Active Shooter Uvalde TX Elementary School

[Shades]

I've been thinking about how to address some of the comments made thus far in the thread. Here's my thoughts, as someone that specializes in physical security and protecting targeted populations:

Protective Security Theory, Goals and Execution:

"Left of boom" and prevention is only one facet of security, and often times not the only goal (or I should say not a realistic goal). A core mission for protective security (i.e. securing people, not necessarily places/merchandise) is influencing actions for the better "right of boom".....as in, after something happens, make it suck less. Just because you cannot afford to turn every single school house out of 130,000 in the US into a fortress with impregnable security does not mean that security measures overall are a fruitless endeavor since they would still present vulnerabilities.

At the same time, you have to come to terms with the fact that bad things will still happen even if you spend a lot of money on security. Most people think spending a lot of money on security ala the most protected US government facilities will mean nothing bad happens, but that's just not realistic. Yes, we want to influence "left of boom" as much as we can, but as someone who works in this field I'm telling you straight up that it's completely fucking unrealistic to think you can eliminate it, and a significant majority of our techniques, tactics and procedures revolve around trying to regain control of the situation quicker than we'd otherwise be able to.

Hardening Schools:

Any significant hardening of schools isn't going to happen on a widespread basis without people who specialize in this having some sort of authoritative capacity over schools. My own agency had this problem for decades, and it literally took several very severe terrorist attacks for us to have a seat at the big boy's table where we could DICTATE security measures instead of simply recommend them through a chain of command that included people who have zero training, education or experience on mitigating threats or dealing with violence. No offense to the one-off teachers in this thread who are going above and beyond, but as long as the educational cadre is in charge of school security, nothing worthwhile will change. Someone mentioned that we don't need a new department of government to handle this, but what you will need are dictated security measures which the educational system has to abide by......not come up with themselves.

Kids will still get killed:

The phenomena of school shootings in the US does not revolve around the location. We call them school shootings, but don't let the name fool you: it's about the kids. You could turn every school into a fortress, and they will still be targeted at places where it's impossible to secure them as well.....popular field trip venues, sports events, parades, etc. So just realize that even if we changed course as a nation and spent untold billions on physical security measures for schools, that's not a solution to the root problem. That's a mitigation of a vulnerability, and will not address or eliminate the root problem. The root problem is not lack of security at schools.

Feasibility and the "but we do it at our other critical infrastructure buildings" fallacy:

The fact there are 130,000 schools in the nation and the daunting logistical nature of revamping their physical security is not a reason to ignore revamping physical security measures. It does however mean expectation management, as some of these measures are things that aren't realistic unless you do it from the ground up when the school is being built. I work for an agency that is responsible for securing high-profile USG installations, and many of our physical security measures are phased-in over a life cycle period of a building....i.e., we simply can't do certain things until it's time to construct a new building. So realize that even if we dictate much more stringent physical security measures on par with the most protected US government installations, it's not going to be complete for another 50+ years.

The reason I'm pointing this out is because the "but we do it at other government buildings" is not a great comparison. It is a fallacy, as even among the most protected US government installations where we have a uniformed code of security measures, those measures are not actually applied equally because it's impossible to do such unless the buildings were all built to the same standard......which they weren't. All of our buildings were built decades, even centuries apart, and thus each one will have vulnerabilities stemming from that until it's time to build a completely new structure. And, to harp on the fallacy part of that: no, we do not rebuild all USG installations overnight when a new important security measure comes out. That's simply not a realistic or even informed viewpoint on how we conduct physical security on critical infrastructure protection to then apply it to schools.

This is absolute gold. Anyone posting here about school security should be required to read it.

[lwt16]

So, I've read this multiple times, but I keep coming back to the same questions.
Performance wise, is the best answer the SRO program, retired cops who become "contract deputies" who only work in the school or private security school guardians with limited powers? Or teachers and staff?

My thoughts:?
SRO can be very effective, lot of bang for the buck, but it can also become the "hide a dude program". You know, that guy who will never lead an assault element into the school, but you don't want him behind you cause he'll probably ND a hot one into you leg as you breach, so you send him to the perimeter or the CP to fetch coffee and sharpen pencils for the Command Staff. Super nice guy, all the fellow troops like him and kids and parents and teachers love him, as he's the "nicest cop they ever met". But, from what I've seen and heard, SRO's can get saddled with a lot of distractions, also. Here, teach this class, monitor study hall, make sure no is smoking behind the school gym, counsel these children on the errors of their ways. Oh, and while your at it, make sure you stay current on all your departmental training, don't get behind on your inclusion, EEO, etc training.

Retired cops as "contract deputies"? Already vetted, already have their state cert, they have one job, walking the school beat or watching the CCTV monitors. You tell me that DB or Dobbs or Trooper224 or some of the other select folks on this forum are walking the halls at my granddaughter's school, I'll sleep like a baby at night.


Private security "school guardians"? Lot of vets out there who can shoot, and are used to working a post, but never really wanted to be a cop and all that it entails. Think a gentler version of Triple C or Acadami. The danger I see here is most schools selecting merely on price and not reputation or performance.

Or just arming teachers and support staff? Yeah, if we could just clone breakingtime91, but too much to wish for.

From your experience and perspective, what is the best answer that will be effective and would actually get community buy-in?

Locally, we can retire and come back to work in schools as a part time SRO.

We’re limited to a salary cap yearly. SROs are expected to handle way too much “school discipline issues” in a nice manner. If it were five days a week of truly watching out for lethal threats and paid well, I’d do that in a heartbeat.

Most of our elementary schools are not staffed with SROs. Middle and high schools are. A large majority of them are NOT the type to competently hunt down a shooter.

Most struggle with the qual course we require once a year.

It’s the reality of the SRO program.

[HCM]

So, I've read this multiple times, but I keep coming back to the same questions.
Performance wise, is the best answer the SRO program, retired cops who become "contract deputies" who only work in the school or private security school guardians with limited powers? Or teachers and staff?

My thoughts:?
SRO can be very effective, lot of bang for the buck, but it can also become the "hide a dude program". You know, that guy who will never lead an assault element into the school, but you don't want him behind you cause he'll probably ND a hot one into you leg as you breach, so you send him to the perimeter or the CP to fetch coffee and sharpen pencils for the Command Staff. Super nice guy, all the fellow troops like him and kids and parents and teachers love him, as he's the "nicest cop they ever met". But, from what I've seen and heard, SRO's can get saddled with a lot of distractions, also. Here, teach this class, monitor study hall, make sure no is smoking behind the school gym, counsel these children on the errors of their ways. Oh, and while your at it, make sure you stay current on all your departmental training, don't get behind on your inclusion, EEO, etc training.

Retired cops as "contract deputies"? Already vetted, already have their state cert, they have one job, walking the school beat or watching the CCTV monitors. You tell me that DB or Dobbs or Trooper224 or some of the other select folks on this forum are walking the halls at my granddaughter's school, I'll sleep like a baby at night.


Private security "school guardians"? Lot of vets out there who can shoot, and are used to working a post, but never really wanted to be a cop and all that it entails. Think a gentler version of Triple C or Acadami. The danger I see here is most schools selecting merely on price and not reputation or performance.

Or just arming teachers and support staff? Yeah, if we could just clone breakingtime91, but too much to wish for.

From your experience and perspective, what is the best answer that will be effective and would actually get community buy-in?

The "vet bro" thing is out. And the percentage of Vets who can really shoot by PF standards is similar to the percentage of cops i.e. those who are into shooting and put in effort on their own.

Most vets are out pursuing success, the "unemployed vet bro" stereotype is mostly BS and the few who do fit that category aren't anyone you want around kids. At least not while in that mode.

If we had enough Breakingtime91s working in Schools the Guardian / School marshal would be the way to go. Already / always onsite and since they are doing other things they are not going to be subject to boredom / burnout that makes the security only position a non starter. The big problem is the necessary mindset is antithetical to current trends in education as a profession.

I agree with @AMC that having an SRO or Security at all 130,000 schools in America is not going to happen. A real Guardian program like the 80 hour TX School marshal program can help. especially if you did (and paid extra for), say a week of sustainment training every year right before school starts

It's super rare to have SROs on campus full time at an at an elementary school.

[AMC]

24 of the 40 (60%) active shootings in 2020 and 17 of 30 active shootings (57%) in 2019 ended in the arrest/surrender of the perp: https://www.fbi.gov/file-repository/...020-070121.pdf

I'm familiar with the study, and I'll just say that the parameters used to define 'Active Shooter' in that study are a little more broad than they type of incident we're discussing here. If anybody thinks that somebody going into a school, killing a bunch of kids, then barricading with many more, is gonna be resolved peacefully....I hope they don't work in my community.

[Glenn E. Meyer]

There's nothing new in this article and nothing in their "profile" is unique to active shooters. If fits people with all sorts of issues.

I agree, I heard this sort of analysis for years when I went to the meetings of the American Society for Criminology. The suicide analysis - I think I mentioned that here quite a few times having heard that quite a few years. Same with the copycat analysis. Now it's good that info is put together but it's not a breakthrough.

Also, you can see a touch of their prejudices breaking through in this:

Peterson: I don’t think most people realize that these are suicides, in addition to homicides. Mass shooters design these to be their final acts. When you realize this, it completely flips the idea that someone with a gun on the scene is going to deter this. If anything, that’s an incentive for these individuals. They are going in to be killed.

The point is that having a firearm and the ability to use it may stop the individual. That's the point. The deterrence point is irrelevant because the you might argue from their viewpoint that having armed police generates an incentive. That's just a stupid, anti firearm aside thrown in.

Dr. Lee Silverman didn't deter the killer, he stopped him. The two TX church incidents where a civilian stopped the ongoing incident or the killer being stopped when fleeing, wasn't deterrence.

Would you rather be, rhetorically, with Dr. Silverman, or with the two mental health professionals that were chopped to pieces (have the exact reference somewhere). Or google psychiatrists stabbed to death by patients.

[wvincent]

The "vet bro" thing is out. And the percentage of Vets who can really shoot by PF standards is similar to the percentage of cops i.e. those who are into shooting and put in effort on their own.

Most vets are out pursuing success, the "unemployed vet bro" stereotype is mostly BS and the few who do fit that category aren't anyone you want around kids. At least not while in that mode.

If we had enough Breakingtime91s working in Schools the Guardian / School marshal would be the way to go. Already / always onsite and since they are doing other things they are not going to be subject to boredom / burnout that makes the security only position a non starter. The big problem is the necessary mindset is antithetical to current trends in education as a profession.

I agree with @AMC that having an SRO or Security at all 130,000 schools in America is not going to happen. A real Guardian program like the 80 hour TX School marshal program can help. especially if you did (and paid extra for), say a week of sustainment training every year right before school starts

It's super rare to have SROs on campus full time at an at an elementary school.

I never really considered the burnout/boredom/complacency aspect of it.
Are SRO's typically on a rotation to combat this?

[UNM1136]

24 of the 40 (60%) active shootings in 2020 and 17 of 30 active shootings (57%) in 2019 ended in the arrest/surrender of the perp: https://www.fbi.gov/file-repository/...020-070121.pdf

In the words of one of my mentors..."that is the problem with today's generation. They decide to do something, and when they meet resistance they give up. No commitment..." He was a meat eater.

We watched Columbine on TV at a chaplain sponsored marriage enrichment seminar. He had 2 years on and I was still probationary. His lecture in my first Active Shooter Response Course included "every one of those cops took an oath, and when the flag went up, they set up a perimeter and let people die. They failed." I thought he was a little harsh at the time, especially with what the training and mindset of the day were. I am not so sure anymore.

Someone far wiser than me once said, as a test for rookies, ask them about a recent mass shooting. Those that hang their heads and lament the state of the world and the sadness of it all are naive or pussies. Maybe not even worthy of the responsibilities of the badge. The ones that answer with "I wish I were there, I could have made a difference" are meat eaters and need to be nurtured and trained, and developed into the cops we want looking out for our kiddos.

Just a couple of thoughts.

pat

[TGS]

I'll disagree slightly on the guard discussion but only on the point that we don't necessarily need pipe-hitters as private security to influence things for the better in a realistic manner.

There's numerous examples of spree killers attempting to get inside federal installations or other buildings that people would generally regard as well protected and being thwarted by the FPS contract guards. As for the quality of those guards, I'd assess as mid-range quality...they certainly aren't going to fill-in on a stack for a DOE Federal Protective Forces SPO-3 contract, but they do have a baseline level of initial and recurring training. The chances of needing to actively hunt someone down are dramatically lower when they have to get past the 2-3 armed guards at the entrance as someone that isn't supposed to be there to begin with. Even a single armed guard, if easily overpowered given an initiative deficit, is still going to slow things down and using proper physical/technical security equipment can likely prevent the shooter from getting deeper inside.

I think we tend to look at the worst case scenario (Mumbai, Westgate, or an insider threat) and throw out the baby with the bath water on addressing the most likely scenario. I.e. we can't afford former 75th Ranger Regiment guys as guards, therefore we shouldn't have guards at all.

There's a reason that high quality security contracts mix and match personnel. Even the DOE isn't using all former "vet-bro" types...that's just the SPO-3s. The SPO-2s are sort of average quality armed guards (but with more extensive screening), and the SPO-1s are basically burdens of the state. By correctly allocating the right personality and skill level to the correct job, you can have an effective yet realistically affordable/sustainable guard contract instead of simply thinking we need certifiable murder-machines as a baseline.

The physical/technical security comes in real big, as does employee adherence to rules. There's no amount of security in the world that will matter if you have people that hear gunshots outside and think, "Oh, gee, I think it's a great idea to prop open this locked door", which is exactly why we have doors that don't allow people to do that. But, that also introduces a new set of issues....specifically life-safety ones not related to violence, and increases the expense of the security program to manage those issues in an ethical and reasonable manner.

[UNM1136]

I never really considered the burnout/boredom/complacency aspect of it.
Are SRO's typically on a rotation to combat this?

Not around here. It is a cush assignment, sought after by those that don't want to really work. One of my best friends is a local SRO, and he arrested a kid with a gun on his High School campus this past week... story.

He is a twice retired guy, and not a hard worker, not looking to work, but can do right when necesary.

He was out of state training when the last one happened. link. at his HS. He would have done the right thing and has good judgement, but he is not there because he wants to work hard. He is counting the weeks to retire.

And I love him like a brother. Actually more than either of my brothers. But it doesn't mean I can't see his faults...

pat

[WobblyPossum]

I watched the press conference @HCM posted. Several people asked the same question I’m asking: during the time the incident commander was treating the situation as a barricaded subject, several students from the classrooms in question were calling 911. Was the information that dispatch knew, that children were still alive in classroom 111, making its way to the guys on the ground? If you know that there are still children alive inside the room, that the shooter is periodically still shooting, and you aren’t 100% sure that he’s only shooting at responding LE stacked outside and not at any more victims, then you have to breach and enter. It’s not a barricaded subject, it's still an active shooter.