Has anyone ever heard of this?
"Combat efficiency"?


Officer Yanez underwent a two-day training course called “The Bulletproof Warrior” in May 2014


Minnesota Police Officer’s ‘Bulletproof Warrior’ Training Is Questioned





ST. PAUL — The Minnesota police officer who fatally shot an African-American man during a traffic stop last week had recently undergone specialized training that critics say can lead officers to believe they are under constant threat of being harmed and can intensify encounters with civilians.

The officer, Jeronimo Yanez, of the Police Department in St. Anthony, Minn., shot and killed Philando Castile after a traffic stop in nearby Falcon Heights, Minn., on July 6. The shooting is being investigated by the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. The Justice Department has said it is monitoring the case.

Policing tactics have been under heightened scrutiny since the fatal police shooting in Ferguson, Mo., of Michael Brown, an unarmed African-American teenager, in August 2014. The police officer in that encounter was not indicted but the department was sharply criticized for its tactics in a report by the Justice Department.

Since then, many police departments across the country, with encouragement from the Justice Department, have opted for what they refer to as a guardian mentality, in which de-escalation of potentially violent situations and similar techniques are emphasized.

Some departments, however, believe that a more traditional and aggressive so-called warrior approach is necessary.

Officer Yanez underwent a two-day training course called “The Bulletproof Warrior” in May 2014, according to records from the City of St. Anthony, a suburb near St. Paul. The training combined the two approaches.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune first reported that Officer Yanez took the course. It was conducted by a company called Calibre Press in Glen Ellyn, Ill., owned by Jim Glennon, a former police lieutenant in Lombard, Ill., according to its website.

Mr. Glennon said in an interview that the main focus of the course was to teach police officers to maintain a sense of flexibility in their work, which he calls “balance,” and involves when to use force and at what level, given the circumstances. He said the course did not teach officers to have a warrior mentality.

“There’s no cookie-cutter approach to this — that’s what we teach,” he said. “We tell them that they have a three to four times greater chance of dropping dead from a heart attack than from being shot by a felon with a gun.”

Asked about the guardian and warrior approaches, Mr. Glennon said, “If anyone says they are mutually exclusive, that’s nuts.”


But critics of the seminars say that the training offered, which includes watching videos showing officers being shot, runs counter to the reforms departments must adopt if they are to win back trust, especially of black residents.

“Courses like this reinforce the thinking that everyone is out to get police officers,” said Chuck Wexler, executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum, a research and policy organization based in Washington. “This teaches officers, ‘If you hesitate, you could lose your life.’ It is the exact opposite of the way many police chiefs are going.”

The “Bulletproof Warrior” booklet handed out at the company’s seminars addresses warfare as much as police work. A copy of the booklet was obtained by The New York Times. It has charts and graphs on “Combat Efficiency” and “Perceptual Distortions in Combat.”


Continued at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/15/us/minnesota-police-officers-bulletproof-warrior-training-is-questioned.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fus&action=click&contentCollection=us&region=rank&module=package&version=highlights&contentPlacement=2&pgtype=sectionfront 

Last edited by Goose (7/15/2016 9:34 am)