Mid-year in 2020, we performed a survey to ascertain the State of the Industry as it was estimated to be by the law enforcement command community. Our survey was completed by a significant number of chiefs and sheriffs, along with plenty of officers and deputies at the rank of lieutenant and above. The last question of the survey asked what challenges or types of incidents they were most concerned about when they thought about 2021. There were ten optional answers and they were free to check as many as they felt might be a challenge. Let’s take a look at the 10 options, listed by order of prioritization in response, and then we’ll discuss the potential impacts on our duty performance.
The answer options were:
· Active Shooter events specifically at educational institutions 58.49%
· Resurgence of COVID-19 requiring additional law enforcement services 54.72%
· Natural Disaster/weather emergency events 49.06%
· Protest/Riot events 47.17%
· Active Shooter events in commercial venues (non-educational setting) 43.4%
· Protest/Riot specifically targeting law enforcement agencies/services 26.42%
· Terrorist attack 7.55%
· Chemical/Biological Mass Casualty event 1.89%
· Explosive Mass Casualty event 0%
· Other 11.32%
The “other” category allowed for specifying and almost all of them were either location specific (i.e. national monument vandalism) or reworded variations of the options already listed above. Note that the Explosive Mass Casualty event received zero interest or concern. When we reached out to a few of the respondents to verify the answers, we found out that any Explosive Mass Casualty event was assumed to also be a Terrorist attack, either foreign or domestic, so it was included there rather than separately.
Now let’s take a look at the events in order of perceived priority. Active Shooter/Active Killer events in an educational institution is still at the top of the list. It has been in all of our recent surveys of this type. This should come as no surprise. Unfortunately, such events still occur and the mainstream media makes sure they are front and center of everyone’s attention. While some of the events have been prevented with early intervention made possible by received intelligence, not all of them can be prevented. When one occurs, all we can do is insure that our personnel, policies, training and equipment are up to the task of response. Policies should support annual review and training updates and all personnel should be trained annually as well.
The necessary equipment for response and efficient neutralization of the threat hasn’t changed. Each officer should have available—either issued or authorized—a patrol rifle, upgraded armor (hard plates in a carrier work well), medical trauma supplies both for the officer himself and for victims who can be assisted once the threat is neutralized. Some agencies consider a handgun-caliber carbine as sufficient for such calls, but this should be reexamined. A handgun caliber weapon with a longer barrel and increased sight radius is only more accurate than a handgun. It does nothing (appreciable) to increase the caliber’s effectiveness at greater distances of engagement. Typically these weapons are put into use because the agency is avoiding political backlash about having “assault rifles” in the hands of their officers. Learn to address that head on and equip your officers properly.
Additionally, once the threat has been neutralized and the scene secured, the next most immediate concern is the medical care of all victims. Any officer not actively engaged in security should be attending to the wounded and should have the necessary trauma kit/training to do so. All of these observations about Active Shooters in any educational institution also apply to active shooters in commercial/business environments.
Even as this article is being prepared, the nation is seeing a resurgence of COVID cases, the distribution of vaccines and the beginnings of mutated virus around the world. Some police administrators anticipated and planned for the necessity of crowd control when the vaccine(s) became available. Given the constant media-fueled near-panic levels of fear from the general public regarding COVID, this anticipation of crowd control issues was reasonable and prudent. As it has worked out (so far, as of this writing), the need for crowd control hasn’t been seen. Vaccine distribution is being managed in an orderly fashion and the presence of a vaccine from several manufacturers seems to be alleviating some of the fear that would normally grow from the expansion of cases and transmissions. Thankfully, recent reports show that the vaccines are effective even against the mutating strains of the virus. Pay attention to the warnings though, as the COVID vaccines are causing higher instances of anaphylaxis and doctors are now warning people with allergies (even food allergies) to exercise care and caution before getting the vaccine.
There is little we in law enforcement can do to address natural disaster or weather related events, but it’s a duty we need to maintain our awareness of. The largest impact these events often has on us is that we have to deal with everything else even as the general public deals with weather emergencies. Preparedness is a must for us.
Protests and riot events are, unfortunately, likely going to be with us on a fairly regular basis. These events require strong leadership and management skills to address. Manpower, overtime, shift adjustments, overtime management, allied agency relationships, mutual aid agreements... all of these items are affected by and impact our ability to respond. As this article is written, just a few days ago our nation saw what is the first riot to penetrate the nation’s Capital Building (at least in this author’s lifetime). As of this writing, one officer has died, 56 others were injured, 68 arrests were made and an assortment of explosive devices were seized. Riots that grow out of protests have been seen in almost every major city in the United States and agencies have to be prepared for them on a short-notice basis.
In the case of those most recent riot/protest events, the target was political. Prior to that, the target had quite often been law enforcement agencies and facilities. It’s an unfortunate reality that we have to be prepared to defend our own structures from insurgence and we have to keep our officers aware of the threat of, and trained to respond to, ambush and other violent attacks.
After addressing all of the above, even in the year we’ll acknowledge the 20th anniversary of the Nine-Eleven Attacks, the concern about terrorist attacks, mass casualty and related events is quite low (as compared to all the above). Unfortunately, we still have to maintain our readiness here as well, most especially as the anniversary approaches. History has shown us how terrorists like to “celebrate” big events by trying to enact even bigger ones (thank God we often defeat their efforts, or they simply fail).
Fortunately (or unfortunately?) the preparations, plans and training necessary for response to terrorist/mass casualty events have a lot of overlaps and similarities with response tactics for riots and protests that go sideways. Managing big numbers of people has many common tactics at the highest level. The biggest differences are whether you’re trying to move people against their will (riots) or you’re trying to render aid while moving them to a safer space (post-attack).
The one thing that every one of these potential events has in common is the inevitability of inter-agency cooperative efforts. No matter how big or small your agency is, if one of these events occurs, you WILL be working with another agency to either neutralize it, mitigate the effects of it, or recover from it. If you don’t have the proper Mutual Aid Agreements in effect now, prioritize them. If you aren’t training for response – either practical training at the street level or table top training at the executive level—make it a priority. Not a single one of us can afford to think, “It won’t happen here.” That’s the single most irresponsible thought you can have as a leader in your agency and community. Prepare for it and if it doesn’t happen in your jurisdiction, then you’ve lost nothing.
