FIREARMS QUALIFICATIONS, EXCEPTIONAL MEANS, AND OODA LOOPS - 061

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This week on the Writer's Detective Bureau. Firearms qualifications, exceptional means and OODA Loops. I'm Adam Richardson and this is the Writer's Detective Bureau. Welcome to episode 61 of the Writer's Detective Bureau, the podcast dedicated to helping authors and screenwriters write professional quality crime-related fiction.

This week, I'm answering your questions about firearms qualifications for police officers when your suspect is terminally ill and what the heck does OODA mean? But before we get into that, as always, I need to thank my Golden Shield patrons on Patreon, especially Debra Dunbar from debradunbar.com, C.C. Jameson from ccjameson.com, Larry Keeton, Vicki Tharp of vickitharp.com, Dharma Kelleher of dharmakelleher.com, Chrysann, Jimmy Cowe of Crimibox and Larry Darter for their support.

I'd also like to thank all of my coffee club patrons for their support every month and a special shout-out to Amanda Feyerbend for upping her monthly pledge. Your support keeps the lights on in the bureau and you can find links to all of the writers supporting this episode by going to the show notes at writersdetective.com/61. To learn about setting up your own Patreon account for your author business, visit writersdetective.com/patreon, P-A-T-R-E-O-N.

This week's first question comes from P.G. Kassel and you can check out his author website at pgkassel.com. P.G. writes, "In a recent podcast, you discussed the firearm qualification requirements for police officers. As a gun enthusiast, I'd be interested to know specifically what an officer needs to do in order to qualify or re-qualify. Thanks so much for all your time in providing truly valuable information."

Thanks a lot P.G. Well, California requires yearly qualifications for firearms and it's really up to the agency to define their own standards. The basic Police Academy requires several different qualifications for handgun and shotgun, which include day and night scenarios.

Some of those are designed to demonstrate basic firearms competency and then others are actual combat courses. They're testing for different things, but in the academy, you go through a lot of different shooting scenarios.

The big difference being that basic competency is demonstrated by standing in front of a paper target at a designated distance and then drawing and firing in a specified timeframe.

Combat shoots are dynamic and they involve moving and shooting and I should mention that we also qualify with our rifles which are AR-15 or M4 variants. We qualify with our tasers and our less lethal weapons like bean bag shotguns or the 40 millimeter foam rounds that fit in a grenade launcher.

At my department, the stand in front of your paper target and shoot is what we call our badge shoot and we do that once per year in accordance with the state minimums and it's how we earn or lose our marksmanship pins for the year.

Those are the pins that we wear on our uniform, similar to what's worn on a military dress uniform, but this is the least realistic shooting scenarios that we encounter. Shootouts are not like having two lines of British troops squaring off against French troops and taking turns firing muskets at one another in volleys of lead.

Our training unit has been amazing at realizing that as you train, so shall you fight. Other than that once a year bad shoot, our shooting training is grounded in reality and equally as important understanding our shooting policy.

To answer your specific question, P.G., our bad shoots for handguns are typically 30 rounds. Three 10 round magazines and then we shoot from the 25, 15, 10 and five yard lines.

Occasionally, they'll change that up to the three and seven yard lines, but usually it's 25, 15, 10 and five. Our range masters will sometimes change things up a little bit during the bad shoot, like making us shoot prone at 25 yards so that's laying flat down on the ground or shooting offhanded using our non-dominant hand when we're at the 15 yard line, but you get the idea.

30 rounds on a typical B-27 paper target where center mass is the 10 point ring and then the further out you go, the lower the score. That means that you have with 30 rounds, 300 possible points and to give you an idea as to what I'm talking about with the target, it's all link to an image of a B-27 target and similar targets like the TQ-15 in the show notes, but just understand that it's just a basic silhouette outline with a bullseye in the center, but the show notes will have images of those at writersdetective.com/61.

I honestly don't know what our minimum passing score is to maintain your qualification. I should know that, but fortunately I'm a good enough shot, I don't have to worry about that, but again, that's set by the agency, not necessarily by the state.

I think the state's minimum requirements are like down in the 60% range which is kind of scary. For us, I want to say it's around the 70% mark. That would be a score of 210 out of 300 for a typical shoot, but it's important to know that they will disqualify us if we throw a shot, meaning, if my round does not stay within the silhouette of the target.

We call those million dollar rounds because that's the kind of liability we're looking at for a wild ass shot that doesn't hit what it's supposed to. Even if I shot 290 out of 300, but that one miss went over the shoulder of the target, then my score's not going to count and I'm going to have to shoot again.

They give you two chances to qualify on range day at least where I work and if I am disqualified or I fail on both of those chances, I then have to come back another day to remediate.

On that remediation day, I'm given two more chances. If I fail to qualify, then it becomes a documented issue and I may end up losing my ability to carry a gun. Now, for that remediation day, the third and fourth chance to qualify, the range master will work with you before the actual qualification shoot to help identify whatever issue you have or improve your chance of qualifying with your shooting.

Once that issue has been dealt with, hopefully you'll qualify in that third or fourth chance. This rarely happens, at least it rarely happens where I work because we shoot way more than once a year and when it does happen, the issue is usually something other than marksmanship.

It can be kind of the symptomology of something else like anxiety or panic attacks or failing eyesight or early onset of a nervous system issue like Parkinson's, those kinds of things.

Since our department or my department requires us to shoot quarterly, those three other qualifications days are much more realistic. It may not be scored like the bad shoot day where I have to have a minimum number of points, but it will be based on making my hits.

We'll use live shoot houses which have moving targets and we're moving and shooting. I've shot from scaffolding towards a target on the ground to see how a steep incline, or excuse me, a steep decline can affect sight picture in shot placement.

We use simunitions which are like think of a waxy paint ball about the size of a regular bullet. Man do those hurt, but we use those for active shooter and force on force training like building search training and we also use a FATS machine, F-A-T-S which stands for FireArms Training Simulator, which is a big shoot, don't shoot simulator where live action video that is controlled by the instructor in the back of the room plays out via a projector on a wall and our FATS machine will shoot back at us with these hard plastic balls that are about the size of a paint ball.

The instructor is controlling the shoot back gun via a joystick. That works as part of the ongoing scenario which is controlled by a computer that the instructor is sitting behind.

The scenario will change, meaning, the actors on the screen will react based upon what I'm doing in the room all by how the instructor is running the scenario. It's like a choose your own adventure kind of set up.

The instructor can make the scenario unfold peacefully where the actor on screen complies with whatever direction I'm giving them or the instructor can make the guy brandish a weapon or did he just brandish a wallet?

Those are the kind of things that are happening on these scenarios. The shoot, don't shoot scenarios are less about like a quick draw response time as much as they are much more about command presence, officer safety tactics and important lessons learned when it comes to those officer safety tactics.

The cool thing about the FATS machine is that after the scenario is over, you get to watch it again in slow motion and see how you reacted. Where was your gun pointing? Was your finger on the trigger when it shouldn't have been? What did you not see because of tunnel vision?

There's one scenario I went through years ago that I still think about all the time. The scenario is that you're off duty and you're in a convenience store with your young son. You're in the aisle along the far wall of the store where all the refrigerated drinks are stored behind glass doors.

Think of like a 7-Eleven and you turn toward the cashier and you're tall enough to be able to see over the tops of all the other aisles in the store and just as you turn, a subject comes through the front door, steps through the counter and pulls a gun demanding money from the register.

Obviously, the question is this is live, this is happening right in front of you. What do you do? This is a split-second decision if ever there was one. The gun is pointed directly at the clerk. His life is in danger, what do you do?

I'll tell you exactly what I did. I recognized that my kid in this scenario, I don't have children, but in this I do, I recognize that my kid has concealment because he's shorter than the top of the aisle.

I motion behind me for him to stay put because I know that the instructor who's running this scenario can see me doing this, I draw my gun, I point it at the rubber and I yell, "Police, drop the gun."

In a fraction of a second, he starts a spin toward me, his gun is still leveled right at me and I unleash a volley of rounds and the rubber drops to the ground as to be expected.

Then I hear my kid "Yell, dad." Now, my point of view on the screen, I'm standing in front of spins back towards my kid behind me and all I see are double barrels of a shotgun at point blank range.

The screen goes black as I hear the shotgun go off in my virtual face. On replay of the scenario, I see that this second gunman actually entered the store first, button hooking left along the wall after he enters, taking the nearest aisle in the store all the way to the back.

As my tunnel vision kept me focused on the armed robbery, I was flanked by gunman number two. Well technically, he was gunman number one, he was the first guy in the store. Was this a good shooting?

Well, legally and ethically, yes. The robber was committing armed robbery and the cashier's life was in immediate danger, but was it the smart thing to do? Well, obviously not.

The way to survive this scenario was to do nothing, to be a good witness. I'm off duty with a family member and no backup. The biggest lesson I took away from this was to remember the plus one rule. When you find a weapon, look for another one. When you find a suspect, look for another one, plus one, plus one.

When you find what you're looking for, what you assume to be there, don't stop looking. Oh, I found his gun. We're good. That's a dangerous way of thinking because it may not be the only gun or the only shooter.

Even on search warrants, you find the drug stash or the murder weapon, you have to keep looking. Thanks for the question P.G., I hope this helps and you can check out his author website at pgkassel.com.

Jessie Nori writes, "Hi, let's say a murder is committed by someone who is terminally ill. By the time the detective has sufficient evidence to make an arrest, the villain is in the hospital conscious, but with little chance of recovery. How would the cops and prosecutors handle this? And, since I'm not sure how my story is going to go yet, how would this be different if the villain dies before an arrest can be made? Thanks."

Well, thank you for the question Jessie. There are a few different possibilities here. One, they could arrest the suspect legally speaking, but then book them in absentia. Meaning, the jail would consider the person in custody even though they aren't physically in the jail.

If this happens, the jail would be responsible for the security of this now inmate. A Sheriff's deputy or correctional officer from the jail would be posted in the hospital room.

This would also mean jail rules apply. There would be no visitation without prior approval or scheduling by the jail. Just like any other inmate. Also, it would mean that the agency running the jail, which is usually the Sheriff's Department, or it could be the Police Department if they're the ones arresting the patient would have to foot the bill for the suspect's medical expenses which leads us to option two.

They wait to make an arrest or file charges until the person is well enough to leave the hospital. If we are talking about someone who is in hospice, then they may allow the person to die without being formally arrested.

That's not to say that the police wouldn't inform the patient that if they survive this illness, they're facing arrest and prosecution, but the decision may be made by the administration of the police department or the jail to not arrest them in order to avoid having to pay the suspect's medical bills.

I know, you're probably thinking justice would be served regardless of money, but if your story is set in a small town and the annual budget of the entire police department, this little police department is only a few hundred thousand dollars per year to pay for patrol cars, utilities, salaries of the employees, the booking fees to wherever they book their arrestees, how will they pay for the medical bills of a terminally ill patient which could rack up in the hundreds of thousands as well?

I'll avoid the healthcare debate here, but the sad reality is that the money may be a serious consideration when it comes to whether an arrest is actually made or not. As the saying goes, it's not about the money, it's about the money.

Let's say the police are absolutely sure that this terminally ill patient is the murderer and the patient dies without being arrested. How do the police treat the actual case itself? Is it open or closed? Or is it considered suspended?

We suspend a case when there are no further leads to investigate, but technically, it's considered an open case. Murder is a part one crime, which means it's one of a handful of crimes that are tracked by FBI UCR, which means Uniform Crime Reporting when it comes to tracking case clearance statistics.

To the FBI, these cases are either cleared or they're not cleared and there are only two ways to clear a case, cleared by arrest or cleared by exceptional means. Also, the FBI only tracks the number of cases cleared, not the number of suspects or the number of arrests.

Cleared by arrest is pretty obvious. At least one person has been arrested, they've been charged with the offense, and then the case has been turned over to a prosecutor, but what is cleared by exceptional means?

It's when the offender or the murderer in your case has been identified, there is enough evidence to make that arrest, charge them and turn the case over to a prosecutor and also that we know the exact location of the offender, meaning that they're not a fugitive.

In this case, we know which hospital room that our suspect is lying in terminally ill and here's the key thing, we've, "Encountered a circumstance outside the control of law enforcement that prohibits the agency from arresting, charging, and prosecuting the offender."

I've tucked that directly from the FBI's website. Examples of these circumstances could be that the offender is dead or a key witness has recanted and refuses to testify at trial or the extradition of the offender has been denied by the host nation like if they're in another country that refuses to extradite to a state where capital punishment is still in play for murder or if the offender has been arrested and is being prosecuted elsewhere for another crime.

In your scenario Jessie, the police and DA may decide to wait on arresting the suspect based upon the terminal illness diagnosis and then once the suspect dies, they'll clear the case by exceptional means or they could arrest the suspect while they're still in the hospital and then may even allow the suspect to make appearances in court via a video feed from their hospital room and then the case will be cleared by arrest like most of the other cleared cases.

I hope this gives you some ideas as to what your protagonist is up against within his or her own administration and then I hope it helps give you at least a subplot in some conflict to make your story that much more realistic. Thanks again for your question

I want to talk about how cops, well, any of us actually react or deal with dynamic environments and how we can improve or even predict how or where to respond to the world around us. I know this sounds awfully vague, but stick with me here for a minute.

US Air Force Colonel John Boyd was a fighter pilot that was a masterful tactician. He could get the advantage over another adversary in under 40 seconds even when the starting position was with the adversary on his six.

With Boyd in the position of disadvantage. Boyd explained the process he used to always gain the advantage. The first thing Boyd would do is observe. We all do this, we pay attention to what's around us. Well, most of us, and then next, Boyd would orient himself in relation to what he observed and he'd come up with options for actions based upon his observation.

I'm here, you're there, where could I go next? Where should I go next? And then next, Boyd would decide which amongst those orientation options would be most advantageous and then he'd act, observe, orient, decide, act. Pretty simple, right? It sounds like we're playing chess.

The thing is this isn't simply a four-step process. This is a constant loop of steps. Observe, orient, decide, act. Observe, orient, decide, act. OODA, OODA, OODA, OODA. Boyd called it the OODA Loop.

What made him such a great tactician in the world of aerial dog-fighting is that he could rip through the OODA Loop faster than his adversary, whether you realize it or not, you go through your own OODA Loops all the time.

Sometimes we see people that never get to their first O of observe. They're completely oblivious as they stand there blocking the creamer and stirs and napkins at my local coffee shop, but most of us go through this OODA Loop process without even thinking about it.

Observe, I've got a cup of coffee in each hand and I need to make it out the front door of the coffee shop. Orient, do I get a tray and carry both at the same time retracing my steps or do I keep one cup in each hand and time my exit from when the door is still open when the next guest comes walking through?

Decide, screw the tray. I'll stand next to the door, but out of the way. Act, I'm standing at the door jam and stepping through just as this lady steps inside the shop. Observe, okay, the door is closing too quickly, now for me to get through all the way.

Orient, it's coming towards my right side and the cup of coffee in my right hand is going to take the brunt of the door's force. Decide, catch the door with my right foot. Act, right leg sweeps forward in a big step and the right shoe catches the door before it collides with the coffee cup in my right hand and right there, I went through the OODA Loop in my head twice in just as many seconds.

As cops, especially given what we were talking about in question one with the shoot, don't shoot scenarios, you should be running through your OODA Loop like a banshee. If you're engaged in a gunfight, you need to be moving and shooting, getting off the X as we say, orienting ourselves to the best possible way to deal with the threat and doing what we can to disrupt our adversary's own OODA Loop like Mike Tyson famously said, "Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth."

That punch in the mouth is the disruption of your adversary's OODA Loop and it's how you can get the advantage. If you haven't listened to it yet, check out episode 48 of this podcast where I talk about Cooper's Color Code and being in Condition Yellow versus Condition White.

Then you might see how understanding Boyd's OODA Loop can be a game changer when it comes to survival, officer safety and writing really believable fight scenes

Oh and hey, this is your quick weekly reminder to do something about those easy to guess passwords you're using over and over.

Check out LastPass for free or upgrade to LastPass Premium for three bucks a month. Just go to writersdetectivebureau.com/lastpass right now to get your password situation totally squared away.

Thank you so much for listening this week. Keep those questions coming. You can send me your crime fiction questions by going to writersdetective.com/podcast. Thanks again for listening. Have a great week and write well.