Latest / The Junto Podcast / E33: Police Training: Accountability, Budget, & Culture w/Dennis Rousseau

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E33: Police Training: Accountability, Budget, & Culture w/Dennis Rousseau · The Junto Podcast

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Hello, America. Welcome to the Junto Podcast, where we promote the practical
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applications of critical thinking and bold creativity.
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I am your host, Edgar Mills.
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Hey, America. Welcome to episode
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33 of the Junto podcast. I appreciate you guys for staying with me.
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Today, we're talking to my good friend, Dennis Russo.
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He does a lot of things. He wears multiple hats, in fact.
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So I'm going to let him tell you just a little bit about what he does.
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And then we're going to be talking about some law enforcement training dynamics
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and some pros and cons and what's good and bad and our thoughts on it.
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So Dennis, how's it going, buddy?
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I'm doing all right. The owner and lead instructor for Force Solutions,
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where I teach defensive tactics and firearms training.
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I'm also a competitive shooter, black belt in jujitsu and a couple other martial
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arts, and an agency full-time defensive tactics instructor and firearms instructor.
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Nice. Okay, so that's a lot of stuff.
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Dennis and I met, I don't know, several years ago just to collaborate on some training, and we did.
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And then we just started shooting together a lot, and we trained together a lot.
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So what we're talking about today is law enforcement, well, deficiencies in
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law enforcement training, and where can we place the responsibility of those deficiencies?
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So I'm going to let Dennis just
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go a little bit because Dennis is still an active law enforcement guy.
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So what do you think, Dennis? Where are we going here?
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Well, I think one of the main things is it's hard to lay the blame on the agency
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or department versus the officer because I think it falls a little bit on both.
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If you have on the agency side, they need people out working and it's hard to have training time.
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But then also on the officer side, there's no accountability of themselves.
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If the agency is not going to teach you, you're in a job that at any given time,
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your life could be on the line, yet you don't train.
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So, you know, a lot of things go into that.
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Physical fitness, you know, firearms training, defensive tactics training,
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you know, mindset training.
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There's a lot of things that you can learn when you're just sitting in a cruiser
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or whatever else you're doing. Yeah.
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And so I did an episode with this with a fellow named Ricky Robinson.
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And so basically on individual responsibility, where a lot of guys like us who
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train basically for a living, where we land is the individual officers are coming up.
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Kind of short on their end. It's good to blame the agency. It's good to blame the organization.
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But there's about 8 million things you could do individually to improve yourself
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when you're in the business of carrying lethal force around.
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Yeah, on that, you know, there's.
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The misconception on firearms is, oh, I have to go to the range and shoot.
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And that's not true. You can talk to any, you know, firearms instructor,
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you know, worth their salt or a competitive shooter.
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A lot of their training is done, you know, dry fire.
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In the basement. Exactly. And, you know, movement drills and all different kind
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of things that you can do without going to the range.
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It's getting the gun in your hand more often instead of once every three months
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or once every six months. Yep, dry firing.
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All right, so let's pick up on your little outline here.
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So in the current landscape, the way things are now with the law enforcement
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training structure there.
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So tell me about, well, what you know.
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You probably haven't been in an academy in multiple years.
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But what's going on in the academies and what's
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going on with their qualification standards and
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frequency and then and then how
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they manage their training time so yeah like you
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said i haven't been to basic academy in quite some time i'm about 18 years but
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academy is where most firearm you know most officers get their most firearms
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training because either they don't know how to shoot a gun or they've shot a little bit,
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and so they're getting a lot more training on how to use the tool correctly,
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how to take it apart, and stuff like that.
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I think training has been coming up a little bit from listening and talking
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to other instructors, but it's still, I think, is still lacking.
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I think, I think a lot of people would agree with that. So right now,
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and Ricky Robinson sort of said similar things.
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Academy training is somewhere between 40 and 80, depending on the agency, between 40 and 80 hours.
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And that's, that's not 40 and 80 hours of firearms training.
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That's 40 and 80 hours of everything, right?
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Yeah. I mean, you have to learn how to take the gun apart, you know,
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put it back together, what to clean, you know, and that shouldn't take that long.
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So, so is that fire, but is that 80 hours exclusive to firearms only,
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or is that like driving and DSD, defensive tactics, techniques and all those other things?
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No, that's, that's firearms only because defense, they're, they're split up. Right. I got you.
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So generally speaking, like 80 hours, let's say that's a two week course, right?
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That's a pretty good, that's pretty good time for training, but like periodically,
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like you should do that every so often.
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Well, speaking of my academy, you know, it was longer than two weeks. Yeah.
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And it was for at least an hour, hour and a half a day.
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And you were on the range a lot. Well, when I'm saying two weeks,
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I mean, eight hour days, right?
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Yeah. Now, that's 80 hours. Yeah. If it was just an eight hour day, yes.
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But it's split up throughout the day with everything else, law and defensive tag.
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So what I'm trying to figure out here is on that hour or two hours in a day
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that's just firearms exclusive, is there 80 hours of firearms exclusively?
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40 and 40. They just stretch it way out. They just stretch it out because they
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have to get in curriculum and all this other stuff they have to do.
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And then generally speaking, what is the qualification once a year, twice a year max?
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It depends on the department and post and all that stuff.
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I think Georgia Post is once a year.
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Most federal agencies is minimum two times a year. Yeah. And I think some of
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them are four times a year.
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Well, I mean, I guess that ain't bad, but I guess it depends on the qualification
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itself. We both know Georgia Post.
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I mean, I don't like to use the words basic and advanced, but it's basic at best.
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Right. Well, I mean, you have to look at it as a minimum qualification standard.
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It's a minimum qualification standard, right.
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But the problem is they use that as the checkmark for my training is good for the year. Correct.
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Exactly. I passed the qual, so I don't need to put anything else into this until next year. Yeah.
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And so what you got written here, which I agree with 100%, one,
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it's all static. There's no movement involved in it whatsoever.
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Two, there are time standards, but they're very loose. Correct.
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And I happen to know, I've had some officers out here that their departments
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don't even really time them.
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They just kind of, they let them take their time.
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Right. And I know there are time
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standards attached to each one of those stages, but they're still weak.
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They are. And then as far as realism goes, like, yeah. Yeah.
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I've never watched a video of, you know, officer involved shooting where they
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were standing at each other. It's not like the old Wild West. Yeah, right.
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So and but they're sticking with it, man. Georgia Post is just sticking with
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it. They're like, you know, this is it. This is what it is. And why do we think that?
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Because are we going to use the term lowest common denominator?
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I mean, I wouldn't say lowest common denominator. I would say it's a measurable,
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it is measurable, right?
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And it's across the board for everybody else.
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Now, talking lowest common denominator, I wouldn't necessarily say that.
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I think it comes down to more about retention and- What do you mean?
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Like skill, like the ability to maintain that level of skill?
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Right. Exactly. And be able to keep.
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So, look, other podcasts, everybody says it all the time, the training standards are minimal.
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Okay, we won't use the term lowest common denominator, but there's officers
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out there that will not do any additional training. Correct.
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They just will not. Exactly.
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So, how do we address that in training? I mean, we do it as trainers all the time.
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Yeah, for sure. We get out there and we'll say, okay, X, Y, Z drill,
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if we're going to do, okay?
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And you're going to have a disparity of skill. between everybody.
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Okay. So this is the baseline for the skill. All right. So.
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But how do we measure? So I'm going to draw the comparison. I'm going to throw
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libertarian idealism in here a little bit. Okay. And draw the comparison.
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As civilian or private company trainers like we are, we have to provide value. Right.
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The customer has to one, get value for their dollar, and they have to have some
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measurable learning going on.
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So for us, we do whatever drills we do, and it's more about the performance
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of the drill and less about the, okay, check the block, you hit the A zone twice.
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Now, by default, because we focus on performance, they're going to be able to
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hit the A zone on the man eventually, right?
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It just takes training. It takes getting there. Right.
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So the contrast is big government, right?
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Agencies, they, there's not any, they don't compete with somebody for,
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for money, for, well, they budget dollars, but so they can train low level training.
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And it's basically kind of like the army, you just push a lot of people in,
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you got to graduate a lot of people and you push a lot of people out.
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Right. And they don't have any incentive.
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The agency itself doesn't seem to recognize the need and the incentive to go
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beyond the post standards. Right.
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Because it's just a government mandate thing. Right. They got to do this.
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They did this. Great. So I would see that as a management thing.
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Yeah, for sure. But it has to come down to the instructors.
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The instructors have to be willing to push their people and for them to learn more and get better.
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Well, not only willing, but able. Well, there's that as well.
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You know, I'm sure we're going to get into that a lot, but it comes down to
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the instructors that, you know,
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help their, you know, just like you said, being able to explain the drill or
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explain this or explain that and have the willingness to do it and not just
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it being a position. Yeah. Yeah. Right.
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And that's the only way that it's going to get better is that there has to be,
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I look at it, you know, you and I look at this as a lifestyle.
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Yeah. Right. And it's not a position.
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Right. So even though at our age, we're still trying to push the envelope to
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be up to date and relevant. Yeah. Right. Yep. That's right.
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We're not sitting back in the past of what we learned. You know,
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I got out of the army in 92.
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What I remember from back then, because it's not about what we did back then
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or whenever it was, it's what we do now.
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And that's what I look at. And I look at that a lot with the instructors as well.
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They'll go to the three-week academy or whatever it is for firearms or defensive
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tactics, whatever it is.
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And now they come back, okay, I'm a subject matter expert now.
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But a lot of the drills that they learn and stuff there, number one,
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they can teach it, they can regurgitate it, But do they understand it? Right.
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And then can you evaluate your students as well?
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Yeah. So this is where the professional, you know, training comes in of keeping
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up on yourself, right? Right.
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Professional development. Exactly. For training. You always have to be developed.
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You're always a student. And much like the individual officer who should go
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train on his own, the instructor should seek out professional development on
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his own to stay relevant.
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Correct. If you're not getting it with your agency, you should be seeking other
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people out, and there's plenty of them around. Yep.
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Because in addition to what Dennis has been saying, he just inadvertently said we're both old.
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But Dennis is older than me, so I'm older.
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Yeah, we got it. Professional, relevant. Just stay relevant. Exactly.
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The skills, the principles don't ever change, but there's dudes that shoot now,
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like 10 years ago, So like the baseline skill level for a pro shooter now,
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I think is higher than it was 10 or 15 years ago. For sure.
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And they're getting younger. And they're getting younger. That's right.
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And so they're, they got longer time to just continually improve upon what's already. Yep.
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And because of the internet and YouTube and all these like proper professional
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dudes out there, young dudes are learning to shoot partially off of YouTube.
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And if you can vet, if you can look at and see who's a bullshit instructor and
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who's a good instructor, and you start looking at these good instructors,
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man, these young dudes are out there just murdering it, man. Oh, yeah.
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Most definitely. I mean, on that note, YouTube has a lot of great information.
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Yeah. It also has a lot of bunk information. Yeah, a lot of bullcrap. Right?
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But just like Edgar said, if you don't know who to watch, get with one of us.
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We'll let you know who to watch.
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But on that note as well, you have to have a baseline of knowledge or you're
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going to be watching this stuff and not understand.
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No, that's right. You got to be able to put in context. Exactly.
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Yeah. And you need somebody to help you do that sometime, especially newer shooters.
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Once you have. Yeah. Yeah. You need to be able to put in context.
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I mean, going off of what you said also is that pretty much all instructors,
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you know, high-level instructors that keep up on their craft and try to get
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better, we all teach relatively the same things. Yeah.
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I mean, you know how many fundamental firearms classes I've gone to multiple
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other instructors, mainly to hear differences in the way they teach things,
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verbiage, stuff like that.
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Because everybody learns different.
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You'll catch a different joke from one guy at the other. Exactly.
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Or they might explain something a little differently than I do that somebody
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else might pick up a little easier.
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But principally, it's all the same. Exactly. There's nothing,
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I say this all the time, there's nothing proprietary in the gun training business.
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I mean, unless you make some widget to put on a gun that's ridiculous or whatever.
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But yeah, so we've laid the responsibility at the feet of the individual officers.
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And then you just laid essentially at the responsibility at the feet of the
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instructors to for continual professional development, which should be done.
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What about the agencies? Are they enabling that professional development? Do you think?
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I would say some of them probably are. I mean, yeah, we're speaking generally.
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Some are better than others. Right.
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Generally, I would say probably not. Yeah. I mean, if they're always looking
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at what are we going to get out of it if we send you to this. Right. Right.
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And I understand it. Look at it from a business standpoint. Return on investment.
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Exactly. They're paying money to send you to whoever.
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But they, I think they make it so hard to where instructors just don't want
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to go through the process of getting help.
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Now with me, that was one of the things with me. I said, well,
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regardless, I'm going to go get this training with or without your.
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And I'm not the type of guy to withhold information to my people.
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Right. And I'm going to give them everything I have.
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So individually, you felt the responsibility to be better.
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Exactly. And whether the department sent you to be better or not,
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you went out and seeked it out. And that's good.
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I look at, you know, we're being held at a higher standard.
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That's correct. If there's a use of force incident or anything like that,
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who are they going to come to?
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Yeah. So what I'm having a hard time with with the agencies is the return on investment.
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They don't they don't see it because of limited budgets and whatever their budget priorities are.
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They don't want to send officers to these higher level skilled courses because
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they don't see the return.
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No. But the return is in everyday proficiency, like every day and ultimately liability.
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So how do you measure that you didn't accidentally shoot a civilian?
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You know what I mean? Right.
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I mean, it comes down to you have a qualification.
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Qualification, just like we said, is a minimum standard. I look at proficiency
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more than a qualification.
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Yeah, absolutely. And I also look at qualifications as, okay,
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we do a warm-up qualification, right?
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That score means more to me than your next two quals that you do.
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That's the cold one. That's what matters. That's what matters. Exactly.
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Performance on demand. Yeah. You know, you're not going to get to warm up in
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a gunfight and be like, oh, hold on a second. Tech pause.
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You know, let me get some rounds in. Okay.
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All right. Now I'm ready to fight. Yeah. Right.
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Because there's this stress element that comes into it too. Right.
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So how do we introduce the stress into the training?
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And that's right. And we do that, right? We do. Private company.
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We do it. It's called B. And most cops. Yeah, exactly.
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And most cops who come out and train with me or you or anybody else,
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they understand that and they're out here looking for that.
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It's all the cops that don't come out to train that you got to worry about.
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But I want to move on to the organizational culture that you got to be.
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Because organizationally, I mean, yes, the leadership sets a tone for that.
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In the military, that's the way, right? If you've got a good company or battalion
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leadership, it sets a tone.
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But I see a lot of it with cops is the good enough for government work mentality. I'm good, right?
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I'm past my claw. 71 will get you a badge and a gun. Whatever you have to call,
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right? Madness. Absolutely madness. Yes.
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So I don't know, man. I listen to some different podcasts and some different
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dudes in law enforcement.
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And there's some out there. And you got to imagine big agencies with a lot of money train more.
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And they hire professionals, come out and train them all. Yeah, somewhat.
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The mass, the majority of agencies, small municipalities, man,
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they're not training at all.
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No, they don't have the money. Yeah. I mean, they got enough for their officers
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to carry their rounds. Yeah.
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And probably they give them enough to go do their qual, and that's about it. Yeah.
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But you're going to have to take it upon yourself. So that's a leadership challenge.
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Yeah, individually you should. Right. Or you allocate a little bit more money
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and take it from something else that you really don't need. Right. Right.
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So we're talking about leadership set in the culture, though.
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So now in some small Georgia rural place, you got some dude that spent his career
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not training and he lived.
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Right. And I say it all the time, just because you live don't mean you did it right. Right.
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And so he don't have an urgency that dudes should be out there training.
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And then they got a low budget.
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So how do, in a leadership position with cops these days, I mean,
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how, how do you set the culture of like excellence in skill when you can't,
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when you can't afford it or you can't.
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I think excellent in skill, you know, you don't have to shoot a lot of rounds
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to get excellent in the skill. Right.
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How many times can you, you know, run reloads on the line with people and evaluate
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them? You have to evaluate.
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That's the thing. But that's a physical training piece.
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How do you set the culture, though, to make your cops who don't have training
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dollars, to make them want to go out and shoot on their own?
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How can a leader do that? You have to get a knowledgeable person that understands
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these things and able to train them in a way that keeps them in budget.
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You know, when we first started our business, right?
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When you first started your business, did we have a whole bunch of money coming out?
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No, we didn't. So we still don't have a bunch of money. Right.
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So we worked with what we had, but we gave the most information that we could, gave them ways to train.
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You know, in essence, when I teach, I'm teaching myself out of a job. Right. Right. Right.
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And that's how I am. And those are the kind of instructors that I gravitate
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towards and, you know, will give my money to. Yeah. Right? Yeah.
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I'm still on the leadership stuff. Like with minimal budget,
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how can, how can the leadership incentivize?
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I mean, and look, it's creative stuff, right?
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Like you can do some kind of day off type thing.
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You know, if you, if you shoot the best on this thing for, I don't know,
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there's got to be some way to make cops want to like get better than the other cop.
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And I totally understand what you're coming from.
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I'm trying to figure out creative ways. How do you push that?
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It's not even, sometimes it's not the management's job either.
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I mean, the management, sometimes they'll put something in place like that,
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but then you'll get half the officers that, okay, so say it's a shooting competition. Yeah. Right?
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And the top dog gets, you know, some time off, just like you said.
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Some of them, some of the officers won't even go do it because they know they're not going to win.
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They look at it as, I'm not going to win versus. That's sort of what can I learn to feed us?
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I don't know, man, you're hammering on the individual, man. And no,
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I agree with, you know, man, I agree with management has a lot to do with it.
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As you know, we've, you know, being in the military and stuff like that,
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you know, having a good squad leader, team leader, stuff like that,
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you know, who do we always gravitate to the, the ones that got in the holes
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with us that dug the holes and stuff versus sat in the tents playing space.
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Well, this next thing that you put, and it's funny because it says peer press,
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Well, everybody in this audience is going to go, yeah, you pressure your peers to be better.
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But no, dudes who go out and train on their own, cops, they get ostracized for doing extra stuff.
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Exactly. That's madness, man. What's wrong with being better?
24:17
Well, yeah, I hear you. I just think it's crazy.
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You want me—being an officer is a multifaceted thing.
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I mean, you think about anything that happens—.
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Anywhere it's like call the police right
24:35
domestic disturbance there's a lot somebody's got a gun
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i mean you you wear multiple hats yeah there's you
24:41
you got to be able to you you know your marriage
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counselor and it's too much you have to know exactly it's
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too much and that is not the the police are
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misused in many ways in my opinion but that's another podcast we're
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talking about training right and yeah individual if you join the police in my
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opinion if you if you get a job with a police force somewhere and you don't
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want to go train with the one thing that's the most like the lethal force never
25:11
mind defensive tactics and all that yeah just to keep yourself,
25:15
alive on the street there not only alive if you're just doing it because it's a paycheck,
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you have failed somewhere along the way because you ain't going to get rich
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being a cop i can tell you that right so what the hell man so why are you even
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out there yeah exactly i want to help my community well go work at a fucking
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soup kitchen man like right if you don't want to trade you can volunteer a lot of different things.
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Because otherwise, I think that they are a menace to society.
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That's right. You're out there now with a false sense of authority and the inability
25:49
to efficiently deliver lethal force.
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I mean, you look at surviving the encounter, but what happens with crappy training
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and you're not willing to train and stuff like that?
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And the old adage of every bullet has a lawyer attached to it,
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right? So there's a lot of things coming out now, especially with video and stuff like that.
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Did you put yourself in harm's way and all these different things, right?
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Did you start the encounter? Did you escalate the encounter?
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Oh, you're certainly scrutinized to death. Yes, exactly.
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And that does happen. So why wouldn't you want to be better?
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Right. So you can have, the better you are, the more confident you are,
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the more bandwidth you're going to have to think.
26:39
That's what training does. Exactly. It makes you, it clarifies your decision-making process.
26:47
Right. Because now you don't have to think about doing your fucked up backwards
26:51
mag change on a retreat. I've seen some bizarre videos you have too. We've all seen them.
26:57
If you train regularly, that's a background app. That's a subconscious task. Right.
27:02
And now you can think about solving the problem in a more efficient way. Yeah.
27:07
How people don't put that together is beyond me.
27:10
But once again, so the culture, that's what we were talking about.
27:13
And I was trying to put it on leadership and it is to a degree,
27:16
but ultimately it comes down to the individual cop and your willingness to go
27:22
out there, train to be better.
27:23
Because regardless of what management says, if it's important to you,
27:27
you should find a way to be able to get better. And if it's not important to you, why?
27:35
Are you not worried about getting... Cops got targets on their backs. Right.
27:40
People hate cops and I have a love-hate relationship with cops,
27:43
but knowing just that fact alone, man, like somebody, it happens all the time in major cities.
27:50
Some cops sitting there eating a sandwich, some dude walks up and smokes them.
27:53
There's plenty of instances of that happening.
27:56
So knowing that, what the hell, man?
28:01
Yeah. So individually, why aren't you out there training if you're not? Why?
28:07
Don't put it on leadership to give you a box of 50 rounds. You know what I mean? Right.
28:13
Go buy 1,000 rounds of 9-0. That'll last you for a little bit.
28:16
Yeah. 200 bucks out of your pocket ain't going to kill you.
28:19
All right. What do we got? Training, curriculum, and defense.
28:22
So that's generic, but it says often outdated and rarely updated, which 100% true.
28:30
How long has the Georgia Post been? They just changed it, but they just changed it to make it easier.
28:34
But up until then When was the last time it was changed I had no idea.
28:39
And that's a lot of them And looking at Agencies and departments,
28:46
There was things that I didn't know About getting curriculum Changed and stuff
28:51
like that Some of them cost a lot of money Because it's bureaucratic And it's
28:56
lawyers Everything involved right Is it touching all these bases All these different
29:02
things I think agencies'
29:05
curriculums are coming up, but it also has to come down to the instructors understanding
29:11
what the curriculum is and how to deliver it and evaluate it.
29:14
And you can train beyond the curriculum and still adhere to. Exactly.
29:18
Yeah, which that's something where you're saying earlier, which is absolutely true.
29:23
Instructors, if you're a good instructor, you can eloquently explain the hows
29:28
and whys and well beyond what's on the damn piece of paper.
29:33
Because when it comes down to it, what is it? We're looking at the use of deadly force. Yeah.
29:38
How do we do it and how we do it legally?
29:41
And here's the four firearm safety rules. Yeah, right.
29:45
Well, those apply everywhere, man. Exactly. I tell people that all the time.
29:49
Four universal rules of firearm safety apply to Afghanistan,
29:52
the Waffle House parking lot, the range. Walmart. Walmart. And wherever.
29:58
It's the same. And then some of the training curriculum. So the outdated,
30:02
yeah. They rely a lot just on static.
30:07
Static drill. Yeah. Yeah. And then the time standards aren't even.
30:12
And the time standards are weak.
30:13
Yep. Ferry to integrate any movement whatsoever.
30:17
Now, I told you today I was doing that consult and I got a course of fire for
30:21
them for a qualification.
30:23
Out of eight stages, two of them have movement, but they have movement.
30:26
There's a retreat and there's one where you close the distance.
30:29
But for what they got, they're very relevant. You have to be able to move.
30:33
Right. And shoot. Now, I don't, very few ranges have the capability to shoot
30:37
at moving targets, but you can shoot while you're moving.
30:40
Right. And this is a good thing about being able to train on your own and not
30:46
going to do you have to technically shoot rounds to learn movement. Yeah. No, you don't.
30:54
You can practice dry fire. There's a you know, if you don't want to use your
30:58
live gun, there's a lot of, you know, other training guns out there that you
31:03
can get cert pistols, you know, whatever.
31:06
Right. But is practicing moving with your tools. Yep. That's right.
31:11
And you can do movement in the basement. You can set up targets.
31:15
Multiple targets throughout the house, walk down the hallway.
31:17
You can do it. You can do it. I do it. So let's see.
31:22
Now, I happen poor incorporation of force on force and scenario-based training.
31:26
I love force on force training. I think it's brilliant.
31:29
It's very hard to standardize, probably. However, it does, especially with UTM,
31:35
you get a little sense of urgency when you get.
31:38
When you catch one in junk, if you ain't wearing your. Correct.
31:43
There's a little sense of urgency there. But there's, there's a right way to
31:46
do it and a wrong way to do it because. It devolves into a paintball match.
31:50
Exactly. It's got to be. That's, that's one of the things. And another thing
31:54
is having good role players. Yeah.
31:57
Because, you know, you, you have to, I'm not saying let the people win, but if you don't die.
32:05
No, but you train for, you train for victory, like in the military.
32:08
And that comes down, we kind of hammered on instructors earlier,
32:12
that comes down to instructors managing that training to get the value out of
32:17
what they're trying to do. Right.
32:19
You have to have core objectives of what you want to see in that scenario and
32:26
stick to it and don't go off script. No, I think force on force is critical.
32:31
Yeah, I think it's critical. I love it. It's problem solved.
32:34
Yeah, it's problem solving. That's what it is.
32:35
And if you had, like you said, role players with a legitimate scenario and they
32:39
kind of stick with that script, you know, like, oh, well, it's scripted.
32:43
No, I mean, you do different scenarios for sure.
32:47
So you don't just memorize the same one. I mean, the better the role players
32:51
are, the better they are being able to roll off of the student, right?
32:58
You know, if they're, say, for instance, I'm just, like, trying to de-escalate the whole time, right?
33:06
Well, a good role player know how to push the issue, right?
33:10
Versus staying in that command loop, right? Well, it's just realistic.
33:14
Exactly. And, yeah, I think force on force is brilliant.
33:18
Let's see what else we got, neglect of low light.
33:21
Close quarters, and one-handed shooting. I concur with all that.
33:26
Low light is critical because most bad things happen in the dark.
33:30
A lot of problems with law enforcement training is all on a static line with
33:35
multiple people on a static line.
33:37
So if you look at low light training in a nutshell, it's usually just being
33:43
touched on. You know, here's the positions.
33:46
You know, shoot a couple rounds from these positions. Do we practice,
33:50
you know, transitioning from a handheld to a weapon mounted light? The pros and cons of ESH.
33:58
You know, I do a lot more training with a, with a handheld light because that's
34:03
probably what I'd be searching with. Yeah. Right.
34:06
So, yeah. And that, you know what? And there's plenty of people offering low
34:09
light courses that are legitimate.
34:11
Right. That cops can go to Tuesdays, onesies and Tuesdays at a time.
34:15
You know what I mean? Mm-hmm. Take that knowledge back to the,
34:18
yeah, so that. Yeah, don't go to class and then just.
34:21
And then just sit on it. And sit on it, yeah, and keep the information yourself
34:25
so you can be better than. And so now we're going to bounce back to the organization,
34:30
not seeing the return on investment.
34:32
Well, if you send two guys who are sort of maybe senior-ish guys or instructors,
34:37
and they go and get some good info, they come back and integrate that into the.
34:42
It might not change your qual, but it changes your training.
34:45
Right. You can integrate it at any time.
34:48
And then one hand is shooting. I think we all know there's value there.
34:52
There's a lot of reasons why you would need to shoot with one hand.
34:54
Perfect example. I got a handheld flashlight in my hand. Yeah, exactly. All right.
35:00
Contextual use of force law. Yeah, that's sort of scenario-based stuff.
35:05
Right. Decision-making and things like that. Decision-making, yep.
35:08
And then lack of integration between defensive tactics, arrest control, and firearms.
35:12
Again, force-on-force situational training.
35:16
If you have a focus on that, well, I don't think, yeah, just have a legitimate
35:21
scenario out there and let it play out.
35:23
Yeah, because if not- And how well did you do the things you needed to do? Exactly.
35:27
You know, the objective is for, you know, you have objective marks for each
35:31
one of these. Notice that there's a problem.
35:34
Take care of the problem. And then what's the last thing we got to do?
35:37
We got to make sure they're in cuts. Right. So we have to take it all the way through.
35:41
All right. Well, next we got quals and standards. So Georgia Post,
35:46
man, it's weak. We all know it's weak.
35:49
Outdated? Yeah, probably. But the time standards definitely are for,
35:53
you know. So, and the argument is this, well, if we make the standard so high, people won't pass it.
36:00
Well, who do you want on the street? Who do you want on the street?
36:04
Who do you want backing you up? Right, exactly.
36:07
Emphasis on round count and accuracy and unrealistic. Yeah. So,
36:11
yeah, they got, what, 14 round and it's two here, two there.
36:15
You do this, you do the mag change with the sidestep. It's all very.
36:20
It recalls a little bit different. I mean, majority of the movement that you'll
36:25
see is either one step to the right, one step to the left, or dropping to a
36:28
knee. And then people get into that.
36:32
You know, you check your six where you throw your in and you do all kind of
36:35
weird range-isms and you never do the realistic stuff that you do. Right.
36:40
And is it realistic for cops to have to shoot somebody at 25 yards?
36:45
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it is. You know, there's a lot of instructors out there that
36:52
don't teach past 10 yards. I know. And that's absolute madness.
36:57
Right. It's mad. I mean, you put, you put two cars nose to nose,
37:03
how much distance is that depending on the size of the car, right?
37:08
People justify not doing that with false numbers just because it's hard to do.
37:12
And then you're looking at, you know, distance, speed, and accuracy.
37:17
And then also, you know, how do we, how do we quantify, you know, speed, right? Right.
37:24
Speed and accuracy and, you know, the person's skill level.
37:29
Yeah. Well, there's a magical way to do that. Yeah. Everybody knows it's called hit factor. Exactly.
37:34
Right. It's just doing one more piece of math. And this is another reason why
37:37
I started, you know, shooting competition. Right.
37:40
Is because number one, it's stressful. Yeah.
37:44
Number two, it shows me where all my holes are. And you're measuring yourself
37:48
against other dudes who may be exponentially better, i.e. DJ.
37:52
Yeah, exactly. Or whoever. And then you find out who you want to get coached
37:57
from. That's right. Right?
37:59
Yeah, man. So that stuff is very important in training. So there's no way that
38:05
we can sit here and talk about it all day long.
38:07
They're not going to change the qualifications and what the standards are.
38:11
They're going to keep them low because they need people.
38:13
They need to keep the body count. It's retention. It's retention.
38:17
And they don't want to have to have a standard. It's hard. Oh, man. Heaven forbid.
38:22
That's why it's important to go get training from other people.
38:24
Right. As an individual.
38:26
I mean, be willing and understand that you're not proficient and that this is
38:31
a degrading skill. If you only touch a gun once or twice every six months,
38:36
then you're just repeating kindergarten every time you go.
38:40
Yeah. And I'm going to hit this last bullet here because we've been talking about it.
38:44
Compare it to competitive shooting or private sector training standards.
38:50
Every trainer I know, every instructor that I know personally,
38:53
exponentially higher standards than any cop agency that I know of.
38:59
Yes, of course. Exponentially higher.
39:01
Because how do you get better? Yeah, exactly.
39:03
You have to push the limit, push the ceiling. I mean, if you got a qual where
39:07
you have a bill drill and you got six seconds to do the bill drill,
39:12
I mean, that's not realistic.
39:15
I mean, the national average for a bill drill is what, two seconds?
39:19
Something like that. Yeah, that's crazy. It's fast.
39:21
And that's like seven yards too, which. Right. Yeah.
39:25
Yeah, everybody, you can go on YouTube and just, you can find any,
39:29
any civilian out there on YouTube who's just smoking bill drills and different things.
39:34
I can't remember the guy's name. I saw him do it the other day,
39:36
like 1.34 seconds. Oh my God. That's insanity.
39:39
Yeah, that's insanity. You know, and it's like, so I'm not saying be good at a bill drill. No. Right?
39:45
But. But that's a very relevant drill though.
39:48
It is. We'll shoot multiple rounds in one city. Right, because it has a lot
39:52
of training value in it if you use it for training. Yeah. Right?
39:56
Grip, vision, recoil management, everything.
40:00
Then if you want to add to it, then, okay, we do retreating build drill.
40:05
Right, exactly. Or you do a build drill from 15 yards, and five yards.
40:09
Yeah, it's everybody, I think it's universally accepted that the build drill is very relevant.
40:15
It's very relevant because of all the things you said.
40:18
If your grip ain't there, your build drill ain't there. No. So you're keeping,
40:25
it's a measure of the control of your gun. That's what it is. Right.
40:29
So let's move on because I want to hit these things. Yeah, no problem.
40:32
I know you've got to roll pretty soon, but instructor selection and training.
40:36
So how does a guy get to be an instructor in a given agency?
40:41
It depends. He's been around long enough?
40:44
It depends. He's ready to get off the street for a while? Because,
40:47
you know, I've seen all different kinds, right?
40:51
Maybe you're in a small department and you're the youngest guy and you just
40:55
got voluntold that you have to go.
40:57
Right. For firearms or defensive tactics, whatever it is.
41:02
Or it's a cushy job. Yeah. So you take it. It's got a good schedule.
41:08
So whatever. So other motivations.
41:10
There's other motivations other than just being a good instructor. Yeah. Right.
41:16
Yeah. It's not necessarily the skill. They just send you to your little instructor training course.
41:20
Right. You pass. I mean, it would make sense sending people that have a number
41:28
one knowledge of the stuff,
41:30
because I'm sure there's departments and agencies out there that have multiple
41:34
people or some people that actually train outside of work. Yeah.
41:38
Or shoot competitions. And it's growing, man. So that's been a good thing. It's growing.
41:43
Over the past five or 10 years, you're starting to see more of our cops get
41:47
out. But like we said before, it's a lifestyle.
41:50
It's not a position. Yeah, right? No, that's right.
41:54
So, yeah, finding those guys, man, who want to do it.
41:58
Yeah. So I want to hit this last one. This is a good one.
42:01
Poor understanding of adult learning theory, but the ability to instruct and
42:05
instructional methodology.
42:07
Right. So many people, you might be a badass shooter and you can't relay it.
42:11
Yeah. What good is it if you can't relay it?
42:14
So you might be a mediocre shooter, but you can convey the knowledge.
42:21
A lot of 50 cent words. Yeah. Right.
42:23
You might be able to teach other people, but you might not be able to perform as well. Yeah. Right?
42:29
There's two sides of the coin. You got to have that balance there, buddy.
42:32
You got to be able to deliver it to be correct. You got to have the buy-in. Yep. Right?
42:38
And, you know, I don't know about you, and I'm pretty sure you do the same thing I do.
42:44
Spare time. I'm learning how to teach adults.
42:48
Right? Yeah, absolutely. You know, I mean, a regular police officer,
42:52
you know, sits in a squad car. How long?
42:56
Yeah. I mean, there's this cool thing called Audible now and Spotify and all
43:01
these different things where you can listen to books or podcasts that talk about
43:06
how to teach people. There's no reason.
43:09
No. These days for anybody to be uneducated on anything. No.
43:14
That because it's all out there. Exactly. There's plenty of ways to be able to learn.
43:18
That's right. You know, body language, how to talk to people,
43:22
mannerisms, all these different things.
43:24
No reason to be uneducated on anything today. No. In today's world.
43:28
All right. Instructor, knowledge, and delivery. So we're kind of talking about that just.
43:33
And I don't want to harp on it too much, but the range-isms versus reality, like. Right.
43:39
If you can't differ, and then the cops who say competition will get you killed.
43:44
If you can't determine what environment you're in, you're in the wrong,
43:49
you're already in the wrong environment.
43:50
I mean, it's a lot different in competition. The skill is the skill.
43:53
Two-way range. The skill is the skill. Exactly.
43:56
Shooting is shooting. Everything else. Problem solving is a different thing.
43:59
Exactly. But in competition, do you have to problem solve?
44:03
Yeah, you understand. I understand that I got to walk the stage and I know what the stage is.
44:09
And convincing guys of that. There are guys who die hard will still,
44:14
to this day, tell you competition and get you killed. Yeah, come shoot a competition.
44:20
But why? They don't want to perform in front of other dudes.
44:22
That's really what's going on. That's the big thing, right?
44:24
They don't want to look bad in front of their peers. Yeah, that's,
44:27
I think that's. They don't want to get smoked by a 15-year-old girl. I think that's the crux.
44:32
I really think that's the crux of it. It is. I really do.
44:36
Range-centric, yeah, instructor, old curriculum, yeah.
44:40
I mean, how many times have we heard it? Why are, you know, you ask somebody
44:43
why you're doing that, you know, an officer.
44:46
And then you hear some bizarre shit. They don't know, usually.
44:49
That they heard from Jeff Cooper back in.
44:51
I mean, just like ask questions like the old, you know, things about,
44:56
you know, on your reload, you have to look at the threat.
44:59
Well can i like make a you know a vision shift to my mag well i mean and then
45:07
get my mag seated i mean how long does that take yeah and also you have periphery
45:11
can i look at my mag well and still see you move in my peripheral i mean so
45:15
you have to debunk things you have to ask questions and,
45:19
there's so much it's it's there's so much let's see outside train we've talked
45:24
about this a little bit of fear of innovation yeah well fear of.
45:29
We've always done it this way. That's a very old man sort of thing.
45:33
And you got your old red shirt, red hat dude at the, who's been a, what do you call it?
45:39
High risk constructor for like the past 30 years.
45:43
Yep. And he's still carrying like, well, okay, revolver. Okay, man.
45:48
Exactly. You got, you got to stay in the game and you constantly got to.
45:51
Updated and relevant. Updated and relevant. Relevant.
45:55
And, and even for instance, like, I don't want to say time.
46:00
Qualifications are qualifications minimum but
46:05
standard only since probably the when did uspsa come around it was probably
46:13
ipsc has been around a lot longer i started shooting ipsc like around 2000 well
46:20
no i mean when the organizations themselves came out so maybe
46:24
maybe there was some cops doing it back then,
46:26
but like that's when you started seeing measurable measurables. Right.
46:32
Now these days it's just understood a one second draw is kind of like the gold stand.
46:36
I mean, before the measurables were the qual score. Right.
46:40
Now we can look at metrics. We can look at, you know, cause we're using a timer.
46:45
That's right. Putting it to time.
46:47
So old guys are averse to that. They don't want that. They don't like it.
46:52
And it, and you, They don't want to do anything they can't do. Yeah.
46:57
And when I have old dudes on the range that are like that, they're like,
47:00
well, you got to be slow and methodical, blah, blah, blah.
47:03
I say, okay, me and you right now. Gunfight. It's go time. Yeah.
47:08
Who's going to win? Well, exactly.
47:11
Yeah. You don't know who you're going against on the street as a cop.
47:15
Exactly. And usually law enforcement is where on time, behind time. That's right.
47:21
Ongoing research. Yeah. Like
47:23
nevermind the quals, right? Is there any instructional recertification?
47:27
Do you have to prove your relevance every couple of years?
47:32
It depends on the agency or departments and stuff like that.
47:35
I'm pretty sure that they do. I know that ours, we have to do every five years. Yeah.
47:41
And that might be all right. Every couple of years, maybe every five years. I don't know.
47:45
It depends on how long. I don't know. But if you're doing it on a regular basis,
47:48
you don't have to worry about it.
47:50
Well, yeah. If you're constantly teaching courses and constantly. Right.
47:54
Or you're competing or going to courses and being a student,
47:58
then you're staying update and relevant.
48:00
And then when you do have to go to your agency's, you know, recertification,
48:06
then you should be above and beyond last time you were there.
48:09
I want to hit on this one last one in that section is no instructor demonstrations.
48:16
Oh, yeah. I've had people come out here who've trained with other organizations
48:20
and they were like, I thought it was awesome that I demoed everything.
48:26
And I thought, like, who's not demoing everything?
48:29
And then they're telling me and I'm like, oh my God, I can't imagine.
48:34
So cop instructors out there, they're just not demoing the skill in some cases, many cases probably.
48:43
I've never taught a class where I don't demo. Right. But there are some out there that don't demo.
48:51
So if you don't demo it, how are your officers supposed to see what it's supposed
48:58
to look like? How are you getting... Right? Or a standard.
49:02
It's so bizarre. I give them a standard when I do it, right?
49:05
And I'll tell you another thing.
49:07
Hey, some days...
49:10
Shines on you. Sometimes it rains on you. Exactly.
49:13
But yeah, being consistent, even if you throw a bad shot here and there, you still got to demo.
49:18
You got to demo. You have to demo it because then you can still use that as
49:22
a learning or a teaching point. Right?
49:27
Yeah. I think it's bizarre that there's private companies out there that don't.
49:32
And there's some here in Georgia. Yeah. You have to demo. Yeah.
49:36
That's madness. So training, training, training. So cops.
49:40
So again, we're just reinforcing that it's widely known and agreed that cop
49:46
training comes up short.
49:48
I say it all the time. I hammer it all the time.
49:52
It's a leadership thing in that budgetary priorities have to,
49:58
they have, if the leadership doesn't prioritize training, firearms training,
50:02
lethal training specifically.
50:05
Then instructors fill in. Well, you can do a lot with a little when it comes to instructing.
50:12
You can. Like you said, just individually you can go in your bed.
50:14
As an instructor, you can do a 100-round day, but spend a lot of time doing
50:21
dry fire stuff and still get the same value.
50:24
You can dry fire the drill multiple times and then run a mag at the end of that
50:30
drill and then go to the next one. So then we got, so we got leadership who
50:35
need budgetary priorities.
50:39
If they don't prioritize training, well, the next level down needs to be more creative.
50:45
So now we got instructors, the onus is on them like, okay, you have minimal
50:49
resources, but you need, you need to relay this information.
50:52
It has to get there and they have to be able to, to learn this and demonstrate this.
50:57
I mean, there's got to be other ways of being it for management to be able to,
51:01
I mean, I know it's hard to, you know, say, okay, well, you can't get your promotion
51:07
until you meet this firearm standard. You know what I mean? Yeah.
51:11
I mean, I don't think that's too far fetched for me. Well, no.
51:17
You should be able to shoot at this level.
51:19
Yeah. Or, you know, you should be able, I mean, think of some jujitsu schools, right? Right.
51:25
They they're like, OK, well, before you get your blue belt, you have to know all these moves.
51:30
You have to have so many hours and you have to go to one competition.
51:35
Right. So why can't, why can't management do that with firearms as well?
51:41
Well, because the pushback is going to be what? Exactly. If you don't,
51:44
if you don't facilitate that, then I'm not, who's going to pay me to do it? Exactly.
51:49
But then that comes back down on the opposite. So I'm going down the ladder,
51:52
right? Yeah. So leadership needs to prioritize.
51:57
Instructors need to be creative and in the game, not just like,
52:01
oh man, this is my nine to five. I'm not just going to spew some stuff out here and regurgitate.
52:05
And then as individual instructors, seek out professional development,
52:10
learn to teach in an effective way. Learning to teach is really big.
52:15
I've been doing a lot of stuff on that. And then keep your shooting skills up as well. Yep.
52:18
And then the individual, like, hey, they're not going to pay for everything.
52:23
Who pays for my bullets? Me. I pay for my bullets.
52:27
So, yeah, the leadership, it ain't on them to coddle your balls through your
52:32
entire training journey.
52:33
Exactly. Go out and seek out and be better.
52:37
Drop 200 bucks on 2,000 rounds and do a lot of dry fire and make that last.
52:43
I mean, there's a lot of instructors out there that, you know,
52:47
I used to, you know, me and, you know, my instructor used to do a free defensive tactics. Yeah.
52:57
You know, training day once every quarter. First couple of times,
53:01
we had a bunch of people showing up.
53:02
And then after that, it's just like, it's, it just started going down and down,
53:08
down in attendance. Too much effort, man.
53:09
And then, I mean, they were still getting post certificate, you know,
53:13
they were getting post points out of it or whatever you want to call it and stuff like that.
53:18
But it got to the point where it didn't make sense for us to do it anymore.
53:22
For the two dudes that showed up. Yeah, because nobody, nobody was showing up.
53:25
The two dudes that gave a shit? Yeah.
53:28
Nobody was showing up. And so there has to be a want and a need,
53:33
you know, in the individual to want to get better.
53:37
There's plenty of firearms instructors out there that give free lessons to law enforcement.
53:43
Pretty much everybody gives discounts to law enforcement. So there's really
53:47
not a risk. Every dynamic two-gun course has two free seats available for any
53:51
law enforcement, dude. And Osprey Shooting Solutions offers four free hours
53:56
of training to any agency.
53:58
There you go. As an initial, you know, introduction, high five,
54:02
I'll come to your range, you come to mine, whatever, and do a little assessment.
54:07
One agency has taken me up so far. Yeah. One agency. All right.
54:13
We're going to get close here.
54:15
I saw a thing. Where is it at? The link between firearms proficiency and reduced
54:20
use of force incidents. And we said this earlier, and I want to reiterate it.
54:25
If you train, and you're well trained, and you're confident in your skill set
54:32
and skill level, you're less apt to go to use of force.
54:38
You're giving yourself, by virtue of being better trained, you're giving yourself
54:43
more time to solve a problem because you don't have to overthink,
54:46
oh, I got to get my gun out of my holster.
54:48
And with your training, the fear factor is not as bad as well. Yeah.
54:53
Because you've been under pressure. You know how to think under pressure.
54:57
That's right. You have that confidence. That's what training does.
55:00
It builds confidence. And then when you see the proficiency in results.
55:06
At further building your confidence. You know you can do the thing that you need to do.
55:10
Right. I mean, make it simple. You're
55:13
a fat body and then you start eating correctly and going to the gym.
55:17
Now you're, you know, fit and you can run and everything like that.
55:23
Did that just build your confidence?
55:24
Yes or no? I don't think it made anybody's confidence worse, you know?
55:29
So pushing the limits builds bandwidth.
55:33
Yeah, for sure. Because, yes, we train to shoot fast, but does it mean do we
55:38
have to shoot that fast? Correct.
55:40
No. And then that's another trope on that or adage here is how do you know where
55:46
your limits are if you've never pushed?
55:48
Exactly. I mean, if you've only driven your car 55 miles an hour your whole
55:52
life and now you've got to drive it at 85, you're not going to know how to do it.
55:58
All right. And then let me see. There was one more I want to look at here.
56:02
And this is one, so the documentation liability, right? Poor training increases exposure.
56:07
And what I'm surprised I don't see more of, and maybe it's because of,
56:11
you know, agencies have insurance agents.
56:15
And then in some place, you know, you have, what's it called?
56:18
Qualified immunity. Qualified immunity, exactly.
56:20
I'm surprised I don't see more liability, at least like, what's the word? Collateral damage.
56:29
I'm surprised you don't see more of it. Right. I've seen, there's been some
56:32
videos out there where I've seen some, the, the classic Polish ambush or just
56:37
crazy shooting off into an area where there's a park, a park or, or, or something.
56:42
I'm surprised there's not more liability and it's pure luck that, that.
56:48
Nobody's getting hurt. That there's not as much, but I'll say this and I've said it 8 million times.
56:53
And I've said this to operators who, who've been to Iraq 8 million times,
56:58
just cause you did something and lived.
57:01
Mean you did it right. Correct. Just cause you were in a officer involved shooting
57:05
and didn't accidentally shoot somebody's grandma.
57:09
Don't mean that it got lucky, man.
57:12
So, so these things are starting to pop up even more because,
57:15
you know, the liability going to the officer because, you know,
57:20
what was it? Breonna Taylor.
57:21
Yeah. That one. Right. Yeah. So the officer that just blatantly was shooting
57:26
and shot through the walls.
57:27
Yeah. He got charged for that. Yeah.
57:30
So So, you know, it's not just about you surviving the incident.
57:35
It's did you do things correctly?
57:37
And with training, it gives you more bandwidth to be able to think,
57:42
oh, do I really need to be shooting in that direction? Well, blind.
57:46
Right. In that particular. Well, my buddy's shooting and I don't know what he's
57:49
shooting at. So all the rest of us are going to start shooting. Right.
57:53
And that's why investigations are critical.
57:56
Now, the public will bust on cops. And I do too, a little bit about,
57:59
uh, we investigated ourselves and found that we were of not liable,
58:03
but training allows you to be able to do these, operate in these gray areas
58:09
with actual proficiency. Right.
58:13
Now, a well-trained cop, not that guy, would not have shot through a blind structure,
58:19
whether it was a window, curtain, or whatever, until he had something identified at heart.
58:24
Exactly. Which is one of the four universal rules of firearm safety. Exactly.
58:28
I mean, there's, there's a lot of videos out there that we can break apart.
58:33
Oh, well, you weren't there, man. You don't know.
58:35
You don't know what it's like to be under stress. Whatever.
58:38
Yeah, man. That, that's what I say every time. Like, whatever. Don't.
58:42
Want to hear about your inability to control your fucking stress.
58:45
I know what stress is like. Right.
58:47
And you can train a lot of that stuff out.
58:51
You can smooth the edges off of that stress with training. But you have to have
58:54
the willingness to train.
58:55
That's right. You have to be, and this is the thing, is what do we preach on
59:00
the range when we're teaching people?
59:02
You've got to fail. Well, yeah.
59:05
Exactly. You have to push the limits and see where you fail.
59:08
Then we bring it back a little bit And then each time you come out there If
59:13
you practice and you train That ceiling is going to be a little higher So it's
59:17
going to take you longer to fail Or farther distance to fail Right?
59:22
Yeah And that's measurable Yeah You got to push them You got to push the limits out there Because.
59:31
You raise your bottom line. The more you train, your baseline keeps going up,
59:37
keeps going up, keeps going up. Exactly.
59:39
And that's what everybody's trying to get to. And it's measurable.
59:45
It's what you should be trying to get to.
59:46
All right, we're going to look at, let's see, you're closing stuff here. Let's see.
59:51
Deficiency. Yeah, so we've identified, yeah, leadership, trainers,
59:56
and the individual officers.
59:57
Everybody needs to do better, but it's all got to do with like leadership,
1:00:03
prioritizing, budgetary specifically. That's a big one.
1:00:09
For instructors is being a good instructor, like a properly good instructor.
1:00:14
Continually learning. To care about it enough for your own professional development.
1:00:20
And then individual officers, man, just your own survivability ought to be enough. But what else?
1:00:28
Find a buddy to compete with, man.
1:00:31
You can survive the altercation and still do things wrong. That's right.
1:00:36
Just because you survived. I mean, there's one where there was a video.
1:00:41
Officers were stacked up in an apartment entryway or the balcony or whatever it is, right?
1:00:51
One was sitting in front of the other one and something happened.
1:00:54
And he went to shoot and the officer moved in front of him and he shot his own
1:00:58
officer in the back of the head.
1:00:59
Well, that guy survived, but he shouldn't have been set up like that. That's poor training.
1:01:06
That could have been trained out. I wonder if they're buddies.
1:01:09
Sure they were. I wonder if they're buddies now.
1:01:12
Well, I mean, that guy's dead. No, I thought you said he survived.
1:01:17
No, the guy that shot him survived, right? Of course, he survived.
1:01:22
Exactly. Yeah, yeah. So just because you survived the shooting doesn't mean-
1:01:25
So I thought you meant the guy- No, he smoked.
1:01:27
Okay, so he smoked his- He shot him right in the back of the head,
1:01:29
and he slumped right there. So yeah, so now there's unintended consequences.
1:01:34
So now that dude is probably- A nervous wreck and probably not a cop anymore.
1:01:39
And he's probably curled up in his living room wondering why he shot his buddy. Exactly.
1:01:43
Back at the head. But could that have been avoided? Yeah, it could. Yes.
1:01:47
Absolutely could have. And that's through tactic. Never mind marksmanship training.
1:01:51
That's a tactical mistake. Right. To be pointing your gun.
1:01:54
But then a lot of times we can't get into tactics because we spend the minimal time on firearms. Yeah.
1:02:00
Well, that's right. That sounds like a tactical mistake for sure.
1:02:03
Because you talked about it earlier, that shooting is shooting.
1:02:07
Everything else is tactics. That's right. Yep.
1:02:10
You have to train both. Problem solving. Exactly. Tactics, all that stuff.
1:02:13
Movement, everything. That's all tactics.
1:02:16
Elevates standards. And the last thing you got here, and this,
1:02:20
I'm going to, confidence saves lives on both sides of the match.
1:02:25
You're mitigating liability to the general public and to you and your partners by training.
1:02:32
Exactly. So that you don't shoot your partner in the back of the head.
1:02:36
Just unreal. Or so that you don't shoot an eight-year-old girl by accident.
1:02:41
Right. Or somebody's abuela. The bad guys don't care. The bad guys don't care.
1:02:47
Have to. Otherwise, we're not the good guys. We're just dudes wearing badges.
1:02:51
You gotta care. There's no indiscriminate just firing out.
1:02:56
And if you don't care, guess what, man? I say it all the time.
1:02:59
If you don't like your job, go be a fucking DJ. You know what I'm saying?
1:03:03
You have to care. McDonald's is hiring. Alright, so yeah, we ripped on the cop training.
1:03:10
Periodically, I like to do that. I want cops to come out and train.
1:03:14
But not because I want cops to come out and train so I can make money.
1:03:18
If cops show up to an incident where I'm at with my wife and grandkids,
1:03:23
those cops need to be fucking proficient, man.
1:03:26
Don't put my grandkids in danger because you're too arrogant to go train under
1:03:32
somebody else or something else. Right.
1:03:34
Training builds confidence, confidence in your approach, confidence in your
1:03:38
interview, confidence in everything.
1:03:41
That is absolutely it. Training builds confidence.
1:03:44
Be proficient. Go out and do it.
1:03:47
All right, Dennis, you want to give your dojo and your websites and all that stuff? Yeah.
1:03:52
So Force Solutions is my training company for firearms and defensive tactics.
1:03:58
You can find me at forcesolutions.co.
1:04:04
And we also, my wife and I own a martial arts school in Woodstock,
1:04:10
Georgia, and that would be atlantamartialartscenter.com.
1:04:15
Nice. So if you're in that area, go give it a look.
1:04:20
Folks. Thanks for listening. Thanks for following. Thanks for sharing. Please do.
1:04:26
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