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Outgunned in a 2,000-Round Gun Battle
The North Hollywood Shootout was a 2,000-round gun battle between two bank robbers and the LAPD on February 28, 1997. A gun battle when shotguns and pistols were not enough when engaging two heavily armed and armored suspects.
Police departments started to add long guns like AR-15’s to their patrol vehicles after the North Hollywood shootout. There has been criticism of the militarization of the police. If the expectation is that police officers should risk their lives to engage active shooters, then, as the tip of the spear, at the very least they should be given the proper tools to get the job done.
The Buffalo, NY, shooter was wearing body armor. Biden has signed an Executive to stop providing military-grade equipment to police departments. Military-grade body armor with ceramic plates would be extra protection for officers hunting a shooter. It could be kept in the trunk until needed. Armored vehicles can be used to evacuate both citizens and officers, as well moving officers closer to a shooter. An armored vehicle can be used to knock down an exterior wall.
Unlike the barking media, I only have two questions that I would like answered. Dispatchers received cell phone calls from the children trapped in a Texas classroom. Did dispatchers inform officers inside the school of the cell calls from students? The second question: were dispatchers asking a student(s) where the shooter was in the classroom? A simple question such as: is the bad guy at the front of the classroom? The second question could have helped with the decision of how and when to breach the door.
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Published in Policing
Exactly. No matter what the details are, this is an old fight over a new bone.
Conservatives have statistics, liberals have anecdotes.
I remember the North Hollywood Shootout. It ended about 50′ from my apartment building. I was at work that day – did not go home that night; spent it at my brothers.
(Above chopped for me to have more writing space.)
You know, one thing to ask here is whether there are suburban outdoor ranges near to that school such that gunfire would not be any notable thing. In my area of central Virginia, there is an outdoor range used by either the VA National Guard or local police (can’t say for sure, because I can’t figure it’s exact location) that is either immediately next door to an elementary school or right across the highway from it (US-460 runs behind the school). As a result, it’s downright common to hear rifle shooting, including automatic rifles being discharged right there during daylight hours. I suppose someone who lives right up on the the school MIGHT take note if they’re hearing a rifle discharge that sounds like it’s coming from a different direction, but that assumes it would be of any significance to them.
**After a bit of research the range I hear belongs to the local municipality’s police department.
Another spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety, the director himself, has released some more details of what happened, and said officers were absolutely wrong to wait until rushing the assailant. It turns out there were two classrooms under siege by the gunman that were connected by an unlocked door. It also tuns out that the commanding officer thought the gunman was the only one alive during their wait for the border patrol to show up, but several students were in fact still alive 45 minutes into the standoff (perhaps 8 or 9) and talking to 911 operators who did not relay this information to the commanding officer at the scene.
https://www.nationalreview.com/news/texas-official-concedes-officers-waited-too-long-to-storm-classroom-it-was-the-wrong-decision/?utm_source=email&utm_medium=breaking&utm_campaign=newstrack&utm_term=27865443
This is a fair point to consider. In an expanded google map there does seem to be ‘agricultural’ areas within 1 mile on a southernly 140 degree arc (probably legal prairie dog & coyote hunting). There is also a gun range on the far side of Garner Air Field, approx. 3 miles due east. Maybe some acclimation to gunfire is possible.
I would still assert if Ramos fired his rifle within 1-3 blocks of Robb Elementary the disturbance to the closest neighbors and businesses would be exceptional.
(BTW – several fine ranges off US-460 :-)