Leo's , active ,retired

[45-70 Ranger]

TIme on the range

In '74 at the SO I started at in central Tx. we had trustees that cast thousands of rounds a month for us. Myself and three other officers, did the loading. Ammo was made available to ALL officers at any time. We shot a bunch and believe me we were good.

Fast forward to the 80's and a bigger dept in north Tx. There I loaded for the dept. We could draw a box of 50 once a week. About 50% did. The rest fired only when we qualified, every six months.

Finished in a bigger dept. where training was looked upon as not only needed, but if you failed to show for training, you got days off w/o pay! We had our own range next to the training center. We shot alot. Most officers would be setting times for the range with the range officer at least once a week of at best every other week. But we were only required to qualify once a year. About 1/3 of the officers would only shoot once a year. That was pretty sad...

Now as for me, I shot three times a week or more. I was known by other officers in that mid size dept as being a gun nut. Well in my time before I retired, I was involved in three shooting. As you can see, I'm still here. Guess the gun nut was on to something huh?

To my fellow retired officers, glad you made it. To my brother and sister officers on the job, be safe and make it home everyday.

Wade

 

[HavelockLEO]

I work in a very, I said VERY small PD in Eastern North Carolina. My departments total man-power (including part-time, reserve, communicators, records clerk, and officers) only tips the numbers at about fifty. Of that number twenty-four are road officers (Sgts and patrol officers), investigators, and School Resource Officers. Of those 24, ten are SRT members and they come from the previously listed billetts.

We've had one extra firearms qual this year, it was shooting from unusual positions and scenario based weapon deployment (traffic stop/behind cover/combat reload). Last year we were cleared to carry our own personal AR type rifle and had a qual day for that as well as a qual day when we upgraded to Gen 4 Glock 22's.

The skinny in my department is that if you arent SRT, you have to pay for your own ammo to practice with, rifle, pistol and shotgun.

I shoot weekly on my own dime, my Glock has better than five hundred rounds through it in the last four months, my rifle hasnt had as much exercise due to the price of 5.56.

I shoot in IPSC matches once a month and CQB matches as well, theyre at the same range two weeks apart.

Other than the SRT guys, I'm the most active shooter I know of in my PD. I know of a few that barely qual, but they have the oppurtunity as much as I do to shoot on thier own time. But as an Ex once told me, "It is what it is".

And its a good thing I'm single, cause if I was married with the ammo bill I have, it'd be a short marriage.............

 

[LeonCarr]

50 total personnel is not a VERY small PD.

Something like 75% of the Police Departments and Sheriff's Offices in Texas have less than 50 toal personnel.

Most LEOs still don't shoot as much as they should.

Just my .02,
LeonCarr

 

[HavelockLEO]

thats fifty total , not fifty officers working the road, thats admin communicators, reserve, part time , and detectives. there are four (4) officers working the road in this town twenty-five thousand per shift, four.......And there are a few towns within a half hours drive that have between one and three officers total in thier departments.

I said very (VERY) small for that reason only.

On either side of my city are two larger cities that have twenty-five (25) plus officers per shift on the road daily, one has that many in its traffic unit alone.

But then I guess small and very small are all relative to your circumstances.

 

[SharpsDressedMan]

I once worked for a four man department in NW Colorado. Best placed I ever worked. The chief wore a ball cap, never wore a tie, and got his hands dirty like the rest of us. Dispatched by the state patrol and later by the county, we had no other personnel. But a neighboring town had only two officers, so I guess we were twice as big......

 

[Usmc-1]

Well I think that sucks , if you have to pay for your own ammo ,that is , lets see , your protecting the community as a cop , then go above and beyond as srt , and your so-called "leadership" requires you to pay for your ammo? More power to you buddy!

Thats one of my biggest complaints is the fact management is unconcerned with the "tools of the trade" doesnt matter whether its a small department or large department, Management should be trying , encouraging officers to shoot more , give them incentives , because lets face it , the last thing you want to do is come in contact with a survvivalist who trains everyday , prime example is the video of the cop who was shot in his patrol car with his collapsable baton , IM SORRY BUT COLLAPSABLE BATON VERSUSES M1 !!!! Who do you think won! Thats the departments fault , bad training , that officer did what he was trained to do , recognize the threat (except the threat level ,obviously in that dept only made it so high) and deal with the situation!
Most traffic stops wont require you pulling your gun , but hey in rural areas where back up my be 20 minutes ? You pull your gun on a nut case who aint complying , and when he gets back in the truck with out your ordering him to do so , its time to "party"!!

 

[Usmc-1]

I also believe management caused the introduction of high capacity handguns , specifically because there departments dont hit the range enough , Glock jumped in on this action and thats what made them a leader in the market !

The officer now has a "17 round magazine , compared to a 6 shot revolver" , with the 6 shot he had to practice alot to maintain accuracy , with this new gun "he's bound to hit the target at least 30% of the time" .

Well I dont like those odds!!!

 

[45-70 Ranger]

Usmc-1, you hit the nail right on the head. In the days when wheelguns were the standard, you had some shooters on the road. At the SO where I started my sheriff asked me my perferred weapon. Since I was just out of the army I said 1911. He smiled and said that's fine for an off duty gun and handed me a 4" Mod 29 S&W. He said this is what we carry. Your backup might be miles away. I want you to win the fight. Get good with it son. He had a point. And I got good with it too. When I went to a larger dept. where the .44 was classed as to much gun, I carried a 4" Mod 28. Felt the same as the other for the most part. Less learning curve. Always qualified with at least a score of 97% or better.

Now that the autoloader is king in the PD world, it's a different story. For the last five years on the job I was part of the shooting investigation team. We'd get called out to the scene of officer involved shootings. With the Glocks, Barettas, and such, the number of rounds expended went up, but the number of hits went down. Some cases the officer fired out his whole mag without even hitting the suspect. When the chief read our report on the shooting, most often there was a remark in the end of the report stating more training was required for the officer/s involved. But in the end, I feel that it is up to the individual officer to seek to improve their use of their weapons. If you want to learn how to shoot well, you practice. If you want to learn how to do woodworking, you do it often. I guess you see my point. It's really up to the officer and how they wish to do the job. Fast and accruate with you weapon, or quick to write that ticket? In a shooting, the pen is not going to help until after the smoke clears and you start your report.

Ok, off the litle soapbox....

Wade

 

[HavelockLEO]

Usmc-1 45-70 Ranger you guys are absolutely right.

I just want to clarify that I'm not an SRT member. I just have no interest in it. When the team got re-intorduced I said to myself, in a department as small as ours why isnt every officer atleast basically SWAT trained. In four years there have been three call outs, and in the case of an active shooter, there wont be time for a full fledged call out, its the patrol officer or SRO that will be the first responder to it, not SRT.

I shoot alot because I value my life and I dont want an incident to be any worse because I'm not familiar or comfortable with my weapon.

I wont get into why I have no interest in SRT, thats a whole other rant.

 

[Usmc-1]

Havelockleo , understandable about the srt , lots of bs and you really dont have much of a life , great job for a single guy! it a small department I think your correct that every patrol officer should be certified , no doubt a s first responder you will be involved in everything ,why not have the training ? But it boils down to the amount of practice , like 45-70 said ,if your into woodworking , and you dont practice much your likely to cut your finger off , its like anything , take your kids for example , when they play a video game , the practice insanely! I mean I play the game Splinter Cell, in order to pass one section (sometimes) I repeat the scene maybe a 100 times , after 100 times you know what to do!! You practice life and death scenarios and you'll be ready , you shoot at the range "center mass" and I guarantee your next shot at the "Democrat" who just robbed the store is gonna be center mass and he's going down , having added rounds is a plus in todays world where the un-lawful sales of high powered weapons are easily available to thugs , but unless you train and practice you might as well go into that fight with a pr-24!

 

[bikerdoc]

Old info here, I retired in 88. Mandatory yearly qual for the record. range was open 24/7

Free ammo as long as you turned in brass. Me, I went once a week, as did my partner and a few others.

Have no clue what they do now as I live in another state.

 

[lemaymiami]

I'm retired now since 1995 after 22 years with a small department (100 officer max, and rarely at full strength). In my era it was annual qualification with pistol, then a separate annual shotgun qualification along with the occasional special training when new weapons were authorized (my first seven years we were only authorized revolvers), when that changed we also allowed auto pistols, my last seven years we were issued Sig 40 cal pistols.

Guys who were interested in weapons training were usually able to wrangle up extra range time. The serious ones became range officers and worked extra duty through the Police Academy and pretty much lived at the range when they weren't on duty doing their regular jobs. When we were finally able to have our own SWAT team, those involved got quite a bit of extra training and range time.

For three years I was in charge of training for my Department. Trying to do any additional firearms training along with every other type of training was difficult since you not only had to find the funds and range time but also had to do it as much "on duty" as possible since the overtime figures were just impossible from a budget standpoint. To this day I believe the best defensive training we ever came up with did not involve range time at all. We did serious high level Officer Survival training and ran everyone on the Department through it. It changed a lot of attitudes and eventually changed doctrine and actual street tactics. I think we worked much smarter and safer as a result. More than a few young guys who came up through this system went on to become chiefs at other outfits in later years and I'll bet their officers benefitted from that mindset...

 

[Harley Quinn]

If you are a bad shot only way to get better, is pratice shooting

Those who are interested in survival, I noticed, they as a rule were not your hotdog copper Today survival is placed way up there, why all the safety equipment etc Plus all the training on covering your partners back, never putting yourself in bad situations...Calling up SWAT, no kicking doors on your own..

Times have changed, in the street and in training, big time...

 

[lemaymiami]

Harley, there are a lot of guys who'd agree with you... I'm not one of them. Some of the tactics we used did add a bit of caution to daily ops, but it's well justified if your guys go home at the end of each shift.

Here's a brief view of what we tried to do (for all I know most of it's been forgotten since I don't hear or see it practiced much). The idea is to put any potential opponent in as much disadvantage as possible.... to allow them plenty of room for them to show they're not going to co-operate, try to run, etc. while putting yourself in the best possible position to respond to any contingency. Every time I see an officer walk up to a traffic stop vehicle on some reality show I cringe.... IN OUR TRAINING EVERY COP THAT DID THAT WAS KILLED, darned nearly every time (and it wasn't hard to do, either).

Among other small changes - we quit searching buildings (and actually called out, if necessary a K-9 unit to do that building search). When you quit "kicking doors" your officers survival chances go 'way up in my opinion. This isn't a game, the idea is to make the job less exciting than it can be. If there was the slightest hint that weapons might be involved the k-9 and his handler were backed up by at least one shooter with a shotgun... Once guys on the street saw what they were facing most quickly stood down. In my years on the job not one of our officers was killed on the job. In the early years it was plain luck. Once we got serious about changing our tactics it wasn't luck at all... In the years I've been retired I've seen instance after instance where local cops were killed in situations that could have been avoided... Hope that doesn't continue.

Face it John Wayne is dead.... and the kind of tactics you see in most movies will get you a ticket to the boneyard if things go badly...

Lots more to say about this sort of stuff but not for general consumption.

 

[Pilgrim]

I retired in 1999 from an eighty deputy sheriffs department in central CA. The policy was firearms training every other month. Two of those shoots was day and night qualification.

Sadly, the more senior one rose in the organization the more excuses he made to avoid firearms training.

I was a firearms instructor and rarely saw deputies above the grade of sergeant at the range.

Pilgrim

 

[C-grunt]

I voted once a month because that is the least amount of shooting I do. I dont quite get out every week but shoot at least twice a month but usually more.

Now that my daughter is in preschool on one of my days off I am shooting a lot more frequently. My dept has enough ammo for every officer to shoot once a month but few officers take it up. So that leaves more free ammo for those of us that do like to shoot.

 

[Usmc-1]

@ lemaymiami I would agree wholeheartedly about building searches , I found the hard way what happens in a building search , Actually I was chasing a guy through an old building ,He must have been there before many times , because when I chased him I missed the "2 gigantic roles of carpet " and ended up cusping my feet under one of them , falling to the ground "breaking both my wrists at the same time" I got up ran after him some more and noticed how "different" I was feeling , I got to my patrol car , hit the overheads and started banging the foghorn , thank god my partner was right around the corner (in his car) , I couldnt move my hands at all , frozen in the middle of the street, if that guy knew I was incapacitated who knows what would have happened!

 

[CathyGo]

I need a "varies" option. You've got everything from people who shoot only at qual time(every 6 months) to people who shoot a few times a week in my unit. A huge obstacle for military is that there is no option to just go to a range and practice shooting. You only have access to your duty weapon when a range is scheduled for the entire company or when you're on duty.

I own an M9. I'm the only one in my unit who does. I bought it specifically to get more proficient with my duty weapon. There are some very key skills that the Army doesn't cover in training. Drawing from a holster is one of them. The excuse I was given is that there were too many training accidents when people were drawing from holsters.:banghead:

 

[NMPOPS]

Before retirement I was the lead firearms structor for my dept. But I was also a detective supervisor but I still managed to get out to the range 2-3 times a month 90% of my dept. Shot quarterly because they had to.

Sent from my Ally

 

[Usmc-1]

@ CathyGo I feel for you , I agree the military doesnt help much , although the entire segment of the military is to protect ,they treat you like a little kid , theres so many rules as to firearms its like you dont get to shoot unless its scheduled , fortunately for me while in the Marines we shot at least twice a week , I was an 0311 , mostly we shot using the m16 (w/ grenade launcher) ,not many of us carried a 1911 , only platoon leaders and platoon sargeants carried them , they did shoot quite a bit though!
If your an MP and they wont train in the proper techniques , holsters draw,holster retention ,etc, go to the local police dept or SO and tell them your predicament ,ask if your can train with them, they might want to ask your command ,but at the very least not only is this great for you ,but its great to have the local cops integrate with the MPs , you never know when you might need there help (vice versa), of course also , kin case you get out , you might have a job waiting for you!!

You brought up another great idea though , I know alot cops wont agree with this , because they want the weapon of there choice for an off duty carry , however , if your department carries a G22 for example , Im pretty sure you can get a sweet deal on a g23 with department credentials (by the way ,1st and 2nd gen Glocks are really cheap right now , because people seem to believe they have to have rails [3rd and 4th gen] and other nonsense you'll never use) , anyway , why not buy a g23 and practice with it , its very similiar to the g22 (its the same gun basically) , so not only are you getting valuable training for your service weapon your enjoying the shoot as well , no need to change the way you hold it , change your target sights , change anything , your shooting the same gun!

Im not saying ditch your 1911 or .380 , Im saying if you practice everyday or as often as possible you will get better ,why not practice with a concealed version of your duty gun?

 

[Harley Quinn]

lemaymiami mentions...

Face it John Wayne is dead.... and the kind of tactics you see in most movies will get you a ticket to the boneyard if things go badly...

True, goes badly is the key...Driving a car, mistake, you are 1 sec from an accident or death...

Some of the tactics we used did add a bit of caution to daily ops, but it's well justified if your guys go home at the end of each shift.

Everyone wants to go home (you would think anyway) Injury and death is a by product of Police work, safety is paramont, walking up on a vehicle/home of problem children is dangerous stuff... Why so many call ups of SWAT= expense in this day and age... (as a rule for officer safety)

Traffic stops and traffic accidents were and are leading in the death of LEO...
IMHO 2 man cars rule. They are safer for the LEO...Felony cars and Metro it was mandatory...Everyday police work seems be 1 man though...

Lots more to say about this sort of stuff but not for general consumption.

Yep

Just read this...

http://www.officer.com/news/10279823/new-york-deputy-dies-after-shootout

Pretty pointed on what has been mentioned and not done at this above scene???
Regards

 

[Usmc-1]

Without a doubt 2 man cars are how to save the officers lives! Just makes sense , sure everyone wants to drive , but my money is on safety and a 2 man car means people are less likely to pull a fast one on ya!

 

[AKCOP]

Being a great shot does not mean you are a great cop, or for that matter even a fair one. Some of the best shots I knew were lousy cops and some of the best cops I knew were lousy shots. Find the cop who is the best shot and ask him what the law is in his state regarding the lawful use of deadly force. Then find the worst shot and ask him the same question. If you do not know when you are within the law to use deadly force what good is it to be an above average shooter who practices three times a week?. If an officer qualifies four times a year and never shoots a round between qualifications is he less of a cop when compared to the guy who shoot three times a week?

 

[SharpsDressedMan]

Which one do you want to protect you in a tight situation? Not saying we need to keep bad cops, but we need to insist that good cops that are bad shots become good shots, or they, too, will be replaced. There are just too many applicants for police to settle for less in either area.

 

[Shimitup]

Most of the cops I know only shoot when they have to qualify. A good friend, recently retired LEO forwarded this to me and some other officers.

[FONT=arial,helvetica]http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=969_1263249923

It's very painful to watch, I hesitated to post it but it's my hope it will inspire some LEO's to get out and practice.
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