ACTIVE SHOOTER IMPACT ON LAW ENFORCEMENT RESPONSE TRAINING

WHAT DEFINES AN ACTIVE SHOOTER SITUATION?

As it relates to law enforcement, an active shooter situation is described as one in which a shooting is in progress and typical law enforcement protocols may be affected in terms of methods used for responding to the incident. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the active aspect of the term implies both law enforcement and the bystander have the potential to affect the outcome based on their responses. According this this publication, The FBI has designated 50 shooting in 2016 and 2017 as active shooter incident. Twenty incidents occurred in 2016, while 30 incidents occurred in 2017.

Twenty of the 50 incidents met the criteria cited in the federal definition of “mass killings”, that is, “three or more killings in a single incident”. The 50 active shooter incidents occurred in 21 states.

A new FBI study of 2016 and 2017 active shooter incidents, Law enforcement officers exchanged gunfire with the shooter at the scene of 14 incidents. They sustained casualties at 8 of the incidents.

According to the FBI active shooter incidents on 2016-2017, a total of (33) law enforcement officers were tragically killed or wounded in 12 incidents. Security personnel confronted the shooter(s) at the scene of 2 incidents, where 1 security guard was injured.

Nearly half of the shooter involved officer deaths are due to being under fire in open spaces and having little training or knowledge of how to respond or protect themselves. According to Greg Ellifritz, President of Active Response Training (follow his blog), this study revealed the importance for law enforcement to undergo additional training similar to that of military tactics such as bounding overwatch.

Although these frightening statistics are hard to comprehend, they show a strong trend toward improving the way our law enforcement are educated and protected in responding to active shooter situations.

PROTECTING YOU SO YOU CAN PROTECT OTHERS

In response to the growing number of ballistic threats to law enforcement, and the government’s effort to create awareness around active shooter situations, ADS has worked with reliable tactical and body armor manufacturers, LBT and Custom Armor Group (CAG), to develop a custom packaged solution.

ADS is proud to offer affordable ballistic protective equipment for law enforcement officers that is light weight, NIJ06 certified and available to ship immediately. ADS’s easy and affordable solution is the ballistic protection your department needs at a fraction of the cost.