Active Shooter Response

Lieutenant Colonel (ret.) Mike Wood is the son of a 30-year California Highway Patrolman
and the author of “Newhall Shooting: A Tactical Analysis,” the highly-acclaimed study of the
1970 California Highway Patrol gunfight in Newhall, California.

The active shooter trend will not abate in 2019. While attacks from garden-
variety crazies will certainly continue, it's possible we'll see an increase in
politically motivated attacks, as disaffected political groups continue their
slide toward the violent radicalism that plagued America from the mid-1960s
to mid-1970s. My hope for 2019 is that law enforcement leaders will take a
more active role in promoting training the responsible citizens in their
communities in the lawful and ethical use of force in self-defense.

If you're not already carrying an individual first aid kit (IFAK) on your person while on
duty, fix that immediately. You can easily bleed out before you reach the kit in your
patrol vehicle.
Communications Technology
Eddie Reyes is director of the 911 center in Prince William County, Virginia. He retired from the
Alexandria Police Department with the rank of senior deputy chief after 25 years of service. He
also served as a project manager at the National Police Foundation.

2019 will usher in three major technologies – Next Generation 911 (NG911), Artificial Intelligence for
911 (AI911) and FirstNet. Implementation of NG911 infrastructure will allow emergency
communications centers to accept text, photos and videos from citizens. This rich data, which will be
supplemented with robust artificial intelligence search engines, will provide emergency call takers with
more complete information before dispatching first responders. A social media dashboard, integrated
into the CAD system, will generate mind-blowing possibilities. Even if only location accuracy is
augmented for the caller with NG911 and AI, this will be a significant improvement compared to the
current capabilities of most emergency call centers. FirstNet is being rapidly deployed to first
responders, which will allow for quick and seamless transition of the super-rich data collected by call
takers to first responders in the field.

An unintended consequence of this intelligent information will be that some call takers will find it challenging to
witness the images coming into call centers, which will create vacancies in 911 centers and require a major training
shift in order to replace those who depart and ensure that those being hired are capable of processing graphic
information.
Crowd Control
Lt. Dan Marcou is an internationally-recognized police trainer who was a highly-decorated
police officer with 33 years of full-time law enforcement experience. He is a co-author of
“Street Survival II.”

Civil unrest will continue to be a challenge for law enforcement in

2019. Currently, most agencies do not address crowd control
training until they are found ill-prepared by a large disturbance. I
predict that more academies and agencies nationwide will begin
to deliver training to ensure every police officer is equipped to
respond to civil unrest and the challenges posed by today's
professional rioters.

Team training should take place shortly before any anticipated event, and at least once a
year. The latter can be an opportunity to have officers clean and inspect their tactical
equipment.
Digital Forensics
Major Christian Quinn is a 22-year veteran law enforcement officer and currently serves as the
commander of the Cyber & Forensic Bureau with the Fairfax County Police Department in
Fairfax, Virginia. He is a graduate of the FBI National Academy.

Law enforcement needs to prepare for the proliferation of the Internet of Things
(IoT) such as wearable technology, internet-connected home assistants and vehicle
infotainment systems. The growing reliance on digital evidence in both cybercrime
and conventional criminal investigations will necessitate that agencies re-evaluate
how to address the subsequent increased inventory of “virtual evidence” that must
be preserved. Police agencies need to be able to substantiate the authenticity of
digital evidence, while still providing access that offers verifiable accountability. This
has the potential to become a mounting financial and logistical challenge.

Cloud-based storage options may offer an affordable solution over investing in servers maintained on an agency’s
premises. However, departments must diligently consider various issues such as rules of evidence, cybersecurity
and fiscal sustainability before deciding what solution meets their needs now and in the future.
DNA Technology
CeCe Moore is the lead genetic genealogist at Parabon NanoLabs, and an internationally
recognized DNA investigative expert, educator and pioneer in the field of genetic genealogy.

Genetic genealogy will successfully be used to identify active serial

offenders in addition to solving cold cases. New forensic
technology advances, such as DNA methylation analysis and
phenotype prediction of novel physical traits, will assist with these
identifications.

Don’t wait for a case to go cold before employing advanced DNA analysis.
Evidence-Based Policing
Jason Potts is a lieutenant with the Vallejo (Calif.) Police Department, a NIJ LEADS scholar, an
American Society of Evidence-Based Policing (ASEBP) executive board member, a Police
Foundation Fellow and a reserve special agent with the Coast Guard Investigative Service.

My hope is that evidence-based policing will enhance strategy, operational deployments, initiatives and
policy while being aware of policing’s inherent uncertainty. Unfortunately, we will continue to resist
research and data partly because U.S. policing is decentralized (18,000 individual police departments)
and based mostly on tradition, culture, politics, law, agency-specific values and public opinion.
However, if we look deeply at our roles in a democratic society and restructure reward systems that
focus at times on deterrence/prevention (where appropriate) and legitimacy, then we may align our
actions to desired outcomes. The result might be the institutionalization of evidence-based approaches
to policing based partly on analyzing and assessing data with the exponential growth of leveraged
technology and more crime analysts.

If police leaders can build a receptivity to scientific research in policing, then we might understand the
impact of our responses by reviewing and using the best available evidence to inform, challenge and
strategically inform our long-term decisions, policies and practices, and place cops at times and locations
of crime to make us more effective in improving public safety.
Homeless Outreach
Dr. Booker Hodges has been a police officer for over 11 years and currently holds the rank of
undersheriff for the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office in Saint Paul, Minnesota. Dr. Hodges is the
only active police officer in the history of the NAACP to serve as a branch president.

I predict that law enforcement agencies will push for more social
service involvement with their homeless populations, as most
issues facing these populations are best handled by those outside
of law enforcement. Communities across the country have already
begun to make this shift and I expect this to continue in 2019.

Engage your social service community and encourage them to respond to calls involving those who
are experiencing homelessness alongside your officers. By doing so you can start the process of
getting people the help they need from those who are best suited to provide assistance.
Media Relations
Julie Parker is a former TV news reporter in Washington, DC, turned media relations director
for two large suburban DC police departments, turned communications consultancy president.

More law enforcement agencies will hire civilian PIOs. This concept has been trending
upward for approximately five years and it makes sense. Former journalists or candidates
with communications backgrounds make for strong storytellers, which is traditionally a skill
set law enforcement has lacked. This is not to say sworn PIOs can't do the job and do it well,
but hiring media professionals to do a media job makes sense. Having a PIO who knows
how the media operates, what “sells” and the ability to do it on a reporter's timeline
generally generates positive press for the agency.

The civilian PIO or lead spokesperson should be a direct report to the police chief of
sheriff. Barriers cause delays and there is little time for delay in today's split-second news
cycle.
Mental Health Response
Lieutenant Brian Bixler is a 22-year veteran of the Los Angeles Police Department and is in
charge of the Mental Evaluation Unit and Threat Management Unit. He is the LAPD's Mental
Illness Project Coordinator and is appointed to the Los Angeles County EMS Commission.

Local law enforcement agencies will be asked to assist federal law

enforcement in the handling of potential targeted mass violence subjects who
suffer from mental illness. These subjects often do not reach the threshold for
prosecution and diversion to mental health linkages is a more appropriate
response.

Local agencies should reach out to their local mental health authority to determine what
resources are available for these subjects. Federal agencies need to reach out to their
local agencies to learn about their law enforcement/mental health collaborations and
develop a system to refer subjects.
Officer Training
Harvey V. Hedden is ILEETA’s executive director, having previously served as deputy executive
director for six years. He served 38 years in law enforcement in ranks from patrolman to chief.

There will be continued training emphasis on responding to persons in crisis,

the mentally ill and impaired. Health and wellness programs will be adopted
by more agencies as part of officer survival. Technology will become
increasingly important to the delivery of training from use-of-force simulation
that approaches virtual reality to the development of on-demand learning
modules that will enable officers to call up training they need while working
on a problem in the field much as we might ask Alexa or Google for the
weather forecast.

Body worn and other cameras are providing us with improved feedback on the effectiveness of training and
increased transparency for law enforcement. Trainers can be of value in educating the public, politicians and
pundits of the realities of use of force and other aspects of police work. Without this context we may be
burdened with politically motivated training/policy that will not increase safety for anyone.
Officer Wellness
Officer Mike Wasilewski, LCSW, is a full-time police officer for a large Chicago suburban
department. Both Mike and his wife, Althea Olson, LCSW, are psychotherapists at Fox Bend
Counseling in Oswego, Illinois.

Millennial officers will continue advocating for increased resources for emotional
wellness and a stigma-free culture in policing. While many administrators will see the
value, they will be challenged in successful implementation if they are resistant to
seeking out mental health services for themselves, having come up through the ranks
when counseling and psychiatric medications were viewed as only for the weak. As
a result, clinical depression, anxiety disorders and PTSD will go untreated in police
officers and suicides will remain the same or increase because continued stigma
prevents cops from seeking out services from a licensed mental health professional.

Make emotional wellness as important as tactical training. In order to be tactically strong, an officer needs to be
emotionally intelligent as well. Begin implementing a wellness check program where officers are able to see a licensed
mental health professional of their choosing in a completely confidential setting, three times a year. This will de-stigmatize
the act of seeing a counselor, provide a therapeutic outlet and foster a relationship with a professional before a crisis hits.
Operations
Chief Jim Bueermann (ret.) began his policing career in 1978 with the Redlands (Calif.) Police
Department, retiring as chief in 2011. In 2012 he was appointed the President of the National
Police Foundation, America’s oldest non-partisan police research organization.

In the latter half of 2019, policing will begin to feel the effects of the coming global recession. This will
be exacerbated by the impact of climate change on policing in the form of increased flooding,
hurricanes, fires and drought, and flare ups of civil unrest in urban centers resulting from controversial
police use-of-force incidents gone viral via social media. This will begin a noticeable reduction in
personnel in many policing agencies and force the re-examination of basic service delivery models,
civilianization, volunteers in policing and regionalized or consolidated/contracted services. It will also
accelerate the expansion of disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence, biometrics and drones
in policing. These technological advances and integration in policing will outstrip practitioner
understanding of their consequences and policy/legislation development, which will lead to increased
tension in community-police relations.

To prepare for an increasingly unstable operating environment, agencies should make an

organizational decision that focusing on the department’s future is a priority and take
definitive steps to operationalize and support the decision. Agencies should designate an
organizational champion to lead the “developing organizational foresight” initiative.
Opioid Response
Allie Hunter McDade is the executive director of the Police Assisted Addiction & Recovery
Initiative (PAARI), a movement of law enforcement agencies that believe in treatment over
arrest.

We recognize that we cannot arrest our way out of the opioid epidemic. This has
led to a shift in police culture toward proactive non-arrest programs that prevent
overdose deaths, improve public safety and enhance trust between police and
communities. Police now have tools in their toolkit that enable them to create
pathways to treatment and recovery. As more departments join PAARI and see the
benefits to their communities, my prediction is that these non-arrest responses to the
opioid epidemic will become a widespread practice in many more police
departments across the country.

As police officers, you have a front row seat to the opioid epidemic. You are problem
solvers and you got into this job to help people. Your community and your agency need
a champion to take action. I encourage you to be that champion. Get started and PAARI
will be here to help.
PTSD
Dr. Chuck Russo is the program director of criminal justice at American Military University. He
began his career in law enforcement in 1987 in central Florida and was involved all areas of
patrol, training, special operations and investigations before retiring in 2013.

In 2018, agencies continued to make significant progress in establishing programs and policies
to assist personnel recovering from post-traumatic stress disorder. However, the reality is that
not all officers will be able to recover. Individuals seeking PTSD-related workers’
compensation and/or a disability pension continue to face many obstacles to obtaining such
benefits. While some individual states have attempted to reduce obstacles, the pace of
change is far too slow. Law enforcement agencies and administrators need to work with state
legislators to improve access to workers’ compensation and enact pension laws to help
officers who are unable to recover from non-visible, career-ending injuries.

It is important that agencies address the cognitive, emotional, physical and behavioral
symptoms associated with traumatic stress by implementing CISM interventions and
peer-support programs.
Recruitment & Retention
J. Thomas Manger has been a cop for 42 years, and served as the police chief in both Fairfax
County, Virginia, and Montgomery County, Maryland. For the past four years, he has been the
president of the Major Cities Chiefs Association.

Hiring the right people is critical. Recruiters will focus more on

looking for candidates who display integrity, effective
communication skills, empathy for others and a spirit for public
service. Creating a culture where these traits are valued and
rewarded will keep those employees professionally fulfilled.

Every encounter with the public is an opportunity to build trust, or harm trust. When
the public believes that they are being listened to, and that their police department is
well intended in their actions, trust is built.
School Safety
Mo Canady is the executive director for the National Association of School Resource Officers,
which provides training for school resource officers.

School safety will continue to be a major challenge for law enforcement and
educators in 2019. When we put police in schools, we must use a community-
based policing approach. If we put police in schools only to stop school
shootings, we are going to fail. If we put police in schools only to solve a
gang problem, we are going to fail. The number one goal of any police
officer working in a school must be to bridge the gap between law
enforcement and youth. Achieving that goal produces valuable intelligence
that helps prevent active shooter situations.

Have at least one carefully selected, specially trained law enforcement officer in every
school.
Social Media
Captain Chris Hsiung from the Mountain View Police Department in California is an
internationally recognized speaker, trainer and blogger on law enforcement's use of social
media to engage communities and change the narrative about policing.

A 2018 Pew Research survey concluded that 91 percent of U.S. adults use a
smartphone and 97 percent use the internet. As more people prefer to do
their business online through smartphones, police departments must begin to
understand the benefits of deploying a “mobile-first” strategy as it relates to
their ongoing use of social media platforms to communicate and should begin
to shift their social media and outreach efforts to provide a better customer
service mobile experience for their residents.

Think about everything residents can do or ask for when they walk into your police
department lobby. Would they be able to ask the same questions or request the same services
through their smartphone? If it's less, you disappoint. If more, they'll thank and praise you for
it and you'll earn a loyal follower.
SWAT
Lt. Matt Hardesty is a 26-year veteran of law enforcement who served 22 years on the SWAT
team as an operator, grenadier, rappel master and team leader and executive officer.

SWAT teams need to increase their focus on protecting communities from terrorist and
homegrown extremist attacks. As more cowards attack our citizens as they enjoy themselves
socially, SWAT teams need to step up and provide protection details. This level of regional,
preventive cooperation may be problematic at first. Teams will have to work with emergency
management and fire rescue agencies to develop a matrix to determine when these protection
details are needed and what resources are to be deployed. The impact on staffing, costs and
equipment will necessitate teams work together to share responsibilities. This may mean a
neighboring team is on standby to assist if a call occurs while the home team is providing security,
or it could be a mutual response at the venue.

While many SWAT teams conduct great training, they often fail to seek training on
terrorism awareness and response. SWAT members need to understand current terrorist
threats and train team members on IED response.
Use of Force
Attorney Mildred O'Linn is a trial lawyer with over 30 years of experience defending
law enforcement. She is a former peace officer, FTO, defensive tactics instructor
trainer, academy manager and accreditation manager.

Use of force in response to mass gatherings of individuals at

protests, political gatherings and concentrated population areas
such as dealing with the border caravan and homeless
encampments with a focus on de-escalation will continue to be a
high-profile issue.

The ability of officers to recall, articulate and implement the training, procedures and policies that they have learned will
be more significant in the defense of officers' choices and actions. Remember: You only get one chance to tell your side of
the story for the first time. LEOs need to be better prepared to explain their understanding of laws, policy and training in
support of their choices, whether that is in a report, interview, deposition or courtroom.
Use of Force
Attorney Mildred O'Linn is a trial lawyer with over 30 years of experience defending law
enforcement. She is a former peace officer, FTO, defensive tactics instructor trainer, academy
manager and accreditation manager.

Use of force in response to mass gatherings of individuals at

protests, political gatherings and concentrated population areas
such as dealing with the border caravan and homeless
encampments with a focus on de-escalation will continue to be a
high-profile issue.

The ability of officers to recall, articulate and implement the training, procedures and policies that they have learned will
be more significant in the defense of officers' choices and actions. Remember: You only get one chance to tell your side of
the story for the first time. LEOs need to be better prepared to explain their understanding of laws, policy and training in
support of their choices, whether that is in a report, interview, deposition or courtroom.