Month: May 2015

Most of us aren’t exposed to the gang world other than watching documentaries on cable. Even if you live or have lived in gang riddled neighborhoods, you probably don’t see or know much about them. I myself grew up in a bad neighborhood where gang members were present, but I rarely if ever had any run ins with them. I was fortunate. I’ve seen a lot of documentaries on the History Channel and A&E just to educate myself; I have been to classes during and after my academy training that focused on gangs.
Since I worked at a minimum security jail during my time in custody operations, I didn’t have much exposure to inmates that were gang members.
I got my first real glimpse into the underworld of gangs during bailiff training when I got to court operations. I was on my first of two jury trials on my training phase. It was a real shocker to me for many reasons: I learned that the defendant or defendants have to be free from handcuffs regardless if they are in custody, this was because it would be prejudicial for a jury to see someone shackled in handcuffs. This particular case involved a suspected gang member,  charged with attempted murder against two victims from rival gangs with multiple gang enhancements and weapons charges. This defendant was held on a Million dollars bail. He was accused of walking up to the victims with a fellow gang member and shooting both victims non fatally and then running away.
During the trial, the District Attorney or DA had to prove that the crime was gang related and was done for the benefit of the gang. This was done through a gang investigator/expert. Their testimony is where you learn a lot about gang culture, who they are, how they operate and why they do it. Gangs work on fear and intimidation, they care a lot about so called “Respect” to get respect, they need to commit criminal acts on behalf of the gang, back up fellow gang members of they are in a fight and other related activities. Gangs are involved in many different types of crimes from drug trafficking, human trafficking, theft, fraud, racketeering, corruption, extortion, assault, to murder. They are in every sense of the word, terrorists.
To join a gang, one has three options: they are either walked in by a family member already in the gang; or they are crimed in by committing a crime in behalf of the gang, and lastly they could be jumped in. Once in, it is very difficult, sometimes impossible to leave.
Gangs cases are very difficult for prosecutors to obtain a conviction. This is due to the nature of gang cases; most victims and witnesses are intimidated from testifying against a gang member for the fear of retaliation and in some cases, like this one, the victims are also gang members from a rival gang who will not snitch even if it is against a rival gang member who literally tried to kill them years before. Serious cases like these take years to get to the actual jury trial. Both victims are only alive because of poor shot placement and small caliber bullets used. Without any testimony placing the defendant at the scene, the jury found the defendant not guilty and they were released hours after the verdict. I can only hope that the defendant turned his life around and left the gang life behind him. He did spend two years in jail awaiting this trial and hopefully that was enough. On another note, this is why it is so important to carry off duty, there were numerous gang members present in the courtroom throughout the trial. They all know what I look like, while I probably won’t remember most of their faces on the street.
I have seen many more gang related cases come through and in my opinion, gang members are cowardly street terrorists who degrade the quality of life in their communities, forcing those who are law abiding citizens to live in constant fear every day and night. There are really two outcomes that the life of a gang member may have: to be in prison most, if not for the rest of their lives; or to be killed by a rival gang or their own.
Pretty much, what you see on the documentaries are true. Gang life is something that is hard to understand because most people are not a part of this underworld of crime. It is a major problem in almost every city in the United States. The best way to fight it is prevention because as you can see, once they’re a gang member, they’ll most likely be in for life.

Striker Fire pistols have been around for many years and in my opinion, they are perfect for duty carry for peace officers and civilians for self defense. They are safe and simple to use and don’t require any more manipulation of the pistol other than squeezing the trigger. It takes fewer steps out of the equation when it comes to shooting, this is especially important in a gunfight. It allows the user to focus on taking care of the threat as opposed to further manipulation of their pistol. With extensive training and practice, anyone can be extremely effective with a DA/SA or 1911 style pistol, but let’s be honest; most officers and gun owners do not train or practice as much as they should and some just don’t think it is a priority. I have carried many different platforms for my duty weapon and I’m going to go with the simpler striker fire system.
Glock wasn’t the first to come out with a striker fire pistol, they were the first to make a high quality and inexpensive one, the Glock 17. Glock has dominated the Law Enforcement pistol market just like Ford dominated the Law Enforcement vehicle market with the Crown Victoria/Police Interceptor for many years. Now Glock finally has some competition by other high quality gun manufacturers. Almost all gun makers currently offer a striker fire pistol.

Sig Sauer and Heckler & Koch have finally got into the striker fire market with Sig’s P320 and HK’s VP9. I recently sold my HK USP.40 and purchased the new VP9 along with a Surefire X300U for almost the same price. The VP9’s msrp is the lowest I’ve seen on an HK pistol, going at $719 compared to almost a grand and above for their other pistols. Sig’s P320 msrp is at $713 so they both are very affordable pistols. My friend recently purchased a P320 and we were able meet at the range yesterday and shoot both and compare the two new offerings from Sig and HK. Both pistols were in 9mm.

Let’s start with the P320. My friend’s model was the full-size with the Medium grip frame. The barrel length is at 4.7″. The whole trigger mechanism is one piece and could be used in different sized frames, allowing the owner to switch from full size to compact or sub compact and even change calibers. That’s a nice feature, however, you need to purchase all of those parts separately. The Medium sized grip fit comfortably in my hands, which are small. The pistol shot very well with all of my shots inside the black center circle of the target. We shot both pistols at 18 feet. The trigger is very nice, with a clean break at around 5 lbs. The reset is very positive and I like it over the VP9’s. slide stop kept being activated by my thumb and after adjusting my thumb placement a few times, I was unable to allow it to go to slide lock after the last round was fired. I’m sure I can work around that issue if it were my pistol. My friend didn’t have issues with the slide lock. With the longer barrel, the recoil was softer than that on the VP9. Overall it is a great pistol that is accurate and easy to shoot. Aesthetically some say that it is ugly or unattractive and I kind of agree with that opinion, it doesn’t look as nice as the classic Sig Sauer pistols but it is a performer!

On to the VP9. Ergonomically for me, this is the winner. It comes with interchangeable grip side panels and back straps so you can make it to fit your hand. I put all small panels and back strap on mine. The barrel length is 4.09″, over half an inch shorter than that on the P320. Which gives it a little bit more recoil compared to the P320 but on the other hand, it’s a little bit more compact. The trigger is also very nice and breaks around 5 lbs. The reset however is not as positive as it is on the P320. The slide lock issue is also present for me on the VP9, but I have been able to move my thumb on a spot that doesn’t activate it. It too was accurate, my friend and a civilian who was happening to be observing have never shot it before, shot very well with it and kept almost all but one or two in the black circle. My friend can’t stand the paddle magazine release on the VP9. I myself like it and I use my trigger finger to drop mags without changing my grip to press a button. Aesthetically it looks pretty cool overall with the Spider-Man looking grip panels.

In the end and after firing close to a hundred rounds overall, both pistols proved to be accurate and comfortable to shoot. Ergonomically we both like our own pistols more than the others. My friend likes the grip angle, trigger and button magazine release on his P320 and I like everything on my VP9, I will say that the trigger on the P320 is slightly better due to the very positive reset. I would hate to have to buy an entire frame in order to get the small size instead of just swapping out some panels. The P320 holds 17 rounds in the magazine while the VP9 holds 15. Like I said before, it always comes down to each person’s preferences. It’s not often that you get to do comparisons between guns other than renting them from a shooting range or purchasing both or being a sponsored writer/reviewer (which I’m not) so it was nice to be able to shoot both side by side for a test drive if you will. I hope this helps if you plan on making a purchase of one of these. If you’re living in California and are not a Peace Officer, unfortunately they are not on the list and will only be available through PPT if you can find one.

One of the most important duties as a Law Enforcement Officer is to protect. It is different for each Officer, depending on their assignment. Many times, we don’t have the luxury of choosing who we protect, not that it matters because we have a job to do.
Yes, we protect the innocent from the criminals and we also protect the criminals when they are in our custody.
Many of you think that Bailiffs only stay inside the courtroom and never leave their post for any reason. That may be true for some, but not all, especially me. Protection is my number one priority on a daily basis. My judge jokes about me being more reliable and effective than the Secret Service to jurors. I am in charge and in control of my courtroom. I must protect my own life so that I can effectively protect my judge, court staff and everybody in the courtroom.
Security in a courtroom can get a little tricky with different cases coming through. My job doesn’t confine me to just my courtroom, another form of protection and service that we provide are escorts. If anyone requests to be escorted to their vehicles, we make sure they leave the courthouse safely. I’ve escorted many people, from victims of a crime, attorneys, jurors, witnesses and even defendants.  Escorts are one of the most dangerous tasks because a lot of the time you are out in the open and sometimes you run into the person or persons that are the threat to the people you are escorting.
Anything can happen during an escort therefore I make sure that I am capable of handling whatever threat I may be facing to the best of my ability with the equipment that I have on me. I’ll admit that I’ve had the hairs on the back of my neck raise on many of the escorts that I’ve done. Some of the most dangerous that I’ve been involved with involved gang trials where the threat is very real to those who testify. With cases involving gangs, you have gang members that are in and around the courthouse there to intimidate or eliminate witnesses to keep them from testifying against their fellow gang member facing prison time. When a case involving gangs is over and there is a conviction, the jurors may face intimidation and retaliation by the defendant’s family and other gang members.
The environment and atmosphere in and around the courthouse can be volatile at times. It is our job to keep everyone safe. The threat and dangers are always present, the best we can do is to prepare and minimize it with training and experience, utilizing the best possible tactics available.
You can see why I take my job so seriously. It’s because others depend on me to make sure that they get to go home safe. I owe it to myself, my family, to everyone that I protect everyday to be the best at what I do.

May is dedicated to Memorialize Peace Officers who have paid the ultimate sacrifice, those who have fallen in the line of duty. This week is Police Week and unfortunately names are added to the Peace Officer’s Memorial in Washington D.C.
It doesn’t matter what color uniform, patch that is on the shoulders of each Officer. We are all  part of one family: The Thin Blue Line.
It is an inherently dangerous profession to be in. It is however not the most dangerous, according to some research on the subject, Law Enforcement doesn’t make it into the top 10. What separates Peace Officers with other professions is that the job requires each Officer to risk their own safety and lives to protect others. We wear bullet resistant vests, carry tools on our belts, a handgun and extra ammunition because it is our job to handle threats that nobody else will. Courage is being scared but moving forward anyways. In many cases, the Officer doesn’t get to go home at the end of their shift. There are many stories of heroism that do not get shared.
I myself have attended more memorial services in my relatively short career than I can remember. I do my absolute best to attend every service that I am able to. I do so because it is important to me personally, that I pay my respects to a fallen officer and their family. I may not know them personally, but they stood up for the same thing that I believe in. It is least I could to do to honor them. They all paid the ultimate sacrifice, they left behind their families and it is our duty to remember them and keep their memories alive. Rest In Peace brothers and sisters, my thoughts go out to you and your families.

This year has been the best year yet in my career when it comes to training. In my personal and professional opinion, there are three  areas or fields of training that are all equally important and dependent on each other to help make a Law Enforcement Officer or Law Abiding CCW Citizen the most effective in the utilization of force.
The three areas or fields are:
1. Simulator Scenarios
2. Simunition Scenarios
3. Live Fire Range Training
What makes this year the best for me is that I have done all three already this year. I am always a proponent of training because we simply don’t get enough in the Law Enforcement field unfortunately. Training is expensive and either takes officers off from work or incurs overtime. Once an officer graduates from the academy, the training they receive is minimal, especially in the use of firearms.
Firearms training is extremely important because I’m responsible for every round that I fire. Most importantly, if I don’t stop a threat with accuracy, I can be wounded or killed. Secondly, if I miss and hit an innocent bystander, I am failing at my mission to protect and serve. Not to mention the liability involved. All LEO’s carry a pistol on their person as a primary weapon. Most don’t have a patrol rifle or shotgun assigned to them and if they do, they’re not always readily available. A pistol or handgun is primarily a defensive weapon and is not the best weapon to take down threats as efficiently as would a long gun. They also are limited in magazine capacity even with hi-capacity magazines. This makes accuracy extremely crucial because it might take multiple rounds on target to effectively stop a threat. An officer doesn’t choose when and where a gunfight is going to take place. This isn’t the Wild West, there’s no showdown at high noon in the middle of main street. With that in mind, the amount of stress will have an effect on the officer’s performance. If they are well-trained, they’ll probably fare better than an officer with less training. It makes sense right?
You’d be surprised on how many LEO’s do not take their skills and weapon proficiency as seriously as I do.
I titled this post “Train Hard. Fight Easy (or Easier)” what I mean by this is that the more you train, the more effective you will be when the time chooses you. I also say easier because nothing is easy when you are fighting for your life.
I might be assigned as a Bailiff, and my chances of getting in a gunfight are much less than that of a patrol officer, but then again I don’t get to choose when and where, therefore I’d better be damn good because I want to go home to my family.

Onto the first field: Simulator Scenario training. My department sent me to Artemis Defense Institute for this training. They utilize the VirTra simulator system, which is light years ahead from the force simulators that I’ve gone through in the past. They have 100, 180 and 300 degree screens. What makes the VirTra system superior to the older simulators is that the graphics are in high definition, the wrap around 300° gives you a more realistic view of your surroundings and finally, the simulator weapons themselves are impressive. Gone are the DOA guns that were not realistic without any recoil. The simulator Glocks here have metal magazines that are filled with compressed air and have whatever amount of shots needed in each, requiring you to reload if necessary. The magazine cycles the pistol and gives the shooter a close representation of what the true felt recoil the real steel weapon has. What you can do safely in a simulator is that you can make shoot/don’t shoot decisions without any safety equipment. At Artemis we were able to work on decision making, accuracy, shooting while moving and weapons manipulation. You definitely get the absolute most you can get out of a virtual simulator there at Artemis, but it’s only one of three fields of training. For more information on Artemis, go to: http://www.artemisdefenseinstitute.com/

The second field of training is with the use of Simunitions. My department also sent me along with a lot of my partners to get Active Shooter training by members of our SWAT team. Simunitions are real weapons that were converted to be dedicated training weapons. They cannot fire a live round. They fire a 7mm paint projectile that are almost a $1 a round so it gets very expensive to run a class like this. Simunition rounds hurt when you get hit, especially at CQB ranges and when they’re fired from a long gun. With them, you can have actual force on force scenarios where you are shooting at an actual live adversary or adversaries. The sim rounds for short, have limitations however, they are not very accurate and they don’t have a lot of range. To be safe, there needs to be safety equipment worn and it is not natural when you have it all on. If the simulator didn’t get your stress levels up (and it definitely does) training with sims will because you’re getting actual shots fired at you and it stings when you’re hit. We all learned some valuable skills individually and more importantly as a team. As realistic as sims are, nothing compares to actually shooting your real weapon, leading us to our final field:

Live Fire Training at the range. In my previous post, I did an AAR or After Action Report on Falcon Ops Group LEO/ MIL 1.5 Pistol Deployment Course that I took last week. I won’t go in depth with how the course was here, you can read the AAR if you’re interested. I’ve taken several classes with reputable trainers over the years and they all have taught me to be a better gunfighter. I’m always learning something new, improving my proficiency and highlighting areas where I need to work on to be better. Shooting live ammunition is the real test in accuracy while in the safest, controlled environment as you can be, while under the watchful eye of experienced instructors who can see what you are doing right or wrong. Every firearms class that I’ve attended focuses on the fundamentals of shooting. Without the fundamentals down, you’re not going to be effective with anything else. If you’re a good shooter already, it’s a good refresher. Going to the range on your own time is good, but if you’re going to an indoor or outdoor public ranges, you’ll most likely will not be able to shoot from drawing from your holster and definitely not be shooting and moving because it’s simply not safe to do so. In a course, you get to do all of that safely. You don’t get to shoot steel targets unless you have your own. I like to shoot steel targets because you get a positive ding every time you get a round on target. It’s fun and allows for students to go through without have to check the paper targets for hits after each run. It adds to some realism because the steel reacts by making a ding and in reality a threat will have some visual or auditory reaction when you have hits on target. At this course and the previous courses I’ve attended, I learned how to shoot my pistol accurately, shooting while moving, shooting in different positions, manipulate my pistol with reloads and clearing malfunctions. For more information on Falcon Ops Group, go to:
www.falconopsgroup.net
It’s difficult to get time to train. I have a family to be with and I work Monday through Friday. The weekend is my family time. It’s rare to get funding to go to training put on by the department so I always jump at any opportunity that arises. For the simunition training, I along with my partners had to sacrifice an entire weekend to attend that training. If you know me, you know that my family comes first and if I’m going to spend time away from them, it’d better be worth it. I can say it was all worth it because all of the training I received has made me as proficient as I am today and makes me and my partners safer every time I’m 10-8. Training doesn’t have to be at certain facilities vor ranges. You can do a lot of it at home! Dry fire practice and movement drills can be done in your room or living room safely as long as you follow the gun safety rules. It only takes a few minutes a week to do this and it’s very helpful. I call all the different skills, shooting positions and techniques tools that are in my toolbox. Will I ever need to shoot from the dynamic prone position? I don’t know, but I sure know how! Knowing how to deal with a certain scenario before you have it happen in front of you is better than having to come up with a solution on the spot, so the more tools in your toolbox, the better off you are.

Training. For a true professional in any field, it never ends. In the field of Law Enforcement it is especially true. Every LEO goes through an academy, some are tougher than others. Everyone must pass the minimal requirements in order to graduate. Most academies, like the one I attended are called “Basic” Academies. That is because as difficult the academy is to complete, everything you learn is just the basic knowledge that is required to start your career.
It has always been suggested by instructors and tactical staff that one should seek further training in the future. It is a suggestion that I have taken to heart.
I will only focus on gunfighting classes that I have taken with this post focusing on my lastest class I attended last week.
This is my After Action Report (AAR) of Falcon Ops Group LEO/MIL 1.5 Pistol Deployment:
This was a 1 day/8 hour course that was for LEO’s and active Military members only and it was completely sold out. Since it was a one day course, no time was wasted. We quickly signed in and loaded up and went through the safety brief. All of the instructors were well experienced in gunfighting and are currently LEO’s or retired or come from the competition world. They all have nicknames with the lead instructor being called “Hollywood” because of all the movie quotes he mentions throughout the day.
After the safety brief, Hollywood went over the 7 shooting fundamentals: Stance, Grip, Sight Alignment, Sight picture, Breathing, Trigger Control, Follow Through. He then demonstrated each and told us why Trigger Control was the most important of them all. Hollywood explains that with their teaching method, they will tell us to do something a certain way and will always tell us why they want us to do it that way; that way, we better understand the technique.
We did some basic drills to focus on the fundamentals then we did a partner drill that was extremely difficult for me and many of the other students to accomplish. The first shooter shoots a shot anywhere on the target, the partner then follows with drawing their pistol and firing a shot with the goal of hitting the first hole. This was repeated five times per shooter then the roles get reversed. I only got close to one with one of my shots.

The Falcon Six drill was fun and challenging at the same time. You have six small circle targets and you shoot two rounds each with 4 rounds in your first two magazines, thus requiring you to reload after two targets. It was a great drill for testing your speed and accuracy. They teach us that accuracy is final. I definitely wasn’t the fastest shooter out there but I never missed on the several runs we did with this drill.
Right after lunch, we got into more dynamic shooting. Shooting and moving, shooting from dynamic positions like dynamic prone and having shoot/don’t shoot scenarios. The only part of the class I had some confusion with was the shoot/ don’t shoot drills. The instructors used picture targets and tape to cover certain areas on the pictures. We were supposed to make a decision and at the same time, communicate with the subjects, your partners with what you saw and when you needed them to cover you when you needed to reload. When it was my turn, I didn’t know who/what was in play. After the drill was over, the instructors explained what was what and what to look for and that’s when I really understood the drill. I gave my feedback about this drill and the instructor told me that they will definitely make changes to it in the future.
Then we moved onto the steel targets. With them, we had to move laterally, turn and face the targets and shoot. We then got down and went into the dynamic prone on both sides. Hollywood then taught us the best way to move with your pistol in a different position than I was trained with in the past. It is a modified version of pistol indexing. Your pistol is pointed up near your head with your trigger finger out of the trigger guard and on the frame. this way, your reaction hand/arm is free to move obstacles, bystanders, fight off an attacker and you will not point your muzzle at your partners or anyone you don’t want to. I thought this technique was very useful, especially in practice. Hollywood also taught us how to properly pie a corner while making yourself the smallest target possible. We then were sent downrange to shoot and move from cover to cover until you got good hits on steel with resounding ‘dings’. At the end of the class, we had a shoot off starting with a steel torso at 25 yards, miss and you’re in the loser’s circle. I miss my fit shot and was out, the sole winner got out to 50 yards.
At Falcon Ops, they didn’t want to yell at us because we wouldn’t learn as well and retain the information. They only yelled at us twice, once when a student muzzled an instructor and second when my group was missing 50-60% of our shots on the shooting and moving drills.
Overall it was a great course and training experience. I took away new techniques and I know what I need to work on in order to improve. I do plan on taking more classes in the future. I highly recommend Falcon Ops Group, I had a lot of fun while learning from experienced instructors. For more information and course schedules go to:
www.falconops.net