law enforcement

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April 19, 2013

Guest Post-The Thin Blue Line Goes Online to Nab Bad Guys

Posted by tgace under law enforcement, work | Tags: law enforcement, University of St. Thomas |
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MSI laptop computer (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

To date, the rapid growth of social media has proved to be something of a double-edged sword for New York City law enforcement.

First, the good news: Investigators with the New York Police Department are using sites such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to find out more about crimes and the individuals suspected of being involved in the unlawful activity. Police officials say they have been able to strike gold through their mining of social networks. In early April, dozens of suspected gang members were arrested after making bold posts on social websites, according to media reports.

“There is a social media component, because these kids, these crews, are bragging and telegraphing what they’re going to do in terms of who they’re going to shoot, who they’re going to kill,” NYPD Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly told The Wall Street Journal.

Kelly said some gang members even have their photo taken in front of the homes of their intended victims.

At an April community forum in the Bronx, Assistant Commissioner Kevin O’Connor of the police department’s Juvenile Justice Division said a spike in gang-related crime in the borough had been spurred by gang members using the Internet. O’Connor said gangs are using Facebook and YouTube to threaten or taunt each other, which leads to real-life violence.

“Kids are shooting each other over what’s being posted on Facebook,” he said, according to an article in the New York Daily News.

The Daily News has also reported that NYPD officers at a Brooklyn precinct scan the Internet for photographs of weapons or for clues about gang activity. The online sleuthing has been credited with helping investigators take guns off the streets of the crime-ridden neighborhood.

“Social media has changed everything,” Joseph Gulotta, the precinct commander, told the newspaper.

At the same time law enforcement officers are tapping into social media to bolster crime-fighting efforts, they are also being warned to monitor their own online activities. In March, the NYPD brass issued tougher standards governing the social media interactions of the department’s 35,000 officers. The rules caution officers against such things as tagging their co-workers in photographs and publishing photos of themselves in uniform, unless the picture was taken at an official event.

The new rules also prohibit the posting of crime scene photographs or witness information online.

The tightened regulations come in the wake of a series of incidents that generated negative publicity for the department, including offensive Facebook comments posted by some officers about a West Indian cultural parade, The New York Times reported.

Elise Redmann writes about Public Safety and Law Enforcement Leadership for the University of St. Thomas online programs. You can follow her at @EliseRedmann.

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March 5, 2013

threat indicators

Posted by tgace under law enforcement, martial arts, self defense | Tags: awareness, law enforcement, martial arts, self defense |
[18] Comments

Resurrecting an old, but what I believe to be important post.

Threat Indicators and Personal Safety

February 16, 2013

Chris Dorner…there is NO excuse.

Posted by tgace under law enforcement | Tags: law enforcement |
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http://lawenforcementtoday.com/2013/02/14/chris-dorner-no-excuses/

Since Chris Dorner posted his manifesto of grievances and murdered four people in his quest to “clear his name”, some in the public, including the media have given him an undeserved folk hero status. The thought process seems to be that since the LAPD has a history of racism, the actions he took to make the department “pay” are justified, including the murders of people with no ability to influence or control anything that happened to Dorner. It is a very disturbing look into the mindset and lack of moral cohesion among this group of people.

…

Chris Dorner had a long list of people he wanted to wreak vengeance upon, did any of those people end up on the list of those he murdered? The question that needs to be asked of those who consider Dorner a “folk hero” is what did Monica Quan, a young, up and coming basketball coach and Keith Lawrence, an African American, Quan’s fiancé, another basketball aficionado and law enforcement hopeful have to do with how Chris Dorner was treated. They both had bright, hopeful futures ahead that Dorner unjustly stole from them. The quote from Dorner’s manifesto stating that because he “never had an opportunity to have a family of my own, I’m terminating yours,” speaks volumes about him displaying the same sort of barbaric mentality he’s supposedly fighting against.

Let’s look at Dorner’s third victim, Michael Crain. He was a Riverside police officer with a trainee in the squad car with him when Dorner pulled up alongside their vehicle in Riverside, shooting into their vehicle. Neither Officer Crain nor his trainee who was seriously wounded had any control over what happened to Dorner, nor had they had any previous contact with him. Officer Crain was a Marine who’d served two tours in Kuwait, had a family he loved, including a daughter he attended dance recitals with and a son, whose baseball team he coached. To those who think Dorner’s actions were justified, where is the outrage over the injustice for these people who did nothing wrong and had never harmed Dorner?

…

One of the best write-up’s about this @#$%-up of a person.

January 1, 2013

Interesting vid about crime statistics

Posted by tgace under law enforcement, politics | Tags: opinion |
[2] Comments

December 17, 2012

Where to start with school security.

Posted by tgace under law enforcement, politics, self defense, work | Tags: law enforcement, self defense, survival, work |
[10] Comments

Old School_House_ (Photo credit: Total Mayhem)

Fact of the matter is. If you are serious about school safety 99% of them need to be torn down, re-designed and re-built. The days of “walk into your local school house/open and welcoming design” are gone….IMO a start would be:

-A buzzer opened door that leads directly into the school is BAD. People WILL need to come and go from a school for many legitimate reasons. What schools should have is what many PD’s have. A front desk area where you can do routine tasks through bullet-proof glass. If you need to come in to see admin you get buzzed into the admin area which is separate from the school area. If you need to get into the school proper you are let in from there.

-Exterior door and ground floor window glass cant be breached by some kid with a rifle.

-Interior classroom doors are always closed and locked during class…and the doors are “unkickable” and designed so that a person with a gun cant break out glass and reach in.

-Someone in the school, be it a full time SRO, a trained guard, or trained staff needs access to a weapon as an emergency tool.

December 4, 2012

stopping power

Posted by tgace under law enforcement, skills, weapons | Tags: firearms, law enforcement, skills, weapons |
1 Comment

September 15, 2012

catch phrase craziness

Posted by tgace under law enforcement, Uncategorized, work | Tags: law enforcement |
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The higher up I get in the administrative chain the more I have to deal with buzzwords, theories and “process”. Organizations and entities like LE seem to love the latest theories such as “Community Policing” and “Intelligence Led Policing”. All the trade magazines start talking about them, agencies start sending officers to classes in the hopes of using them. The problem is (in my experience) is that there is very little meat to chew on.

The problem people who DO have with the people who deal in CONCEPTS is that the latter all seem to be long on process and short on application. Ive lost count of how many classes on things like “Intelligence Led Policing” I’ve gone to where everything the presenter said made sense while he was saying it, but on the drive back to the PD you realize that you really have no clue how you are supposed to implement it. I’d trade days worth of theory classes for a couple of hours of someone telling me “try THIS and see if you notice improvement”.

August 15, 2012

never confuse movement with action

Posted by tgace under law enforcement, leadership, military, quotes, tactics | Tags: law enforcement, leadership, military, mindset, tactics |
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Action (supermarkets) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

“It is even better to act quickly and err than to hesitate until the time of action is past.” -Karl Von Clausewitz

I’ve seen/heard/read variations on this sentiment over the years and I agree with it on a conceptual level. If you hesitate when you need to act it can mean the difference between mission success or failure…or life and death.

What I’m less clear on is what happens with this saying on a practical level. WHEN is it better to act quickly? Always? Is it always better if you don’t hesitate? Will your boss support you if your actions result in an unsuccessful outcome? Will the military, the media, the government back you if your act on the battlefield results in civilian casualties?

I’m not asking if they SHOULD back you. That’s an entirely different matter.

I think this concept is situation dependent…if bullets are flying and you have to move, that’s different from considering your next step in a barricade call-out.

I also think that this idea can be expressed in a metaphor of a street fight. There are always two considerations in a self defense situation…the immediate issue of survival and the need to act within the scope of the law. While the first should always take precedence, failure to consider the second can turn survival into a Pyrrhic victory.

In my opinion the only way to approach crisis decision making is to have a solid grasp on the “higher order” concepts; tactics, law, ROE, etc and ingrained physical skills that don’t overburden your thought process. Hopefully you get to road test these skills enough so that experience will allow you to adapt your training to the chaos.

August 8, 2012

everyone loves a hero…

Posted by tgace under law enforcement, tactics | Tags: law enforcement, mindset, tactics |
[8] Comments

Fred Leland Jr. of Law Enforcement and Security Consulting just made me aware of this quote of William F Owen’s:

“Popular military history (and especially regimental or unit histories) constantly fail to recognise that outstanding courage and sacrifice are not the same as good tactics. It could even be said that, if you have to resort to courage and sacrifice, tactical skill is lacking. More often than not, heroism gets advanced to cover up poor tactical conduct. Thus the understanding of what creates successful tactics is largely absent from a lot of modern doctrine. With confusion as to tactics, something called the ‘operational level of war’ seems alluring. It might even be suggested that commanders are drawn to describing themselves as working at the operational level, because it allows them to avoid responsibility for bad tactics.” ~William F. Owen

I agree. While we all admire the hero, I’d rather carry out 100 uneventful but successful operations than be remembered for bravery in a @#%$$’er where everything went sideways.

You?

July 18, 2012

police officers vs police sergeants

Posted by tgace under fun, law enforcement, work | Tags: fun, humor, law enforcement, work |
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English: NYPD Sergeant Stripes – based upon the file: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:NYPD_Sergeant_Stripes.png – redrawn as svg (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A little humor with some buried lessons:

The First…

Eleven people were dangling below a helicopter on a rope. There were ten Officers and one Sergeant.

Since the rope was not strong enough to hold all the eleven, they decided that one of them had to let go to save all the others.

They could not decide who should be the volunteer. Finally the Sergeant said he would let go of the rope since Sergeants are used to doing everything for the good of the Service. They forsake their family, don’t claim all of their expenses and do a lot of overtime without getting anything in return.

When he finished his moving speech all the Officers began to clap…

Moral:

Never underestimate the powers of a Sergeant.

The Second…

A group of Sergeants and a group of Officers take a train to a conference. Each Officer holds a ticket. But the entire group of Sergeants has bought only one ticket for a single passenger. The Officers are just shaking their heads and are secretly pleased that the arrogant Sergeants will finally get what they deserve.

Suddenly one of the Sergeants calls out: “The conductor is coming!”. At once, all the Sergeants jump up and squeeze into one of the toilets. The conductor checks the tickets of the Officers. When he notices that the toilet is occupied he knocks on the door and says: “Ticket, please!” One of the Sergeants slides the single ticket under the doors and the conductor continues merrily on his round.

For the return trip the Officers decide to use the same trick. They buy only one ticket for the entire group but they are baffled as they realize that the Sergeants didn’t buy any tickets at all. After a while one of the Sergeants announces again: “The conductor is coming!” Immediately all the Officers race to a toilet and lock themselves in.

All the Sergeants leisurely walk to the other toilet. Before the last Sergeant enters the toilet, he knocks on the toilet occupied by the Officers and says: “Ticket, please!”

And the moral of the story?

Officers like to use the methods of the Sergeants, but they don’t really understand them.

The Third…

Once upon a time three Officers were walking through the woods and suddenly they were standing in front of a huge, wild river. But they desperately had to get to the other side. But how, with such a raging torrent? The first Officer knelt down and prayed to the Lord: “Lord, please give me the strength to cross this river! “

*pppppfffffffuuuuffffffff*

The Lord gave him long arms and strong legs. Now he could swim across the river. It took him about two hours and he almost drowned several times.

BUT: he was successful!

The second Officer, who observed this, prayed to the Lord and said: “Lord, please give me the strength AND the necessary tools to cross this river!”

*pppppfffffffuuuuffffffff*

The Lord gave him a tub and he managed to cross the river despite the fact that the tub almost capsized a couple of times.

The third Officer who observed all this knelt down and prayed: “Lord, please give me the strength, the means and the intelligence to cross this river!”

*pppppfffffffuuuuffffffff*

The Lord converted the Officer into a Sergeant. The Sergeant took a quick glance on the map, walked a few meters upstream and crossed the bridge.

Send this to a Sergeant so that they have something to smile about;

and to the Officers if you think they can stomach the truth!