Police officers fired ‘randomly’ when confronting gunman
One of the bystanders injured by police in the shooting near the Empire State Building has told the Guardian that police officers appeared to fire “randomly” when they faced gunman Jeffrey Johnson.
If you’re gonna aim try and aim perfectly.
If you wanna aim at the target, you got to know what you’re doing because it’s the street.
I could have been dead right now. I could have been dead.
– Robert Asika, wounded in the shooting
A naturally upset and injured bystander caught in a shootout and, as likely as not hit by a round fired from a police officer, sounds off to The Guardian newspaper. There are some interesting debates contained in the words of those adrenaline fuelled soundbites e.g. “perfectly”, “aim”, “try” and the short phrase “know what you’re doing”. Wow, these members of the public aren’t asking for much, are they? (I’m attempting irony here).
I did my 30 and some years in a British police force where less than 3% of officers are required asked to volunteer to be trained to carry firearms in order to protect the public and their colleagues (not always prioritised in that order, officially anyway). Becoming a firearms trained officer wasn’t/isn’t compulsory, as I’ve already sarcastically hinted at, but those of us who did volunteer were put through some pretty effective training. Of that 3%, an even smaller number were selected (after volunteering again) to train to the highest level of skills at arms and tactical/dynamic manouevering. That `level` was, in reality, the point where the operation would be deemed so technically difficult and hazardous that military SF level dynamics and munitions i.e. explosive methods of entry, high speed rappelling, automatic weaponry etc was required (think assaulting the Iranian Embassy, London, May 1980). Until that point is reached, the civil police run the show. I trained to the latter tactical level and over the years had varying degrees of crap scared out of me, the majority of which was in training, with a couple of major exceptions. Train hard, fight easy is a phrase familiar to many Lexicans, so I won’t dwell.
The advantage I had over my `standard level` firearms trained colleagues was simply more training time, coupled with my own personal committment to be the fittest I could possibly be, the best shot I could possibly be with the variety of weapons I was required to use and the best prepared, mentally, I could possibly be. I could not achieve all of the aforementioned during the training time allotted by the police force. I could not practice my firearms skills because handguns are prohibited in the UK and so I could not fire any full bore handgun outside the police range. I was not allowed to use the police range other than during my allotted training days which was 2 per month. We had to requalify to the required marksmanship standard on alternate months. What I could do in my own time was run, weight train, research, think, eat properly, stay sharp.
When I visitied a Michigan police force in the 80′s, they were amazed at how much weapons training I did compared to them, but I did point out that I was in a small minority. If every officer in my force was required to carry, the training and requalification would probably be bi-annual or less with the shooting and tactical skills commensurately less professional/basic/ one might even be tempted to say `ragged`. I was also quite pleased when I found I was the top scoring officer on their ranges that day 
(BTW, I loved their FN FAL).
I’m sure that the NYPD ESU would have far greater shooting skills than the standard patrolman, but as we all know training is an investment that a lot of forces would be under pressure to cut, experience takes time and laying down accurate fire whilst controlling your rectal sphincter and trying to stay alive yourself cannot be trained to 100% reality. That takes real investment.
I remember seeing a video of a robber holding up a small convenience store owner – the owner pulls out his handgun, starts firing – the robber starts firing – all in all easily 10 rounds are flying back and forth and during that time neither one is hit
And this exchange is at 10′ or less
I suspect when the adrenaline is going sometimes the mind slips into neutral?
One of the old West gunfighters was asked a question – Wyatt Earp? Bat Masterson? I forget who but the question was how he was so effective.
[paraphrasing] It isn’t that I’m faster than most; I’m not. But I take a quick moment to aim
As an aside Hogday with the limitations that were placed on you for training – 2 days per month at the range? – you must be a natural with firearms. And the time you spent thinking about it.
When I got my pilot’s license years ago – I have to say my solo was “memorable”.
Short of killing myself it has to have been one of the worst solos recorded.
Took me 2.5 hours to actually get the plane down – and keep it down.
A strong crosswind came up and – without dragging this story out – - my flying reminded me of Buddy Hackett’s flying the Beech 18 in Its A Mad Mad mad mad World
I learned about crosswinds that day – and properly using the rudders.
Point is, for 2 months after that I did no flying.
Just went over in my head, over and over, what I should have done to properly control the airplane.
Ailerons into the wind, opposite rudder
I kept “flying” but only in my head. (There are some who claims that continues with me)
Anyway my instructor picked the windiest day he could and when I flew again I had the smoothest …. straightest landing I ever had.
The mind is pretty powerful and I would think your superior shooting skills was in no part due to not only your actual practice, but thinking about it.
Well, Bill, the initial course was 3 weeks duration, followed by 2 days a month.
I think you might find that this was pretty high in terms of weapons training for police, anywhere in Europe, maybe even the US? We’d have loved to have been able to take ourselves to the range in our own time but that did not happen, does not happen and probably never will happen over here. Even less likely come the day that all of our police service becomes fully armed, whenever that might be.
On another point you made, adrenaline and the mind going into neutral; we were taught to recognise that it actually goes into fight/flight unless you’ve trained to expect it. On Tac training we would get our guys into a state of what the clinical psychologists would term `arousal` (steady now) before we even started the training. Once `aroused` (I said `steady`) you could then start to seriously train, whilst in that zone, so that when the real deal went down you could recognise the signs and use them to your best advantage rather than be controlled/governed by them. Clinical psychologists were always consulted, and often present, in much of our top end training.
In light of the spate of recent firearms-related shootings by clearly deranged folks, plus this, I expect some very breathless moralizing by those who are paid to bloviate for a living. I also expect that there will be some very intense reviews going on within NYPD, including the incident and their overall handgun training for routine patrol officers.
COMJAM, a trivia snippet: I was told when I was in Michigan (1980) that at one point the NYPD (or was it Detroit) were being taught to fire triple taps rather than the normal double. That certainly puts the third tap in the `spray and pray` category, when one considers stability, necessity for a third round etc doesn’t it? (and signalled the demise of the revolver, probably) At one point double tap was dropped from our training and the focus shifted to single, carefully aimed shots. Can’t recall if that lasted or not, but it smacked of lawyer intervention at the time. E/w the British public don’t expect to be hit by a stray police round, however good the intent and I don’t suppose the American public is any different in that regard :-/
Got a Cousin on a Tatical weapons team.Local police force. His service
weapon is a .9mm Glock. His favorite personal load is a 45 acp and for the wife a.38super both model 1911 frame. Had wife at the range one day.
she outscored him and his supervisor. She sells Real Estate…..
She is one of those focused people… She can drive nails with that .38 super…
The Empire of New York deigned to allow me a handgun license last October. In December I was at the range and started chatting with a young guy who had just graduated from the NYPD academy class earlier that week. He said they hardly had any firearms training at all. I know two guys who are in the academy now. (Well I work with the mother of one, never met him) and I told both of them to head up to CT for training with this guy ASAP:
http://www.defenseassociates.com/asaa.htm
Daryle, you just touched on the dirty little secret many police departments don’t want to talk about. Most police officers, most of the time, aren’t very good with their sidearms. Over the years I’ve heard from more than a few former peace officers about departments which only require once/six months or once/year qualifications. Add to that the old chestnut that over 90% of police officers in the country never draw their weapon on the job, and it’s no surprise many can’t hit a damn thing.
If you want some laughs, just drop by YouTube and look up all the accidental discharges by police posted there. Personal favorite: a DEA “veteran” pulls his weapon out, announces to the class that he’s the only person in that room (of high school kids) qualified to even handle a firearm, and then shoots himself in the foot while re-holstering his weapon!