Respect the blue

“We sleep soundly in our beds because rough men [and women] stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm.”

— a quote attributed to George Orwell.

A few weeks ago, I got a tiny little taste of the stress a police officer experiences in their day-to-day work when I took part in a ride-along with Sergeant Amber Williamson. This past Thursday I got a surprisingly heaping portion when I got a chance to try out a handful of scenarios in the MILO simulator which has been at the Nevada Police Department the past week.

The Multiple Interactive Learning/Training Objectives system is an interactive simulation training tool used by military and law enforcement agencies around the world. As set up here, it consisted of a giant wall-sized screen onto which video of a number of situations could be projected.

The trainee would be provided with a number of special laser-equipped weapons to use which ranged from pepper spray, Taser, an M4 rifle and — what was given to me — a Glock 22 (a standard police-issue handgun).

During the simulation, I could — and officers are expected to — interact with what was happening on screen such as telling the suspect to drop the weapon or get back in the car. The system’s operator could change the scenario based on what I was doing. Causing the suspect to drop the weapon, for example, or maybe having him attack.

There are hundreds and hundreds of situations to experience, from domestic violence to traffic stops to active school shooters.

Now I’ve played video games my entire life and taken part in a number of pistol shooting competitions, I did not expect this system to faze me. But after the second or third scenario, I found my heart literally thumping in my chest.

This is an amazing tool and I wish more of the public could experience it.

Folks often pick apart incidents where lethal force is used. Which is all too easy to do from the comfort of an armchair. But no one can say how they’d react in a situation like that until they’ve experienced it for themselves and this simulation allows people to get an idea of what it would be like.

In one of the scenarios I went through, I arrived on scene to find a distraught man in front of a house with two knives. I told him to drop the knives which he did, then he fled around the corner of the house.

As I advanced around the corner I found myself looking down a narrow path. The house was on one side and a leafy hedge on the other. There was a small path leading off to the left between the house and a detached garage behind the house. The path was shaded by trees creating mottled patches of light and dark which made it difficult to see. I had no idea where the suspect had gone.

Then I see his head pop out from behind the garage at the end of the pathway, maybe 30 yards away. I order him to step out and he does but there is something in his hands which he begins to raise.

Instinctively, I fired.

The screen changed to read “You used lethal force, discuss with the training officer.”

Immediately, I had doubts.

Lieutenant Steve Bastow, who’d been operating the system, asked why I shot.

Well, he had something in his hands, he was bringing it up like a gun.

But could I have sworn it was a gun? No, I could not.

Luckily for me, it was a gun and if I had hesitated it would’ve been me who’d been shot.

Our men and women in blue, those who are ready to do violence to the people who would do us harm, face the possibility of having to make a life-or-death decision in a split second in probably horrible conditions. They deserve our respect and thanks.