Advanced Pistol Operator

Watch enough law enforcement lethal encounters, and you will begin to see a trend: officers repeatedly leave cover. They expose themselves so they can see the entire body of the bad guy they are engaging. On the other hand, if you watch the bad guy’s actions, many times they seek cover and do a far better job of keeping themselves protected.

After seeing that trend as a firearms instructor, you have to ask, why is this happening? The truth is that the blame lies with firearms instructors. From day one at the academy, we have recruits stand in the open with a target in front of them, and they fire 90-95% of their rounds at that target without any cover and being able to see the entire target. For many officers, that week or two of firearms in the academy will be the primary firearms training they receive in their career, and the lessons we teach them during it will stick with them throughout their careers. So the truth is the training we are putting out is effective; we just don’t like the results.

By human nature, we want to put objects between us and dangerous things. I imagine thousands of years ago, while the caveman was out hunting and saw a saber tooth tiger, he did the same thing and tried to put a rock, a tree, or something between him and the predator that might kill him. That’s why we see bad guys seek cover; they haven’t had any training to override their primal instinct to protect themselves. While officers have, in many cases, had just enough training to teach us to step out from cover to see the entire target/threat.

I have witnessed it many times on actual calls. Once, an officer standing next to me behind a big oak tree stepped out and exposed himself to get a better view of the bad guy. At the time, I thought less of that officer and, in my mind, criticized his actions. In hindsight, while his actions were wrong, it wasn’t his fault; it was mine. I and every other firearms instructor who had taught him had failed him.

So how do we fix this? The number one thing we need to do is start from an early point in firearms training and begin making recruits shoot from cover and shoot from positions where they can’t see the entire target. Get them used to this and make it their normal so that they revert to that under stress. In our monthly training, we need to be adding cover or barricades on nearly every drill so that those officers who have spent their career shooting in the open start getting reps with barricades.

Last but not least, we, as firearms instructors, need to start taking a really hard look at what we are putting out. We often judge an officer involved in a lethal force encounter for making a mistake when the reality is that the blame is on our shoulders.