Police interacting with armed citizens

Status
Not open for further replies.
G

GEM

Moderator Emeritus
Joined
Apr 11, 2004
Messages
11,303
Location
WNY
This a good article for officers for problems and procedures dealing with armed citizens.

https://www.police1.com/concealed-c...ail&utm_term=0_5584e6920b-42bf9c0d14-83999136

It is also useful read for the citizen to understand their prospective as sometimes here, folks demand that the law immediately recognize them as righteous and/or that the citizen should intervene (that's your decision but understand the risks).

Discusses the perceptual problems and stress issues on the police side and citizen side of the encounter.
 
In our (required) CWP class, the instructor advised us to immediately call 911 and inform the agent of the situation and that you are an armed permit holder and are holding a suspect at gunpoint. If the threat has been neutralized, there is no reason to still be holding the weapon.
 
Well, that's a good idea but I would argue a bit. If you look at real world incidents sometimes all that gets from the dispatcher is a description of YOU as armed. OOPS! Not that you shouldn't but be aware it can go awry.

Also, holding someone at gun point when the law arrives is a bad thing. Next, you hold me at gunpoint and I say - Well, I'm walking away, cowboy.

What then would you do? Also, witnesses might not understand the situation and tell 011 there is a man with a gun and describe you. Recall the guy recently who picked up the AR and got shot by the arriving law. I'll pass at apprehending the bad guy to surviving the incident.
 
Be an early caller, be a good witness.
Don't try "citizen's arrest", don't shoot at a fleeing felon.
Don't be holding a gun when the police arrive.

If you have shot, shot at, or pointed a gun at an assailant, or just have a gun on you, don't argue with the police. They will probably disarm and "detain" you. As the experts on PF say, know how to surrender.
 
Kleanbore said:
I cannot imagine holding anyone at gunpoint.
Click to expand...
Consider the scenario where someone came at you with a knife or a bat: you draw your weapon and present and the attacker drops his weapon and holds his hands up. At that point, you are not justified in shooting, either legally or morally, so, what do you do? You must either detain him until the police arrive or let him go on his merry way I vote for the former.
 
Shanvanvocht said:
Consider the scenario where someone came at you with a knife or a bat: you draw your weapon and present and the attacker drops his weapon and holds his hands up. At that point, you are not justified in shooting, either legally or morally, so, what do you do? You must either detain him until the police arrive or let him go on his merry way I vote for the former.
Click to expand...

Have you ever detained someone? It doesn’t sound like you have. People don’t always stand there with their hands up even for the police.

You do realize that you have no deadly force option once he raises his hands unless he attacks you again. So just what are you going to do if he gets decides to run? You can’t shoot him and he most likely knows that and that makes the gun in your hand a moot point.

There is no reason for a private citizen to hold anyone for the police. A CCW permit is not a peace officers commission and trying to act like a peace officer is fraught with both physical and legal peril.
 
Here's an interesting insight that I got from John Holschen. In the course of your interaction with the bad guy, you get the 'drop' on him. Well, you tell him to do XYZ. He does not. So what to do? Naive folks start yelling at the bad person and APPROACH closer! Oops, too close and while you are yapping, you get attacked.

John argued as a civilian, as you give commands you back up - distance is your friend.

There is tendency in these discussions for guys to want to establish dominance as a goal. Pumps you up. However, your goal is to survive. That view annoys some. However, your emotions need to be buffered by cognitive processes.
 
Upon hearing something go "bump in the night" outside my home, my plan is to remain alert and listen.
If it was a fleeting sound, that is great. If it is a person rooting around in the locked barn, I'm calling the cops.

Certainly not interested in what would feel like an ETERNITY trying to hold someone…who might also be a very desperate and unpredictable "three-strike felon" without a whole lot left to lose in this lifetime.
 
In our (required) CWP class, the instructor advised us to immediately call 911 and inform the agent of the situation and that you are an armed permit holder and are holding a suspect at gunpoint.
Click to expand...
Watched video of an incident where a homeless man repeatedly attacked a group with a large rock. They had just managed to get the upper hand when the police arrived. The officer saw them beating the man who had attacked them multiple times with a lethal weapon, but he didn't know what was going on.

So he separated them, and was paying attention to the group, not the actual attacker. The attacker got up, casually walked over to the group while the cop was talking to them and struck one of the women in the group hard enough to knock her unconscious. The presence of the cop had no deterrent effect on him at all and the cop didn't move quickly enough to stop him from injuring the woman.

The moral of the story is that if you choose to keep an attacker close to you, or choose to stay close to the attacker, when the police show up and take control of the scene, you WILL be disarmed--and while still close to the attacker. Depending on how the scenario plays out, you may become vulnerable to the attacker again.
 
Shanvanvocht said:
In our (required) CWP class, the instructor advised us to immediately call 911 and inform the agent of the situation and that you are an armed permit holder and are holding a suspect at gunpoint. If the threat has been neutralized, there is no reason to still be holding the weapon.
Click to expand...

“Holding a suspect at gunpoint” is generally a very bad idea, from a strategy-and-tactics viewpoint. Violent suspects are not generally inclined to cooperate, and, by definition, robbery is a crime of violence. If that is official South Carolina teaching doctrine, well, that is sad. If that is NRA teaching doctrine, well, again, that is sad. I could say something MUCH more salty, than “sad,” but, well, will leave it as “sad.” An LEO may have a sworn duty to detain a felon, but, a private citizen does not.

Shanvanvocht said:
Consider the scenario where someone came at you with a knife or a bat: you draw your weapon and present and the attacker drops his weapon and holds his hands up. At that point, you are not justified in shooting, either legally or morally, so, what do you do? You must either detain him until the police arrive or let him go on his merry way I vote for the former.
Click to expand...

Well, in this case, the bad guy is still within a moment’s reach of his weapon. I would hate to be the good guy, waiting for an officer to arrive, especially in the jurisdiction where I was an LEO, with its notoriously slow response times. Pistols can get heavy, during gunpointing. Plus, when the officer arrives, I would know that I would be ordered to drop MY weapon, and get on the ground, which would mean that my weapon would be within a relatively short distance of the bad guy, and, I would be on the ground. I hate ground-fighting; too old for that stuff.

I am not saying that no suspect should ever be held at gunpoint, but we do need to really think about these things.
 
Old Dog said:
Best thing is to have a plan. And as noted, distance is your friend.
Click to expand...

I had the duty to hold a an EDP who was threatening his brother with a knife for about 10 minutes while I was awaiting backup. Call came in that the suspect was holding a knife to his brother's throat. When I arrived the suspect was walking around in the yard with the knife in his hand yelling and then muttering to himself. I took up a position about 30 feet away at the corner of the mobile home they lived in and commanded him to drop the knife and step away. Surprisingly he complied. I then ordered him to turn around and face away then to lay flat on the ground. Again he complied. We stayed in that position until backup arrived then we took him into custody without incident. I knew he could go from compliant to fighting in the blink of an eye from previous arrests. I might have handled it differently if backup had been unavailable or a long distance out (the joy of rural LE). Distance and an obstacle between you and the bad guy............Best idea is not to attempt to detain anyone.
 
Jeff White said:
Best idea is not to attempt to detain anyone.
Click to expand...
Over on the CCWSafe blog (open to the world) recent advice included the following:
"The news radio report we referenced in the Redding, California case says the neighbor “tried to hold him at gunpoint until police arrived.” Holding someone at gunpoint once the immediate threat has been neutralized is, legally, very different from a defensive display. Don West says, “Once the imminent threat has passed, and now you’re holding a gun on someone, ostensibly waiting for the police to get there, this is no longer defense of others. This isn’t self-defense. This is a form of citizen’s arrest.” Holding someone at gunpoint carries its own set of legal risks. Don says, “you can be charged with false imprisonment or assault if your perceptions were incorrect.” Beyond legal consequences, an armed defender holding someone at gunpoint risks being shot by responding police officers -- or by another concealed carrier who doesn’t understand the context of the situation."
For the full context of that advice, hop over to
DEFENSIVE DISPLAY IN DEFENSE OF ANOTHER
Posted on 10/22/2021
 
Shanvanvocht said:
Consider the scenario where someone came at you with a knife or a bat: you draw your weapon and present and the attacker drops his weapon and holds his hands up. At that point, you are not justified in shooting, either legally or morally, so, what do you do? You must either detain him until the police arrive or let him go on his merry way I vote for the former.
Click to expand...

I ask you to PLEASE read and grasp the rules of " action v/s reaction".

You will be in one of those modes when involved in ANY confrontation.

If you can grasp the facts of this ,that I mention.

You will NOT try to control or hold anyone during a confrontation,ESPECIALLY a deadly force incident.

I taught this in our academy for 22 years,the "good guy" usually lost BADLY.

And that was with lights on and not losing your life due to an error.
 
Craig_VA said:
Over on the CCWSafe blog (open to the world) recent advice included the following:
"The news radio report we referenced in the Redding, California case says the neighbor “tried to hold him at gunpoint until police arrived.” Holding someone at gunpoint once the immediate threat has been neutralized is, legally, very different from a defensive display. Don West says, “Once the imminent threat has passed, and now you’re holding a gun on someone, ostensibly waiting for the police to get there, this is no longer defense of others. This isn’t self-defense. This is a form of citizen’s arrest.” Holding someone at gunpoint carries its own set of legal risks. Don says, “you can be charged with false imprisonment or assault if your perceptions were incorrect.” Beyond legal consequences, an armed defender holding someone at gunpoint risks being shot by responding police officers -- or by another concealed carrier who doesn’t understand the context of the situation."
For the full context of that advice, hop over to
DEFENSIVE DISPLAY IN DEFENSE OF ANOTHER
Posted on 10/22/2021
Click to expand...

What about using a "zip tie", either around the suspects legs or wrists, so you no longer have to keep pointing your gun at them while waiting for the police?
 
JTHunter said:
What about using a "zip tie", either around the suspects legs or wrists, so you no longer have to keep pointing your gun at them while waiting for the police?
Click to expand...

Can you say "unlawful restraint"? You are moving from self defense into making a citizens arrest. Illinois law gives you all of the powers of a peace officer if you witness a felony......but.......it gives you none of the legal protections. Pull your zip tie too tight and you are on your own in court. When the police arrive and start their investigation and decide that maybe your detention of the "suspect" wasn't legal or warranted the states attorney may decide to charge you with unlawful restraint. By the way, you could be charged with unlawful restraint for holding a "suspect" at gunpoint. Those are the possible legal ramifications.

Do you like to fight? How are your hand to hand skills? Do you have a lot of training and experience in ground fighting? I ask these questions because most of the times an arrest turned into a hand to hand encounter was at the moments the cuffs went on. I've had subjects who were calm and compliant throughout the process turn into a violent rage when the steel hit the wrist. If you ever tried to take a non-compliant subject into custody you would realize what a bad idea it is to try to do it yourself. While I made a lot of solo arrests, I always preferred to have another officer present when actually taking a person into custody. Have you thought about how to keep the subject form getting your gun while you put the zip ties on him? Do you carry in a retention holster?

Trying to restrain a subject is a terrible idea.
 
JTHunter said:
What about using a "zip tie", either around the suspects legs or wrists, so you no longer have to keep pointing your gun at them while waiting for the police?
Click to expand...
The point is that we are not LEOs, and any effort to hold a person by force (gun) or restraint (zip ties) once the threat is over is a form of citizen's arrest.
If not done just right from a legal standpoint, we open ourselves up to potential criminal and civil liability for forcible detention. I recommend you go read the entire blog post as linked.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

F
  • Locked
Three Tiers of Police-Citizen Encounters
Replies
2
Views
374
Mainsail
Mainsail
D
  • Locked
Armed Citizen from AR Interacts with Police Officer in AL
Replies
21
Views
2K
ourichie
O
M
  • Locked
Bad guys, police and armed citizens
2 3
Replies
65
Views
4K
TooTaxed
T
W
  • Locked
Concealed and carried: Wisconsin fails its citizens by limiting right to arms
Replies
4
Views
711
jimpeel
J
J
  • Locked
Communicating Effectively with Police - long
Replies
6
Views
807
G21dude
G
Back
Top