Wednesday, May 30, 2001
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Wednesday, May 30, 2001 |
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High risk law enforcement Cops train for potential deadly encounters By JOHN MUNFORD
The really bad guys the rapists, murderers, drug dealers don't often turn themselves in. Typically, the cops have to sniff them out. That means entering a situation where death lurks around the corner of a narrow hallway or on the other side of a closed door. When the body-armored, pistol-pointing officers burst in the front door, they have no way of knowing where all the weapons are in the house. "Get out of the closet! Get out of the closet right now!" barks one of the entry team members. "Get out and put your hands where I can see them! Drop the gun!" It can be a recipe for disaster. But by taking precautions, law enforcement officers can increase the chances that no one gets hurt during these tense situations. That's why local probation officers and Fayette sheriff's deputies took part in a special course in high-risk warrant searches last week: to reduce the risk on themselves along with the good and bad folks they encounter on such raids. "One of them could be saying, 'I'm not going to jail for the rest of my life. I'm going to take out as many cops as I can,'" warned Carlos F. Ortiz, an instructor with the Georgia Police Academy, who taught the course. "Your goal is to go in there and arrest the individual without violence." The best way for the officers to keep themselves and others from being injured or killed is to be prepared, be alert and be smart, Ortiz said. Being smart involves avoiding "fatal funnels" that give a gunman more body surface area to shoot at, such as the middle of a doorway. Instead, officers are encouraged to peer around the edge of the door in a cautious manner if possible. As each suspect is encountered, orders are barked loudly and clearly: "Put your hands up! Let me see your hands! Now get down on your knees and stay there!" Meanwhile, other officers lie in wait for those wanting to escape from other areas of the home. Rooms are cleared one by one until the entire house has been searched. The State Probation Office of the Griffin Judicial Circuit originally sought the training for its new POSSE (Probation Office Strategic Search Effort) team, and local sheriff's departments expressed interest in participating also, said Bill Larkey, chief probation officer. The probation office wants to cooperate more with local officials in finding suspects who have absconded, Larkey said. Currently, the Fayette County Sheriff's Office serves all the probation violation warrants here, and the state probation office appreciates that, he said. "If they didn't do that, our probation services wouldn't be as effective," Larkey added. "... We just want to assist them when it's proper." Warden Ed Sanders at West Central State Prison in Zebulon graciously agreed to host the course, providing classroom space and an abandoned building to use in drills, Larkey said. The Pike County Board of Education also allowed the use of a school building that was being renovated, which gave the officers a chance to work on clearing classrooms and hallways during potentially dangerous situations, Larkey added. Officers would enter the structures armed with specially designed handguns loaded with paint-tipped bullets to shoot at suspects if necessary. Participants also wore face and neck guards along with body armor to take the "sting" out of the bullets. After each entry, the teams' techniques were evaluated by Ortiz. "This really makes us more aware of the types of dangerous situations we might encounter," Larkey said. The training was scheduled months before an Atlanta police officer was killed during a raid on a drug house, officials said. The Georgia Police Academy provides training year-round free of charge to state police officers thanks to a federal grant program through the Governor's Criminal Justice Coordinating Council, Ortiz noted. "We want to provide the officers with tools and techniques to make them successful," Ortiz said.
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