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How do law enforcement agencies prepare and investigate officer-involved shootings?

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How do law enforcement agencies prepare and investigate officer-involved shootings?

How do law enforcement agencies prepare and investigate officer-involved shootings?

When an officer fires a weapon in the line of duty, they are responsible for each bullet they fire, according to Matt Giordano, executive director of the Arizona Peace Officer Standards and Training Board (AZPOST).

“You’re responsible for that round as it leaves the gun,” Giordano said. “You’re responsible for being cognizant of their backdrop, what’s behind the intended target.”

Giordano said that AZPOST certifies every law enforcement officer working in the 160 agencies in the state. He explained that his agency also oversees compliance and has the ability to revoke and suspend officers based on violations of their agency’s standards.

So far in 2019, there have been two northern Arizona officer-involved shootings that have resulted in three deaths and one wounded officer. Law enforcement officers are put through hundreds of hours of broad and agency-specific training and have a large amount of specific training focused on who takes responsibility when firing their weapon in the line of duty.

Training firearm use

Charles Hernandez, spokesperson for the Flagstaff Police Department, said that they use a virtual training system called MILO to judge and train an officer’s decision-making skills.

Rob Wilson, owner of Timberline Firearms and Training, purchased a MILO system for his potential customers.

The MILO system is installed into a shooting range and is controlled by an instructor. The instructor can decide to show one of hundreds of video scenarios with filmed actors that include domestic violence, hostage and inebriated subject scenarios.

Filmed scenarios don’t always end with a bullet being fired. The MILO system allows the instructor to end the scenario with a cooperative subject if a training officer uses a satisfactory de-escalation tactic, Wilson said.

“In a real-life shooting situation, there are lots of your senses and stimuli being triggered. This tries to get as many of those stimuli as it can with the audio and video,” Wilson said. “An instructor can also be engaging the student in different ways by giving commands, or in some of the scenarios there are branches you can go where you have to respond with deadly force or non-lethal force might be appropriate.”

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By: SCOTT BUFFON Sun Staff Reporter, Arizona Daily Sun