Posted by: MattJ
texas police to stop sparring - 01/10/07 04:16 PM
A horrible tragedy. But I am not sure they are making the right decision here.
http://www.policeone.com/training/articles/127313/"
AUSTIN, Texas- The Texas Department of Public Safety said it will no longer train police officers with a boxing drill that resulted in a recruit's death last year.
The department suspended full-contact fighting after Jimmy Ray Carty Jr. died of head injuries last May. He was knocked to the ground at least twice by blows to the head.
"We are confident we will find ways to train them that will keep them safe and keep the people of the state of Texas safe," department spokeswoman Tela Mange said Wednesday.
The agency used the drill for at least 30 years and had argued it was useful training for officers who must be prepared to fight on the streets.
But consultants hired by the department after Carty's death recommended the drill be eliminated because it caused too many head injuries and did not involve realistic situations.
The department also banned all other exercises that involve hitting or other hard contact between trainees."
Given that many police officers face physical conflict every day, I'm not sure that removing all "live" training is a good idea. Many aspects of combat cannot be imparted without resistance. I mean, should CPR be not taught if someone gets injured? Accidents are bound to happen.
With all due respect to the dead cadet. Not trying to minimize the heartache of the family involved.
Posted by: Stormdragon
Re: texas police to stop sparring - 01/10/07 04:19 PM
Posted by: JKogas
Re: texas police to stop sparring - 01/10/07 05:43 PM
Typical knee-jerk reaction. You gotta remember, its GOVERNMENT we're talking about here.
-John
Posted by: ashe_higgs
Re: texas police to stop sparring - 01/10/07 06:11 PM
government isn't the problem, it's insurance liability that's the issue...
Posted by: MattJ
Re: texas police to stop sparring - 01/11/07 09:58 PM
Unsu -
You make some good points, and I do not disagree with you about officers duking it out with perps. But when you say:
Quote:
Why do policeman or statetroopers need to know how to box with gloves on? That kind of training is for sport and the ring not for the streets or law enforcement.
I disagree. Sport is just an aspect of training. The idea is to get the officers used to hitting and being hit with energy and resistance. This is a daily occurance for some officers on the street (one of my best friends and his wife are police officers).
In the same way that you would recommend BJJ for officer training (despite probably hearing "but you don't want officers rolling around in the broken glass", etc ), that is not the point to have them groundfighting just for the sake of sport. They are learning timing, energy and movement by boxing and BJJ, etc.
Certainly some better control should be excercised - and probably some better medical attention as well - but this seems like throwing the baby out with the bath water. Will they stop firearms training if someone gets hurt or dies on the range? Again, no disrespect to the fallen cadet.
Posted by: ITFunity
Re: texas police to stop sparring - 01/12/07 06:38 AM
Yes the magic word:
LIABILITY
I believe they have this training, as believe it or not, many police recruits have never been in a fight or have gotten punched in the face. It is more like awareness, much like tear gas & pepper spray exposure. There have been other examples of this as well. Years back, the Mass Troopers had a similiar unfortunate occurance as well.
Defensive tactics are also taught to cover the agency for liability purposes as well. So it is a catch 22.
I also would not be surprised if there may have been some hazing or intimidation involved, to persuade someone to drop out, that the staff did not think would make a good officier.
Posted by: Fletch1
Re: texas police to stop sparring - 01/14/07 04:15 AM
The question is of comparing "LIABILITY" with "PROBABILITY". The risk of injury in training is seen as an avoidable one just by eliminating the risky training. Risk on the street is unknown until something happens and it is deemed unavoidable. Some administrators would rather gamble that the probability that something bad will happen on the street is pretty slim in that respect.
Percentage-wise, they are "probably" correct. Training (especially H2H) represents a miniscule portion of the total working career of LEOs. If in that extremely small amount of time, they are experiencing any serious injuries/deaths, it is likely that the program will be trashed. This is because 99.9999% of the rest of the working career, most cops don't get seriously hurt on the job. This is just numbers but numbers make administrators sit up and listen.
I think contact training should be mandated for cops although I don't necessarily think boxing is the way to go about it. It likely got started because one of their head trainers was into boxing. He could fight as a boxer and their administration sought to impart some of those attributes to their recruits.
Good initiative, just misguided.
Posted by: chunky_chicken
Re: texas police to stop sparring - 09/23/07 07:05 PM
yeah..they def. overreacted here. it is a great shame, but what are they going to teach now? learning something in theory is different than learning something in practice. just as you cant expect to do a sliding roundhouse kick by hearing how its done, you cant learn to fight by being told to punch the guy. they cant teach them with no-contact. its idiotic. i am deeply sorry for the casualty. but i am also sorry for the town that will now have an undertrained police force.
Posted by: Unyu
Re: texas police to stop sparring - 09/23/07 10:38 PM
It's just so hard for me to respect what someone writes if they are obviously without a clue. First off this is the Texas State Troopers, not some small town police force. Secondly, you do need some full contact sparring, but not in a round-robin, one opponent after the other manner.
The truth is that most of you guys has ever been in the military, government or part of a large state police force, so how do you know what's relevant for h2h combat in that type of job description? Is it because you train MMA or some other combat SPORT like boxing and now think that gives you the right to take this death so lightly because you think your harsh training is an end-all-be-all method?
Take your your own mentation and life for granted; cops need their brains and health to keep working. Anyway, what about premorbidity? Do you even know what that means? How do you know if someone doesn't have an existing head injury or problem, like an aneurysm?
I love how nonmedically trained people on this forum like to speak out their arses. I also wonder how JKogas can belittle and even curse at posters with little-to-no repercussions. It's unfair and I now doubt him more than most because of his approach and narrow thought processes. Just my opinion.
If you are training to fight by kicking your own butt on a continuous basis then you're not smart, PERIOD. If you are a sadist or masochist or a combo of both don't let your neuroses speak for what you want to be true. It's pathetic and weak.
As a cop or soldier in the modern world you need to understand some basic principles of unarmed conflict. You don't need BB level training and you definitely shouldn't be required to bludgeon your brain for some hypothetical B.S. that has a 98% likelihood of never happening. Punching bad guys in the face or head is a recipe for litigation. Restraining them and teaching arts that allow you to restrain and submit without incurring or delivering strikes to the head is a plus.
I boxed and I'll tell you it is not enough. It is for the ring and NOT the street. Your hands never get use to making a full and proper bare-fist due to the wraps. Your hands wind up taking a lot of punishment due to the saftey you feel from wearing pillows on your hands. That's not to say that as a boxer you won't know how to strike with your fists, it's just that without gloves it is a COMPLETELY different approach and feel.
Boxing is not a MA and it has no place in police training IMHO. Some of its concepts do, but most of what you learn in the gym or ring means diddly when it comes to training for police or trooper work.
Plus you people sound like calloused a-holes, putting training philosophies over real lives. The dude died and he probably would have NEVER had to punch someone or receive a punch to the head in his REAL job. Again, it shows how narrow your scopes and experiences in the concrete world are.
Posted by: MattJ
Re: texas police to stop sparring - 09/23/07 11:00 PM
Typical condecsending BS from our friend Unyu.
Don't tell ME about talking out of my ass, junior. My dad was a probation officer in Washington, DC, and two of my best friends are police officers in Baltimore, MD. I am very aware of the kind of things that happen to them and what kind of training is beneficial.
Quote:
you definitely shouldn't be required to bludgeon your brain for some hypothetical B.S. that has a 98% likelihood of never happening. Punching bad guys in the face or head is a recipe for litigation.
Litigation. Perhaps in Bucktooth, Texas you don't have suspects that resist arrest. But in a major urban area like Baltimore, or Chicago or Los Angelos, you are damned right that officers get into fisticuffs on a daily basis. A FEMALE friend that works in an undercover drug unit probably gets into more fights in one day than your ass has probably ever been in.
It is indeed a tragedy that the officer died in the course of training, and I never tried to minimize it. I actually agree with you about restraint training for officers. But if you think they "don't need" striking training as well, you ARE ignorant.
Posted by: JKogas
Re: texas police to stop sparring - 09/24/07 07:44 AM
Unyu, Unsa, Multiversed......Welcome BACK Dr. Krunk!
Posted by: Joss
Re: texas police to stop sparring - 09/24/07 09:15 AM
I think, if anyone ever really looked at the subject of empty hand/stick training for local and probably state level LE in the US, the real scandal is not so much the quality as the quantity.
Basically, cadets receive it (whatever "it" is) at the academy and that's it. No more. Notice the article said the guy was a recruit.
In the "real world", training dollars follow the highest liability risk. Nowdays, that's bad shootings and collateral damage from high-speed chases.
Firearms training? Academy. Probably re-qualify once a year.
Emergency vehicle? Academy MUST PASS. MAYBE some periodic follow up.
Empty hand or w/stick? Academy familiarization - that's it.
So, in a nutshell, their training is about like a novice going to a "self-defense" seminar... though it might be a multi-day seminar in a police academy. But, once it's over it stops. You're free to make your own assessment of that kind of effectiveness.
"...But consultants hired by the department after Carty's death recommended the drill be eliminated because it caused too many head injuries and did not involve realistic situations...."
If you accept "fight like you train" as a doctrine, justifying this drill is probably very difficult. My guess is that this Texas DPS drill was probably no more than a rite of passage hazing, thinly disguised as something useful. Cops don't use boxing to arrest people. Their mission is to secure people, and beating them down is very risky, PR and liability wise. A cop getting into a boxing situation on the street indicates a situation well out of control.
"...The department also banned all other exercises that involve hitting or other hard contact between trainees."
At face value, this is just a typical dumb government over reaction. We (here) have been over this subject soooo many times. There HAS to be resistance training for effectiveness. And just because LE are not supposed to respond to a punch with a punch, it doesn't mean being prepared to receive one is worthless.
But keep in mind that the media is the source of all this "information".