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Alerrt Report: Uvalde Shooting
Alerrt Report (Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training) program has issued a 26-page report on the Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde, TX. In Street Cop Speak it would be called an Epic Fail.
The gunman, an 18-year-old with an AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle, entered the building at 11:33 a.m. Before that a Uvalde police officer, who the report did not identify, saw the gunman carrying a rife toward the west hall entrance. The officer asked a supervisor for permission to open fire, but the supervisor “either did not hear or responded too late,” the report said.
When the officer turned back toward the gunman, he already gone inside “unabated,” according to the report.
The officer was 148 yards away from the door, which the report said was within the range of his rifle, and allegedly said he was concerned that an errant shot could have penetrated the school and injured students inside.
“Ultimately, the decision to use deadly force always lies with the officer who will use the force. If the officer was not confident that he could both hit his target and of his backdrop if he missed, he should not have fired,” the report read.
Shooting at a moving target that is 148 yards away is not the same as shooting at stationary paper target with a berm behind the target. As the report stated if he could not be sure of hitting the target and the backdrop was not good if he missed then the officer should not shoot.
The rest of report is critical of the police response, as it should be.
Authors of the 26-page report said their findings were based off video taken from the school, police body cameras, testimony from officers on the scene and statements from investigators. Among their findings:
It appeared that no officer waiting in the hallway during the shooting ever tested to see if the door to the classroom was locked. The head of Texas’ state police agency has also faulted officers on the scene for not checking the doors.
The officers had “weapons (including rifles), body armor (which may or may not have been rated to stop rifle rounds), training, and backup. The victims in the classrooms had none of these things.”
When officers finally entered the classroom at 12:50 p.m. — more than an hour after the shooting began — they were no better equipped to confront the gunman than they had been up to that point.
“Effective incident command” never appears to have been established among the multiple law enforcement agencies that responded to the shooting.
Here is a link to the Police One article that contains a link to a pdf of the report.
Published in Policing
But wouldn’t that penetrate the school walls? I don’t know, that sounds a bit reckless.
I’m thinking anytime you’re shooting at a living breathing person there’s adrenaline. Even if the target is a scumbag.
Might depend on how long they stand there and think about it first. Or wait for permission from a higher-up, etc.
Have you ever gotten tunnel vision? It’s irrational and uncontrollable and sudden.
Hardy har har. ;-)
If the idea is maybe 2 or 3 shots max, that’s not like indiscriminately spraying the school walls from outside.