When eating out

[KingEdward]

praying for the families / and the dept.

the only thing I generally do when eating out is what most have
mentioned here: be observant of who comes in and what they are
doing and where is the exit I would get down and go for in an emergency.

There are times past when (even if I haven't finished) I have noticed
an employee or former employee come in and the air is tense and/or he/she
and another employee or manager are having words and not nice calm
responses. I leave.

[Dwight55]

As far back as I can remember, I have made it a habit to sit where I can see the counter and the main entrance door.

It is not a mandatory, must have, rule, . . . but it is done often enough that my wife complains about her back being to the counter/door area. Apparently her sister always did that too, . . . which made her notice it when I started it back in '68 when we got married.

I certainly don't mean to sound like I'm disrespecting the police officers, . . . but I think they may have let their guard down too far for too long. Ya got to take care of #1 yourself, . . . and situational awareness, . . . 24/7, . . . is the only thing that offers any real success percentage.

May God bless,
Dwight

[Glenn E. Meyer]

We don't know the exact circumstances so saying they let down their situational awarness is premature.

Was this person known to them? Walk in with a drawn gun?

I said before, that many shooters could walk over to a table and draw. They could shoot 4 people in 2 to 3 seconds. Unless you were ready to go on an interminate cue, could you beat them?

Do you want armed folks to go to the isoceles stance when someone walks by them?

Darn just world hypothesis - I was just teaching it. If bad things happen to good people, we can't accept that the world isn't just, so it's their fault!

[Dwight55]

In all probablity, . . . you are probably correct, Glenn, . . . my SA comment was meant more that they may have gotten into a routine, . . . and on any given day could have been predicted to be there.

Human beings in general are creatures of habit, . . . they prefer known paths, . . . they develop predictable, documentable actions.

If the fact that the killer made the brag about going to do it was true, . . . then in all probability, . . . he had seen and scoped out this situation.

One of the pillars of situational awareness effectiveness is that the person does his/her best not to become predictable.

May God bless,
Dwight

[KingEdward]

The gunman gave no indication he intended violence when he walked into the shop, police and witnesses reported.

He stood in line at the shop’s counter as if to place an order before pulling out a gun and opening fire on the officers, Troyer said. The killer fled on foot.

If the above is true in this situation, then the assailant had an insurmountable advantage.

[sakeneko]

The more I hear about the details of this situation, the more I think that KingEdward's last comment is essentially right. It isn't that there were no security measures that could have been taken and weren't; it's that none of them would have prevented this tragedy from happening. I can't imagine any security measures that the individual police officers could have taken that wouldn't have been too much to live with on a practical basis.

[Maximus856]

I don't mean to be the devil's advocate here, but I hate to break it to a lot of people on here.. Not every bad guy is just some idiot who learned how to shoot his gun in that very instant of the crime he's committing. As far as being unpredictable, how unpredictable can you honestly be in everyday life? Unpredictability may confuse a small child or a dog, but a man with half a brain? I don't know everybodys past experiences, but I've found in a life a lot of people say 'I would have done this.' In all actuallity nobody has had their situational awareness or unpredictability tested in a real world situation, against somebody or something who isn't braindead. What if this BG in question, has the same shooting skills or better then you all who claim that this wouldn't of happened to you?

Large American and enemy companies have been slaughtered by squad and platoon size assualts..*IN WAR.* The thing where human situational awareness is almost always at an all time high. So with that said, if you were one of the 4 sitting down drinking coffee in a nice little shop, one which you probably frequent a lot, do you still think you would of been the one walking out of that door?

-Max

[BillCA]

Dwight has reminded me of a lesson that was repeated frequently to us at the academy.

Be predictably unpredictable on a daily basis.

They tell you to avoid taking the exact same route out to your beat every day. Or the same route home at the end of your shift. Never eat at the same restaurant twice in the same week. Don't eat your meal at the same time every day. Avoid making anything you do predictable on a day to day or week to week basis (i.e. Friday dinner at a Denny's).

This incident may be a prime example of why that rule exists. Officers have been followed home so actions can be taken against them. Others have been killed dining in their favorite eatery because they habitually dined there on a specific day/night.

However, humans are fallible. Who wants to delay getting home after a long week? Or take an extra few minutes getting home on your anniversary?

[JDot]

Well, they got him last night. Shot and killed. Apparently he had gotten alot of breaks that got him out of jail when he should have stayed in...story repeated in alot of places, I imagine, but they don't all become police killers.

[w_houle]

Hyper vigilance is a symptom of PTSD and is as hard to maintain as it is to control. If this person went far enough out of his way, he would have found an advantage somewhere. What were they suppose do, walk around in some form of cover formation? I understand not to be in a fog, but even if you choose the back booth and sit with your gun drawn and sitting next to you: You still have to holster up and walk to the register.
This was just a matter of opportunity.

[scottaschultz]

fastforty wrote: These guys had to be stark raving Condition White.

How do you know? Were you there? Were you sitting with them at Forza Coffee? According to your profile, you are in California, not Washington. It sounds like you are making the assumption that because Maurice Clemmons was able to execute his plan (for the time being), that those officers were some rookies straight out of the academy sitting there with their heads up their asses and allowed themselves to be shot.

I just love how all of these Monday morning quarterbacks can sit here and call out these officers and then tell us how your hyper-sharp situational awareness skills would have caught this guy the moment he stepped into the coffee shop and how you would never let something like this ever happen to you.

Scott

[ZeSpectre]

When you are dining out, what is your method of maintaining situational awareness. Here 4 officers, trained, were taken out by one BG. Why would you, or I, be different?

Sometimes you are just jacked. Unpleasant but just a fact of life.

I was part of a demonstration scenario for a classroom shooting where I played the professor at the head of the class. Now since I actually knew what was going to happen (and I'm fairly well practiced) I'm pretty sure that I could have spun and filled the doorway with airsoft pellets the instant I heard the door open.

BUT

For the sake of realism I "played stupid" and since I was the "authority figure" and closest to the door I got "whacked" every time. Not a happy thing to think about, but a fact of that scenario and a very real possibility.

However, in the "Armed CCW" version of the scenario the CCW "student" was able to take the "shooter" down right after he shot me. Yeah I was jacked, but at least it was possible that medical help might have been on the way shortly thereafter (unlike the "unarmed" scenario where the "shooter" just casually blew the entire class away).

[Glenn E. Meyer]

Another professor here. Yep, your career would be quite exciting if you drew down on every time the classroom door opened. I also did an exercise for unarmed attempts to get to a shooter in a large lecture hall if the person just came in and from the corner opened fire.

1. You probably can't get to him or her.
2. You can't throw your laptop that far.

Now as regards to the officers' response. At the last IDPA match we had a stage were you were at about 4 yards from three targets. You had to draw and fire three strings.

1. Draw and 2,2,2
2. Draw and 1,1,2,1,1 - tac sequence.
3. Draw and three heads


So here are the times for the three stages I mentioned and the points down. They are for the top 7 out of 63. I’m the 6th (SSP – MM).

Cat Rank T1 T2 T3 Total
Time Points down
ESP SS 2.65 3.35 2.52 8.52 0
CDP UN 2.82 3.37 2.62 8.81 0
ESP EX 2.71 3.64 2.51 8.86 0
CDP EX 3.70 2.92 1.95 8.57 1
SSP SS 2.83 3.24 2.68 8.75 1
SSP MM 3.40 3.44 2.91 9.75 0
SSP UN 3.09 4.30 3.22 10.61 0


Dropping your latte and responding to this would be a bear if you had no warning. I just read that they think the shooter was hit by an officer who chased him and fired the shots as he or she died (didn’t see who it was). Mindset? I would think so.

Even the bottom of the list (except for major disasters) was doing about 3 - 6seconds.

[BillCA]

Dropping your latte and responding to this would be a bear if you had no warning.

Astute... very astute. And I'm not being sarcastic.

Even if you CCW 24/7, even if you hear a loud noise inside a mall, grocery store, restaurant, etc. is your first reaction to clear leather? I think all of us want to believe that a loud noise wasn't the result of a gunshot, but of someone dropping a pallet or heavy object. Perhaps even some construction work. Sitting at a table with your warm latte, even if you notice the officer across from you staring intently, buy the time you turn to look, it's just in time for the lights to go out.

That's human nature. We can't live our daily existence so wired up that the slightest loud noise or suspicious character causes us to unholster -- or even move quickly to a defensive posture. I don't want to live like that and I know most of you don't want to live that way either. You do the best you can do and try to minimize your exposure.

[petemo]

Probably nothing could have stopped what happened. S---t happens. Basic training 101 us army. Don't bunch up!!! But then that's combat areas. I guess as a cop there everywhere

[powergunner]

"He says investigators believe the officers were targeted, and it was not a robbery."

I think there will be more findings about that story. I don’t know why but I think it was some sort of revenge... either for something the officer/s has/have done to this guy, or something like that...

I don’t know why. Who today will even think about doing such a random slaughter, or maybe I just watched too much mafia movies?

[Madcap_Magician]

Part of it, too, is that sometimes there isn't much you can do. If you get ambushed and are well and truly in a kill zone, you may just be hosed.

If the guy came up unnoticed, pulled a gun, and started shooting, he got two before they could react, since he knew what he was going to do and they had no clue and no reason to suspect they were about to be attacked. The other two were then two steps behind because as Billy the Kid said, nobody ever outdrew a gun that was already pointed at them.

[Glenn E. Meyer]

I've seen people outdraw a pointed gun. It can be done. I think I will pass on how. It's taught in classes. Take a good one.

[BGutzman]

It is possible to beat someone to the trigger who has already drawn a weapon but in many situations its unlikely. I think these four officers were totally caught off guard and certainly they would have found it difficult to draw from a sitting position and who knows maybe due to table position two of the officers may have even had there back to the perp.

There are things these officers could have done differently but to be honest I think most people in the same situation would have done as these officers did.
We can't live thinking that every second presents a mortal danger nor can we disregard that in reality some level of danger exist everywhere we go.

[ClayInTx]

I’m not a law enforcement officer and I do not fault what the referenced officers did or did not do.

I believe almost every supposition of what they should have done has been expressed, and accomplished nothing for them. They’re dead.

There have been several suggestions of what should be done in the future, some simple, some complicated.

To wit:
Don’t meet at the same place every day. If you’re going to meet regularly with others not in your immediate group it requires a schedule. This becomes predictable also.

Sit where you can watch the door. This means your attention is on the door and not the meeting.

Take a different route home each day. There is a limit to the ways to get home. Every so many days you are going to be going a way you’ve gone before. The BG merely has to wait along one and sooner or later he’ll get you.

I’ll stop laundry listing all the options for the officers. As far as the BG, he had option after option of ways to get to them.

These officers did nothing wrong and they didn’t stand a chance. They fell in the line of duty and are to be honored for their sacrifice. Even military persons get rotated back to Stateside duty after a combat tour; police officers are on the front line from the day they take up the badge until the day they lay it down, and might not be safe from a grudge even then.

I have seen nothing posted in this thread that would prevent another occurrence of a similar tragedy. NOTHING!

There is nothing that CAN be posted to prevent one. NOTHING!

Civilians in a similar situation are in the same predicament, there is really no way to prevent a determined killer, who bides his time and keeps his mouth shut, from eventually getting to you.

So what’s the point in continuing?

[Daugherty16]

But not one that is already smoking from the shots being fired at you. At best, he misses or doesn't immediately incapacitate you and you get a chance to return fire. This was simply a planned execution, and he didn't miss. Glenn, your exercise included clearing leather, right? How long to actually squeeze off 6 or 8 aimed shots? Nope, i don't see how even being hyper vigilant could have prevented this tragedy.

My heart goes out to the families of these slain officers and the folks in their community.

Outstanding work by the brother officer who ID'd the perp, drew down and took him out when he refused to comply. Word is, the callous bastard was carrying one of the slain officer's pistols. Personally i'm glad he's not still consuming oxygen.

[markj]

I see it like this, 4 police sitting at a table working on their laptop PCs, guy enters all look up, see guy get into line to order, all eyes go back to the PCs, guy sees this and opens fire. Hard to avoid this in a public setting, recommendations are do this work at the precinct. Never let your guard down in public, to bad it is this way but police are not considered best buds to a lot of folks. They need to be on alert at all times.

I sure do feel for these police officers and the families. Tragic.