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SWAT or not? Police militarization

I'm all for the police having the ability to do what they need to on the hard jobs, and providing them with the gear it takes to do those jobs. I have no qualms about that whatsoever.

But seemingly every police action does not require an 8 or 10 man stack to achieve.
 
...or busting down the door at 3 am, flash-bangs, shooting of dogs, etc...
 
I'm beginning to think that some these are training exercises in preparation for bigger and better things. PD's have all this neat stuff to use but no where to use it. So why not do a little training at the expense of the community. Many of these raids are on soft targets,; mayor's house, "wrong" addresses. Sure, they can get training in a controlled "play" house but it's not the real thing. Hitting residents at 3 am gives them a greater element of surprise, less chance of a full scale confrontation but with actual "bad guys" to deal with. Shooting the dogs serves 2 purposes...takes out the bite threat and desensitizes the officers to killing something. I don't hear of full scale, swat raids on suspected meth labs...flash bangs and meth labs don't go well together. Not much chance of an explosion at granny's house, though. Meth labs appear to be watched and hit when there is the least chance of a violent confrontation. Everything else is fair game.

I don't think our local PD has been doing anything along these lines. But the community where I work is known for its overbearing, in-your-face PD. Several have been brought up on violence charges. I could see them using these tactics. There is such a chip on their shoulder and arrogance in their voice when you talk to them. I wouldn't put it past them to use this tactic to serve a warrant...
 
Mike you are correct. You don't even want a spark in a meth lab and even plugging or unplugging an electrical device is all but forbidden. Even camera's with a flash are not often used for evidence collection.

You are correct and certainly don't flashbang, you don't even want to discharge your weapon unless you have no alternative.

And those weapons will usually have a suppressor attached strictly for safety reasons because suppressors emit less flash (burning gasses), and thus increasing officer and public safety and would make osha and insurance companies are happy at the same time that officers aren't going deaf due to prolonged exposure like they did just a decade or two before.

The chemicals and gasses emitted from making meth are not only toxic, but caustic, and often times a meth house must be destroyed afterwards.
 
First, we have to realize that police carry guns for their own protection, not the populace. That they have to arm themselves like they do should be an indicator of what they anticipate finding themselves up against whenever they go through a door. I will separate "active shooter" scenarios, because those are much harder to predict, and that's the reason for officers carrying patrol rifles/carbines/shotguns.

Second, there are detectives and DAs and judges who have been doing a pretty shoddy job lately if you read in the news - there is no reason that they should be using a sledgehammer when something more subtle will work, similar to the meth lab example above. Some simple police work, patience and thinking will solve a lot of problems without even the threat of violence. I think that there is too much rush to trot out "the team" and go head to head with suspects, which in the end is getting officers killed, and justifying - you guessed it - more weapons, harder tactics. It is a spiral, that once it goes out of control, is hard to deescalate.

Third, that spiral is going to lead to actual bad guys arming themselves more and more heavily. This is the weakest part of our gun system/culture. Known, true bad guys get guns illegally and then use them very publicly against officers who are making legit raids, which makes all gun owners look bad for how the baddies got their guns in the first place and brings pressure to restrict gun rights. You only have to look at the examples above to see that. The hard part is knowing what intel is good and legit and what is just using the police to get revenge.

There will be a point where all of this comes to a head a la Ruby Ridge, and we'll start all over again. There will be too much force used too quickly and unnecessarily and there will become a national drama, when everything could have been solved with a knock at the door. The problem is, if you are an officer, would you want to take the risk of making that knock knowing what could be on the other side?
 
John A., I agree. And that is a product of a lot of things, mostly overreaction, probably embellishment by the neighbor (FKtard, as aptly named), and bad circumstance. Whatever happened to just being good neighbors who knew those that lived around you?

I'd bet a good portion of my salary that when the neighbor called, that he wasn't quite truthful in what was happening, hence the overresponse.

However, if you tell me there is a bear next door, I'm not coming to check it out with a slingshot. I'm coming loaded for...you guessed it.
 
Here's a local incident from earlier this week that took place in a quiet little neighborhood on the other side of town...

A Couple face charges after Smyrna standoff: Police use tear gas; no one injured in incident



A Sheriff's Office armored vehicle known as a Bearcat responded to the standoff on Carter Lane in Smyrna Tuesday. The standoff resulted in two arrests
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members of the Smyrna Police Department SWAT Team leave the area after a standoff was resolved on Carter Lane in Smyrna Tuesday.
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Smyrna firefighters respond after a tear gas canister touched off a fire during a standoff on Carter Lane in Smyrna Tuesday.
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SMYRNA — Two suspects were taken into custody after a standoff with police Tuesday at a house at 507 Carter Lane.

Police were initially called to the residence after being informed that a resident of the house had pointed a pistol at two guests that morning.

No one was hurt, said Kevin Arnold, chief of the Smyrna Police Department, but a fire was started when police deployed a canister of tear gas into the residence.

The Smyrna Fire Department quickly doused the flames, Arnold added.

After the tear gas canister was deployed, the couple came outside and peacefully surrendered, Arnold said.

The incident began when Jonathan Scott Ashley, who was charged with aggravated assault, pointed a pistol at his girlfriend’s brother, Jeff Joyce, and Joyce’s girlfriend, Cassie Hughes, Arnold said.

Jeff Joyce’s sister, Ashley Joyce, was charged with simple assault for physically attacking her brother and his girlfriend, Arnold added.

Jeff Joyce and his girlfriend left the house, Arnold said, and Ashley Joyce and her boyfriend went back inside.

Approximately 18 police personnel arrived at the scene, Arnold said. The force included the Smyrna Police Department’s SWAT team, including three snipers, and two members of the Rutherford County Sheriff’s Office’s SWAT team, who arrived in an armored vehicle containing SWAT equipment.

A hostage negotiator tried to contact Ashley Joyce and her boyfriend by cell phone, a PA system and a “throw phone,” a corded telephone that officers threw through one of the residence’s windows, Arnold said.

When the couple refused to respond, the tear gas was used, Arnold said.

Emergency medical crews were notified of the barricaded subjects and had an ambulance on standby in case it was needed, according to Randy White with Rutherford County Emergency Medical Services.
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Looks like one helluva roll-out for a domestic...
 
I tell ya they are just getting a "practice" in before the big one... :shock:
 
LES,

What is wrong with that incident? On the face it looks like overkill, but lets break it down based on what you posted...

Domestic dispute in a home turns bad when a gun is pulled by homeowner on a relative and violence is threatened - I think you can probably turn to gun handling rule #3, which he obviously had a target in mind.

Complaint is registered with police. Who knows what the content of the complaint was other than I can almost guarantee that it included the following: "He pointed a gun at us and told us he was going to kill us", "He has lots of guns".

Police are obviously going to respond (regardless of the "sleepy little neighborhood" tag, which often has just as bad of things going on there as the ghetto, it just looks nicer. Police are not going to respond to a guy threatening violence with a firearm with anything less than overwhelming capability, should it be needed.

They deploy in somewhat of a standard formation (team, snipers, negotiators, vehicle, etc). It's too late to try and go get something when bad shit is going down right in front of you. Homeowner may have multiple guns, his wife might get involved, he might take her hostage, who knows. Too many variables to just use a couple officers to go check it out.

They tried to get him to answer a cell phone. They deploy loudspeaker. They deploy throw phone. Obviously homeowner knew he screwed up and was trying to ignore his way out of the situation. That's not usually the best choice, especially when the police are going to arrest you for aggravated assault and there are known firearms involved (see above). So, in the interest of attempting to reduce the level of violence, they deploy tear gas through a window to flush them out. Probably the least violent thing they could then do with the least risk to themselves. They then surrender. No shots fired. Fire starts (those grenades get HOT!) which is promptly put out because its anticipated by the department. Medics on standby and probably did the decontamination from the CS (which the homeowners will be feeling every time they shake their clothes out).

Homeowner arrested for being stupid and pointing guns. Stupid girlfriend arrested for inciting stupidity (both charges made up but are the gist of the situation). IMHO, the above is a good example of restraint while also having the capability to respond quickly to a variety of situations. Seems like calmer heads prevailed.

The issues I have are when we do the same rollout for a bogus call and then instead of understanding the situation as Smyrna above obviously did, they bust in, destroy the house, shoot the dog, terrorize the family, realize it was bogus, and leave the family in a lurch and a legal mess. That's pisspoorpolicework because even based on a report, they didn't understand what was actually happening and that any call that comes in is not fully truthful and rational (because humans have a tendency to exaggerate to make the call more serious, etc.), but there is probably a grain of truth somewhere. This thread is full of those examples, and those are the departments, that I bet if you look, have a lot of other problems as well.

All of this is obviously IMO, and YMMV. Just my two cents based on the report above, which seems to come from a fairly neutral, unbiased reporter/source about what actually happened in the situation and how it was resolved.

Sorry for the long post, but I think we start to get excited when "sleepy little neighborhoods" have bad things happen and it shocks the community, where if you go 5 miles across the tracks, no one cares that the same thing is happening on a daily basis because it's "expected" there.

Standing by for shotgun blast :)
 
You don't have to worry about get'n blasted around here.

I get what you're saying, but I spent the last ten years living in one of the more tough parts of town where gang shootings occurred with regularity. As bad as it ever got we never saw the level of response as in the incident above. Smyrna is a tiny little outlying country suburb and I'm just amazed that they are even equipped for that kind of response. Granted the article gave a pretty basic outline of the events that transpired before the police were notified, so we don't have all the details. As the title of the post and following conversation suggest, I'm just amazed that this level of response is becoming accepted as the norm. Don't get me wrong I'm all for our LEO being equipped to handle any situation they encounter, but this one still seems like overkill to me...
 
LAZY EYED SNIPER said:
You don't have to worry about get'n blasted around here.

I get what you're saying, but I spent the last ten years living in one of the more tough parts of town where gang shootings occurred with regularity. As bad as it ever got we never saw the level of response as in the incident above. Smyrna is a tiny little outlying country suburb and I'm just amazed that they are even equipped for that kind of response. Granted the article gave a pretty basic outline of the events that transpired before the police were notified, so we don't have all the details. As the title of the post and following conversation suggest, I'm just amazed that this level of response is becoming accepted as the norm. Don't get me wrong I'm all for our LEO being equipped to handle any situation they encounter, but this one still seems like overkill to me...
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In times past, most of these domestic disputes, school fights, bar fights, etc. would not have resulted in someone calling the police in the first place. Much of this results from the fact that people generally have lost the ability to solve simple issues on their own, and have become far too dependent on "the law" to solve all their problems for them. We even see people calling 911 because they didn't get the pizza toppings they wanted.

It's another of the many vicious circles we encounter regularly. The Govt. offers to solve our problems, and we take them up on it. Then complain when they solve it their own way and we pay the bill (taxes, etc.). Everybody ends up being a pain in somebody else's ass.
 
Sorry for the long post, but I think we start to get excited when "sleepy little neighborhoods" have bad things happen and it shocks the community, where if you go 5 miles across the tracks, no one cares that the same thing is happening on a daily basis because it's "expected" there.

Standing by for shotgun blast :)
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Not the way we try to do things around here. Opposing opinions are very welcome and make us all think. Don't apologize or expect to get blasted on your post. You brought up very valid points and it helps to see thru the cloud we sometimes find ourselves in well dealing with stuff. And that is just my opinion... :D
 
LAZY EYED SNIPER said:
You don't have to worry about get'n blasted around here.

I get what you're saying, but I spent the last ten years living in one of the more tough parts of town where gang shootings occurred with regularity. As bad as it ever got we never saw the level of response as in the incident above. Smyrna is a tiny little outlying country suburb and I'm just amazed that they are even equipped for that kind of response. Granted the article gave a pretty basic outline of the events that transpired before the police were notified, so we don't have all the details. As the title of the post and following conversation suggest, I'm just amazed that this level of response is becoming accepted as the norm. Don't get me wrong I'm all for our LEO being equipped to handle any situation they encounter, but this one still seems like overkill to me...
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LES, I totally agree. I'd bet a couple things: they got a federal grant as part of emergency response/counter terrorism money; they have a mutual support agreement with other agencies in the are, especially if they are the biggest show around; and well, if you have all those toys, you have to use them to justify them :) I'm not defending this department other than it appears that they responded well. It's sad that sort of response isn't done everywhere (again a budget decision, I'd guess). I'm going to guess that there will be fewer "low-profile" call outs because each one is expensive and everybody's budget is shrinking.

The attitude and openness to discussion across the entire site is most refreshing. Thanks for encouraging such an environment! :)
 
zagmp03 said:
The attitude and openness to discussion across the entire site is most refreshing. Thanks for encouraging such an environment! :)
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Absolutely!

We appreciate your input and value discussion. Even when the points of view may not align at times, we'd rather see open and intelligent conversation or even respectful debate than just a bunch of folks agreeing with each other so they won't get called out for having a different opinion. That gets really old and we don't put up with that kind of nonsense around here...
 
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