Semantics rears it ugly head again, as the definitions become important. None of the shootings you listed would be classified as active shooter under some definitions. On the other hand, some departments classify it so broadly that any mass murders or spree killings could be called active shooters. That is one of the problems in researching some of these things, we can't get everybody to agree on the terminology.So no officers have been injured or killed during active shooter situations in the US. BULL! Mind you, I am not the expert, but by golly I can find lots of incidents to the contrary using the exact same resource he used, the internet.
Again, it depends on definition, and that is one of them. A number of active shooter definitions say that the potential targets must be confined within a restricted location from which exit is limited. Other definitions focus on the shooter, for example if his movement is restricted, as Whitman's was.So I'll bite, why would Charlie Whitman's incident not be considered an active shooter incident by some definitions? Did he not shoot enough rounds? Enough people? Were his targets not confined enough?
Since response to an active-shooter incident is a race, a race between the responder(s) stopping the shooter and the shooter racking up a greater and greater body count, I strongly advocate that officers should move to contact as quickly as possible, and by themselves if need be, to expedite stopping the shooter from killing more victims.
Again, definitional.So he wasn't an active shooter because of a lack of confinement? Source?
Can't speak for him, won't speak for him. I'm just pointing out that when people use terminology that is open to interpretation, it behooves them to provide the definition that they are using. Since we don't know what definition Borsch was using we don't know if his inclusions or exclusions are accurate.So assuming you are correct, why would Borsch use a less common definition?
Whitman, for example, has traditionally been classified as a barricaded sniper, IIRC. But that is where the definition issue comes up, because some consider all barricaded snipers as active shooters.Operationally speaking, how if the incidents I cited were not active shooter situations, what sort of situations were they?
I think you are misrepresenting what Borsch has said. I don't see anything that suggests the BG will automatically just fold up shop if the officer rushes in or that it will be an easy situation.How does a cop responding to a scene know if he has an "active shooter" as per Borsch's definition and hence knows it will be an easy situation to handle such that he can just rush right in as claimed and the shooter will fold up shop and either surrender or commit suicide?
Whitman, for example, has traditionally been classified as a barricaded sniper, IIRC. But that is where the definition issue comes up, because some consider all barricaded snipers as active shooters.
They generally try to avoid police, do not hide or lie in wait for officers and “typically fold quickly upon armed confrontation.”
Because active shooters seem so intent on killing, it’s often difficult to convince first responders that “this bad guy is one of the easiest man-with-gun encounters they will ever have,” Borsch observes.
Hiding behind a wall, in a tower that has been blocked at the entrance...yeah, that is a barricaded sniper.Whitman is classified as a barricaded sniper? LOL. They did know he was barricaded until after most of the killing was done, did they?
Depends on your definition. I certainly wouldn't classify Whitman as an active shooter incident, others might.Isn't a barricaded person engaged in actively shooting people an active shooter?
OK. You're certainly entitled to do that. I think it just as likely, perhaps more so, that Borsch was working from a different definition than you are, as some of the incidents you mention are well coverfed in the literature and common knowledge.So I stand by my claim that Borsch missed several incidents where cops were killed and injured by active shooters, incidents he claims never have happened in the US.
No, I don't.So you don't see anything from Borsch to suggest active shooters will just fold up or that it will be easy?
"Typically fold" is very different from "will fold". Nowhere does Borsch suggest that an active shooter will always give up and pose no danger to the officer. His point seems to be more that many active shooters are not particulalry aggressive beyond their immediate goal, and thus the officer can attampt to contain the damage sooner than we might have previously believed appropriate .From the first post of the thread...
Similarly, the "easiest man with a gun call" does not mean it is an easy call, it means in the spectrum of a particualrly dangerous call one type will be easier than others.So the active shooters will likely be the easiest man with a gun calls officers will ever handle ...
OK. I think you've completely misinterpreted Borsch and what he has said, but everyone is welcome to interpret things in their own light. In fact, in the original article he specifically says that he feels this will "lessen the toll of casualties while exposing the responders involved to little additional risk." He doesn't say there is no risk, only that a one or two-officer assault does not expose the officer to much in the way of dangers other than would be present if they waited for the more commonly recommended 3 or 4 officer team.By his own description of active shooters, Borsh missed significant information that is directly contrary to his claims and therefore is misrepresenting the threat posed by active shooter mass murders to cops.
There were dozens of officers who were on scene who could have ended the confrontation but they hid instead.
My analysis of "active shooter" says it's someone who is roaming at will through a facility or a local area, shooting at people he can see.
Borsch is questioning the "containment" protocol and saying that in a likely majority of these active-shooter cases, swift intervention by police can reduce the death toll.
ACTIVE SHOOTER: An active shooter is an armed person who has used deadly physical force on other persons and continues to do so while having unrestricted access to additional victims.
Thata is such a bizarre re-write of history I don't even know where to begin, other than to say apparently you know very little about the case.IN the videos of the Hollywood shootout officer hid behind cars and snipers sat on the roofs with there heads down. There were dozens of officers who were on scene who could have ended the confrontation but they hid instead.