets its emotional satisfaction from - that the cops are just a bunch of fucking cowards. If you want to go there, my response is "You go do the job then, if you are so fucking brave". Because that isn't about outrage at them not doing their job, that is about second hand schadenfreude from a bunch of armchair soldiers who think they have the first idea about what being in that moment is like, and can make emotive judgements about people they don't know reacting to circumstances they cannot possibly understand.