Posted by Tina
I have to hand it to NAACP activist Larry O’Hara for participating in an exercise sponsored by the Bradford County Sheriff’s Office in Georgia where simulated life and death scenarios would give him an experience similar to those police officers face in the field. After shooting an unarmed man who was reaching for his wallet in the simulation Mr. O’Hara said that he actually felt like his own life was in danger:
“I felt it was justified because I felt my life was actually in danger,” O’Hara said. “And when I fired, that was at the last, the very last. I wouldn’t have fired right away.”
In another scenario — a domestic dispute — O’Hara was shot by a suspect.
O’Hara, who lives in Waycross, Georgia, said after the experience he has a better understanding of the decisions police officers make. He said he is setting up a meeting with the mayor and other leaders in Waycross to share his experience and encourage them to work to find ways to build more understanding between police and members of the community.
“I had no idea the pressure that the policeman or policewoman is under,” O’Hara said.
After the exercise, O’Hara told Smith that he would have to look at things differently when it came to police-involved shootings. He said his mindset has changed since the experience, and he hopes others can learn from it as well.
“If I was in the public, those people, they probably would have thrown whatever they had at me and said, ‘Murderer, murderer,’ but we can’t take those chances,” O’Hara said.
This was an excellent idea and whoever thought of it is to be commended. A simple training exercise like this has the potential to completely flatten the, “hands up don’t shoot” argument and more importantly save lives. Might be a good idea to put students through the rigors?
It’s great when people like Larry learn what it can be like to be a cop. The one part of this job that is so tedious, so challenging and so frustrating is that life and death decisions often come very unexpectedly. These situations are so few and far between and then when it happens a cop must be 100% right.
How do you keep your edge, how do you act 100% right, when there are such long periods on the job when absolutely nothing happens? This leads to a false sense of security when being more alert to danger is warranted.
Looking back at my police career, there were only a couple of times when I could have justifiably shot someone, but there were perhaps several hundred encounters where a little force was required.
This is typical. So, when it hits the fan most cops are stunned and there’s this momentary hesitation as the adrenaline kicks in. Then, if you are still alive, you make that split second decision, shoot or don’t shoot!
In most cases it just happens so fast, there’s really no time to react, no time to think and if you survive the initial encounter you react based on your training, instinct and then its over in 1 or 2 seconds.
Most people could not pass a shoot, don’t shoot scenario. It’s tough! Mistakes can and do happen even to professional cops. But, lately it seems society wants all cops to be perfect all the time. It will never happen. Lives will be lost, sometimes it will be the cop’s life.
As career cops, my son and I lived by one truism, its better to be judged by 12 than carried by 6. Thank God we never made a fatal mistake, although his career is not yet over. He’s got 5 more years to go and who knows what could happen in all that time.
The reality of this job is, the more armchair quarterbacking that goes on the more likely the cop will hesitate when he shouldn’t. This is how cops die. It’s also how innocent citizens die too, because a cop who hesitates at the wrong time can get a citizen killed by the bad guy/s.
This is not a profession for average people, especially today with all the strict rules, unrelenting oversight and micro-managing that goes on. I wouldn’t do it again and I hope my son makes its to his retirement age and gets out and is allowed to return to being a normal human being once again.
I wouldnt have a cops job. I make more money pouring concrete and my customers don’t try to kill me. My hats off to those who do it, but I wouldnt want it.
Excellent post, most likely not going to be a favorite by some of the Liberal posters.
We live in a complicated PC world of incomplete information. Refreshing to read about a activist taking the time to understand the pressures of being a Cop.
It is clear that many lay people react wrongly to a situation when they sense immediate danger.
Even with the best training possible, Cops are exposed to deadly situations on a daily basis, never knowing the possible outcome that require their training to preserve their lives.
Now add in the factor/directive of doing only as much as the situation requires, for the best possible outcome involving the suspect, and instinct becomes a valuable asset.
Resistance to a Officers order is the worst possible way for a suspect to react which clearly escalates the situation. Still we read in report after report, the suspect was shot after resisting and making a aggressive move toward the officer involved, that kind of stupid person does not deserve the martyr title.
I most likely would not last beyond a week of active duty as a Police officer, at least as a soldier in a war conflict you know before hand your enemy’s intent and goals while engaged in a fire fight, and the purpose your Government put you there to begin with.