Building Searches and RAID

A couple of weeks ago we learned how to search buildings, houses, and other structures. When criminals are hurting people or committing crimes, we must respond to stop them.

We began by learning about a technique called RAID. To preface, Jefferson County unfortunately has had several situations with active shooters in the recent past. In order to respond to these calls, specific training has been developed and implemented. This is part of the academy training we receive so we will have the necessary skills and abilities to combat these situations. Luckily, Deputy Joselyn is one of our academy directors and is currently on the Jefferson County Regional SWAT team. He and many of his comrades of SWAT shared their experience and knowledge with us over several days in an abandoned building that we were fortunate to use for training.

RAID is used when active shooters are known to be in buildings or other structures. We must stop these threats immediately to save lives. This technique consists of forming a group of four officers with a point officer, and left, right, and rear guards moving together. The officers in the RAID formation each have a specific task and also constantly protect one another as they search and clear rooms. Their guns are drawn as they search for bad guys. On the final day of this training we were able to carry guns with simunitions, which are basically bullets filled with paint. Some of the instructors were bad guys who had guns loaded with simunitions and we got to go through real potential scenarios. These included some situations in which we had to use lethal force with our simunitions. We also experienced getting shot with them and continuing in the gun fight.

The second part of this training was learning how to search buildings. Many times we will perform these in response to alarms and burglary calls and may be by ourselves or with just one other officer. These are done much slower because there is not an immediate threat.

Lots to be Grateful For

This seems like an appropriate topic since Thanksgiving is coming up next week. I am very thankful for the opportunity I have to be going through this academy right now. I had to wait almost two years, but it was well worth it. I am thankful for the wonderful men and women who are my instructors and my classmates. They have stood by my side for about 18 weeks now and have helped me, supported me, and yes, even laughed at me sometimes. I owe the success I have had in this academy and the success I will have in my career to them.

Veterans Day recently passed and I want to express my appreciation and respect to those who have fought, continue to fight, and will fight in the future for the the freedoms of our country. I want to thank the men and women who proudly put on the badge of law enforcement everyday and bravely walk the line of duty. I am grateful for those who have made the ultimate sacrafice for our society: those serving in the military, those working in law enforcement, and those doing other acts of goodness.

I want to thank my wife and daughter for standing by me as I embark on my journey as a cop. I am grateful that they love me and support me.

This academy has been a great experience for me. I encourage those of you who will be attending future Jeffco or other academies to take full advantage of this wonderful opportunity. It is an opportunity to gain knowledge and skills that will help us serve our communities everyday. We can also build character and acquire attributes that will help us serve beyond our jobs as cops.

Traffic Stops

Almost everyone has been pulled over for speeding or other violations. This is frustrating but we must realize it is for the safety of our roads. Stopping vehicles for traffic violations is a big responsibility we will have as law enforcement officers. Through this procedure, we can also find evidence of crimes to help us get criminals off of the streets.

In the academy, we have spent several days learning the proper way to stop vehicles for traffic violations. As cops, our first focus is our safety. This includes parking our patrol cars and approaching the other vehicles in a cautious manner. There is really much more than I realized that goes into a stop. I have often heard that there is no such thing as a routine traffic stop. In fact, it is one of the most dangerous things we will do as cops. We have watched many videos in the academy that show how quickly things can go down hill during these stops. Many officers have gotten into full-on fights or even gotten shot after pulling over a vehicle. It is critical that we be at our very best each and every time we pull someone over.

We worked on what we will say when we make contact with drivers. In essence, we have worked on coming up with a "spiel" that identifies who we are, why we made the stop, and the action we take. We also must give drivers specific instuctions regarding safety for them and us, and what they must do for their violation. We got to get in real cop cars and go through everything from notifying dispatch of the stop to writing tickets while pulling over real cars driven by our instructors. We also got to go through scenarios, which have really occurred before. This forced us to think on our toes and use the skills that we have learned so far in the academy.

Here I am speaking with a driver who was speeding

Officer D from Westmintster did a good job setting up this safe stop

Officer B is going to keep the roads safe in Lone Tree

This is a high-risk stop in which two patrol cars are needed because the driver is under arrest

Deputy H keeps her gun pointed at the suspect during this high-risk stop

Officer O safely clears this car of any other occupants

Tasing Day

One important piece of equipment that cops carry is a taser. We recently had a class where we learned about how tasers work and how to use them. As part of the training, we got to be tased if we wanted to. The purpose of this is to know what it feels like because we may have to tase people in our careers. We will also be able to tell a court of law that we know the effects of a taser firsthand.

I think those of us who wanted to be tased were ready to get it over with at the beginning of the class. Instead, we go to learn about tasers and their effects for about eight hours first. During this time, we got to sit and think about getting tased and how it would feel. We also had plenty of time to decide whether or not we wanted to be tased.

I decided that the experience of being tased would be invaluable for me as a law enforcement officer and went through with it. Although it only lasted for 5 seconds, it seemed much much much longer. It is difficult to explain how it felt but I definitely know I never want to get tased again. It is not fun, but I would definitely recommend doing it at least once for training purposes if you become a law enforcement officer. Apparently my class thinks I had one of the best reactions but I will just say that physical and verbal responses from a taser are entirely involutary!

Recruit H is ready to deploy her taser to this resisting individual who is padded up for this part of the training

Recruits E and S use their tasers simultaneously to get compliance from these fake bad guys

The following pictures illustrate the intensity and effectiveness of a taser:

Driving

Driving is a major part of law enforcement work. Of course we all see cop cars out driving around almost every day. For us Jeffco recruits, we will be working in the county jail initially so won't be out patrolling in cop cars. However, that opportunity may come soon enough and the majority of the other academy recruits will be going straight out to the road for police departments. Driving is something we do everyday, but learning to drive like cops in different situations was really cool.

We began by doing lots of parking and maneuvering between cones:

In this drill we had to decide at the last second which path to take based on the lights above:

Laying down some nice skid marks at 60 mph:

More fun with cones:

Taking some time to relax in between the high intensity driving:

I had never taken turns as fast and braked as fast as I got to do during this training. One night we got into some real cop cars and turned on the lights and sirens for a simulated high speed pursuit, which was a real rush! We had a wonderful time driving and all passed the timed qualification course that was required. A big thanks to all of the instructors who taught us and to the Colorado State Patrol for letting us drive fast on their track!