In article <XnsACBCC578EA8E0xyzllk@95.216.243.224>
<governor.swill@gmail.com> wrote:

Active shooter response protocols call for police officers to
immediately attack and neutralize a gunman � especially when
children are the targets � according to experienced law
enforcement experts.

But although officers on scene at the Robb Elementary School in
Uvalde, Texas, arrived within minutes of the attack on May 24,
they posted up down the hallway.

Images from inside the school show that the officers on scene
had long guns and body armor, as well as ballistic shields. But
they stacked up down the hallway and did not breach the
classroom, where the gunman who killed 19 children and two
adults holed up.

Children inside the elementary school classroom called 911
multiple times pleading for help.

But it wasn�t until 77 minutes after the 18-year-old killer
entered the school that a tactical team breached the classroom
door and shot him dead, according to authorities. That was far
too long, experts say.

"If you attack the shooter, you disrupt the shooter�s plan, and
the shooter has to defend himself," Dave Katz, a former special
agent with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and now the
CEO of Global Security Group, told Fox News Digital. "And if the
shooter is shooting at you, that is better than having the
shooter attack children."

Based on the images from inside the school, he said it appeared
as though the officers had inadequate Level IIIA ballistic
shields, which are designed to protect only against common
pistol rounds, and based on their formation in the hallway,
insufficient training. Katz said his expertise includes being a
master shield instructor and leading the DEA�s shield program in
the 1990s.

"Those were the wrong shields for the operation," he said.
"Those guys had the wrong equipment and the wrong training."

More robust Level III shields would have protected the officers,
he said, but even without them, they should have attacked the
gunman.

"The moment those kids are in danger, the shields go down, you
advance down the hallway, and if you�re shot at, shoot back,"
said Katz, a father of three. "If you go down, the next guy will
get him."

UVALDE SHOOTING: TEXAS DPS OFFICIALS BRING ROBB ELEMENTARY
SCHOOL DOOR INTO STATE CAPITOL AHEAD OF HEARING

He said police should train to react quickly and aggressively
and warned that schools should have their exterior doors locked
at all times

Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw told the
state Senate�s Special Committee to Protect All Texans last week
that the police response to the active shooting was an "abject
failure and antithetical to everything we�ve learned over the
last two decades since the Columbine massacre."

He said that the first officers on scene had sufficient numbers
and firearms to have stopped the gunman within three minutes.

At least one DPS special agent appeared bothered by the lack of
action being taken at the scene, according to the updated
timeline released by law enforcement.

"If there's kids in there, we need to go in there," a DPS
special agent repeated twice at 11:56 a.m. An unknown officer
responded, "Whoever is in charge will determine that."

"The only thing stopping the hallway of dedicated officers from
entering room 111 and 112 was the on-scene commander, who
decided to place the lives of officers before the lives of
children," McCraw said at the hearing. "The officers had
weapons; the children had none. The officers had body armor; the
children had none. The officers had training; the subject had
none."

More than 10 officers entered the school less than three minutes
into the shooting, McCraw said previously, but the incident
commander, Uvalde school Police Chief Pete Arredondo, allegedly
held up their advance.

Arredondo ordered the officers to wait for more tactical gear
and a key to unlock the classroom door, McCraw said.
Investigators later determined that the door was likely unlocked.

McCraw said it was "plain and simple" that there was
insufficient training, and he accused Arredondo of making
"terrible decisions" as well as delaying officers from other
agencies who wanted to move in on the suspect.

Arredondo did not respond to Fox News Digital�s request for
comment.

"The bottom line is no one was in charge," said Katherine
Schweit, a former FBI special agent who launched the bureau�s
active shooter program.

She said the response was out of sync with how police train for
active shooter crises.

"I believe in the police chief�s first interview, he said, �I
wasn�t in charge,� and now we�re hearing he was in charge," she
told Fox News Digital. "The bottom line is no one was in charge."

Active shooter response policy, which Schweit helped formulate
in the wake of the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012, involves
directly pursuing the suspect, then neutralizing him, she said.

"We learned from Columbine that we had to do a more effective
job of getting in to get to where the shooter was, not just to
stop the shooting, but also to look for opportunities to save
people who might be injured and bleeding out," she said.

That also means moving in, whether officers have ballistic
shields or not, and regardless of whether they�re of the
appropriate level.

"Everybody wants to have the best, safest equipment, that�s
great," she said, "But no active shooter training requires
ballistic shields."

Training requires officers to "pursue the shooter, period," she
said. And if they had, the uncertainty about the door lock
wouldn�t have even mattered.

"The key situation is one more item that�s showing us that the
officers did not execute on the training they received," she
told Fox News Digital. "If they had gone after the shooter, they
would have gone through the door and found out it was unlocked."

She also stressed that schools need to put emphasis on the "run"
in the slogan, "run, hide, fight." The word comes first for a
reason.

"The first thing you should consider is to run and/or escape the
area," she said. "We are telling teachers and children to stand
still and hope that somebody else can come and save them. And
I'll tell you, in situations where children have run from
school, they have survived."

She also questioned the wisdom of having a small school police
department.

"Would they be better served to consolidate departments to
provide bigger and stronger training?" she asked. "Joint
training is not the same as having every individual on your team
able to do what we needed them to do in Uvalde. They just don�t
have the resources, the timing, the training, the depth in those
departments."

At the least, she said, smaller departments should consider
working closely with larger neighbors or contracting with county
agencies.

Congress and the Justice Department are reviewing the Uvalde
response.

Fox News� Paul Best contributed to this report.

https://www.foxnews.com/us/uvalde-officers-ballistic-shields-
woudnt-have-stopped-rifle-rounds-hesitation-cost-lives