Public Safety, dial '000' and.....
Posted: Sat Oct 20, 2012 7:10 pm
Cops too scared to aim their guns, says firearms training officer
Thomas Chamberlin, Kay Dibben From: The Sunday Mail (Qld) October 21, 2012 12:00AM
POLICE don't know how to shoot their guns and will die on the job without more lessons, a firearms training officer has warned in a scathing critique of policy.
Sergeant Matt Russell says police are "hesitant, incorrect, or even scared during training" because of a lack of practice - sometimes not firing a gun for up to two years between mandatory shooting programs.
He said Queensland Police Service hierarchy viewed training as a "tolerated evil", only covering minimum requirements "for fear of eating up precious working hours".
"This is all well and good until you end up on the other side of a situation where you find your Glock in hand, and you have to decide whether to squeeze the trigger or not," Sgt Russell, a firearm training officer, wrote in the Queensland Police Journal. "And then ... can the officer hit what they are aiming at? I would expect that in Queensland, should the same situation arise as the recent shooting in New York at the Empire State Building, there would be a lot more missed shots, or dead police, or both."
Queensland Police Union acting president Shayne Maxwell called for a review of firearms training.
Weapons training for recruits will be cut back next year from two weeks to one, with no Taser training.
"It's a very important element of police day-to-day training," Mr Maxwell told The Sunday Mail.
Officer-in-charge of firearms and officer safety training Senior Sergeant Steve Crabbe said police did "more than enough training" each year and it would be rare for an officer to wait for two years before re-training.
Sen-Sgt Crabbe said that since 2005-06 training had been four hours a year with an extra day of scenario-based training after national minimum guidelines for incident management, conflict resolution and use of force were released.
Operational Skills Training Unit Acting Superintendent Joe Joyce said police continually evaluated training and took account of coronial findings.
