By Josh Gelernter
Friday, July 22, 2016
Periodically, FBI agents have to re-qualify to carry
their service pistols. When I was a teenager, a family friend in the FBI (a
tremendous mensch, Special Agent Ron Barndollar) used to take me and my
brother along to his qualification tests.
For me and my brother, this was always a big deal. We’d
show up amidst a crowd of FBI agents carrying an assortment of exciting guns
that they were only too happy to show off for us. A few agents would always
come over to say they remembered us from our last trip, or just to introduce
themselves — FBI agents tend to be very friendly. We’d sit in on a briefing by
some FBI firearms instructors, who would bring everyone up to speed on FBI
firearms policy. One year, an instructor announced that the FBI had decided
that agents couldn’t choose their own gun lights or shotgun shells anymore. He
joked that the FBI didn’t want them to have any advantage over the bad guys. He
added, “Next year, they’re taking out the air conditioning.” It was a
sweltering summer day, and he got a good laugh.
Afterward, everyone would head out to the range and watch
the shooting.
I don’t remember exactly what the test was, but it was
something like: 50 shots, split up between 25 yards, 15 yards, 5 yards, and 7
feet, with a minimum score of 80 percent. Agents waiting their turns would
regale my brother and me with war
stories. Then, when all the agents were done testing, my brother and I would
get a chance to run through the course ourselves — and if there was time
afterward, to try out some shotguns and “assault rifles.”
This story has a point besides reminiscing about my
idyllic childhood. During one trip, after all the shooting was done, we were
invited to try out the FBI’s FATS machine — the Firearm Training System, a virtual-reality
arrest simulator.
It works like this: A trainee stands in front of a movie
screen, onto which are projected pre-filmed interactions with potentially
dangerous suspects (played by actors). The scenes play out differently
depending on the choices the trainee makes (different middles and ends are
selected by an instructor). The choices the trainee has to make tend to boil
down to shooting or not shooting. He has in his hand a gun that shoots light
beams. He shoots at the screen, and the FATS machine records where the virtual
bullets go.
When I was the trainee, I got killed over and over again.
Everything happens very fast: A suspect shoves your partner, and a split second
later your partner’s gun is in the suspect’s hand, and you’re dead. A suspect’s
hand drifts out of sight behind a kitchen island — even though your partner is
shouting at him to keep his hands up — and suddenly he’s holding a gun, and
you’re both dead. A suspect charges you, suddenly, and you don’t shoot because
you can’t see a gun. He has a knife in his waistband, but before you realize
it, you’re dead.
Conversely, a lot of scenarios can be resolved
peacefully. People shout and scream, but they keep their hands up, and everyone
lives — assuming you don’t get carried away and shoot them. The point of the
FATS machine is to prepare agents for the split-second life-or-death decisions
that all law-enforcement officers are inevitably required to make. It teaches
something that the FBI has learned over decades of dealing with bad guys: that
if someone you’re trying to arrest does something with his hands other than
keep them in plain sight, there’s a good chance that he’s planning to shoot
you. That’s why policemen shout the keep-your-hands-where-I-can-see-them thing
so emphatically. They want to be sure that if you do something else with your
hands, it isn’t accidental.
It also teaches agents to treat unarmed suspects like
armed suspects until they know better. Particularly the ones who charge or
attack. The fact is, there’s no way of knowing whether someone is unarmed or
just pretending to be unarmed, until he’s been searched.
Last year, a self-described “radical political activist”
and Black Lives Matter protester named Jarrett Maupin agreed to go through a
FATS-style police exercise — not using a FATS machine, but using paintball guns
in a parking lot. Maupin was told to question a man behaving suspiciously. The
man’s hands disappeared momentarily behind a car, reappeared holding a gun, and
Maupin was “killed.” In the next exercise, two unarmed men were having a loud
argument. Maupin approached them, one of the men starting walking aggressively
toward Maupin — and Maupin shot him dead.
A local Fox affiliate in Phoenix filmed Maupin’s
experience (you can watch it on YouTube). Afterward, one
of the local reporters tried the same exercise, and got exactly the same
results. The reporter asked Maupin what conclusions he’d drawn from the
experience. “I didn’t understand how important compliance was,” said Maupin.
“But after going through this, yeah, my attitude has changed. This is all
unfolding in 10 to 15 seconds. People need to comply with the orders of law
enforcement officers — for their own sake.”
Maybe the answer to racial tensions and anti-police
protests is for police to offer every member of Black Lives Matter a chance to
take the test that Maupin took. Or maybe the police should start doing
FATS-machine demos in high-crime neighborhoods, to help people understand the
decisions cops are faced with. Maybe they should open FATS arcades. I bet
they’d be popular.
In the meantime, though, it’s worth remembering:
Policemen, FBI agents, DEA agents, et al., have a very tough job.
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