St Louis PD Bodycam footage from school shooting in 2022

[SumtnFancy]

The bodycam footage was released from the school shooting at the Central Visual & Performing Arts High School in 2022.

Not a good look for the St. Louis Metro PD.

 

[Compatriot G]

Besides not just rushing the shooter with overwhelming numbers, I noticed the officer whose bodycam we are watching was shooting over the left shoulder of the officer in front of him. The officer in front of him moved into his field of fire. Fortunately, the bodycam officer stopped shooting. Otherwise, he would have shot the other officer in the head. It seems like a bad idea to me to shoot over your fellow officers.

 

[Denny347]

Not a good look for the St. Louis Metro PD.

What's not a good look? It's not a perfect response but they're actively trying to stop the threat.

Besides not just rushing the shooter with overwhelming numbers, I noticed the officer whose bodycam we are watching was shooting over the left shoulder of the officer in front of him. The officer in front of him moved into his field of fire. Fortunately, the bodycam officer stopped shooting. Otherwise, he would have shot the other officer in the head. It seems like a bad idea to me to shoot over your fellow officers.

Overwhelm him? The doors were locked from the inside. It's very difficult to force a door open that swings towards you. They eventually did, but until then, they did what they could, engaged the shooter through the windows. I saw an officer see a potential "lasering" and pulled the officer out of the way. It happens. We try to minimize these things but until you are actually in the middle of it, you don't know. I would venture a guess that the "lasering" officer was hyper focused on the threat and not what was going on around him. It can happen to the best of us. Thankfully, it was addressed and no one was hurt. I think that was also a side effect of so many officers trying to engage a shooter through a single window. It's hard to just stand there...doing nothing.

 

[SumtnFancy]

What's not a good look? It's not a perfect response but they're actively trying to stop the threat.

It's referring to the multiple times that overzealous shotgun guy flagged the other officer and how unprepared/under trained they looked in general. I'm not necessarily saying they did anything "wrong" but this doesn't exactly scream competence

 

[Ark]

That's a goat rope, alright. But at least they're putting fire on the guy instead of doing nothing.

It does seem like quality of active shooter response and number of people responding are inversely correlated.

 

[Denny347]

It's referring to the multiple times that overzealous shotgun guy flagged the other officer and how unprepared/under trained they looked in general. I'm not necessarily saying they did anything "wrong" but this doesn't exactly scream competence

It could very well be that. However, most departments don't teach team tactics to patrol officers. Administrators think it's a "SWAT" tactic that should only be practiced by SWAT. If you don't teach them how to stack, move, shoot, as a team, you won't perform under stress. There are certainly some good training takeaways in this video but it's not a sh*tshow by any means. You've got an active shooter in a school, killing people, they went to work to stop the threat. Good job.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

It is a CF, but they are attempting to stop the killer.

This isn't Texas.

 

[Destro]

Another reminder that real life gunfights rarely resemble TV, movies, or training on a 1 way range.

 

[Compatriot G]

It could very well be that. However, most departments don't teach team tactics to patrol officers. Administrators think it's a "SWAT" tactic that should only be practiced by SWAT. If you don't teach them how to stack, move, shoot, as a team, you won't perform under stress. There are certainly some good training takeaways in this video but it's not a sh*tshow by any means. You've got an active shooter in a school, killing people, they went to work to stop the threat. Good job.

I'm curious, are team tactics taught at the Academy? If not, they probably should be.

 

[Eric66]

Another reminder that real life gunfights rarely resemble TV, movies, or training on a 1 way range.

Wait, you mean a bad guy isn't going to stand perfectly still about 20--30 feet away and directly in front of a good guy and wait to get shot? Damn, I even paid extra to get the paper silhouette targets with lifelike faces printed on them just for that very occasion.

 

[BigRed]

As has been demonstrated time and time again, gun free zones are very dangerous and sometimes deadly.

Unfortunately, it seems the first responders in this attack were unprepared and unarmed.

 

[Noble Sniper]

Inept…… they look poorly trained. I’m actually suprised one of the officers didn’t shoot another one of the officers. Reminded me of trying to herd cats!!! A shotgun blast or two would have taken care of the door lock in a hurry…. Again they look poorly trained. They knew what they had to do but really didn’t know how to do it in what I saw here. Most looked very uncomfortable with a firearm…..

 

[BehindBlueI's]

I'm curious, are team tactics taught at the Academy? If not, they probably should be.

At least for ours, they are touched on but it's hard to get enough time for practice and reps to really be good at it. You also can't have reliance on team tactics because it's much more often going to be a "you" or "you and a partner" situation to resolve for the vast majority of your career.

I've been the guy with someone shooting from the back of the bus over him and it sucks. I'm sure I've also been the guy who inadvertently flagged someone. Until you've been there, it's tough to understand how much sensory input you're having to triage and process. Realistic simunition training with multiple role players helps, but is resource intensive. There's a reason the military spends so much money and time on mock up villages, battles, etc. Domestic LE does not get that same level of resource dedication.

 

[cbhausen]

And… “Denny’d” and “BBI’d” consecutively in the same thread.

No ******** comes from the mouth of either.

 

[2tonic]

What I noticed most was a lack of command hierarchy. I don't mean to criticize the response, they did their best to neutralize the threat, and were successful.
As pointed out upthread, this is a tense, dynamic situation, and patrol officers are seldom trained in assault team tactics. In view of that, if the response force is an "ad hoc" combo of SWAT and Street, then maybe the team trained guys should take the lead, and be the ones issuing commands.

It just seems there was a lot of unnecessary and conflicting vocalizing, and it gives the air of panic, as opposed to a focused, purposeful response.
I see examples of this on every episode of "Cops" or "On Patrol", multiple officers issuing contradictory commands to a subject, totally confusing them and delaying their compliance. Hands up, kneel down, turn around, walk backwards....all commanded simultaneously.
What a CF! There needs to be one voice of authority, clearly and decisively directing a suspect, just like, pardon the comparison, training an animal. One boss.

I'm not an LEO, and I understand that tension and adrenaline are surging in sky high amounts during these situations, and you only rise to the level of your training. For exactly those reasons, all LEO's should receive more than a modicum of "team" training. Anything less, and the Command staff is doing a severe disservice to their officers, which may result in tragedy.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

What I noticed most was a lack of command hierarchy. I don't mean to criticize the response, they did their best to neutralize the threat, and were successful.

This is true and something that LE is working to address. Funnily enough, I just did my supervisor training on ICS and rescue teams (joint operations with fire/ems and police to enter the 'warm zone' of an active scene to conduct rescues). The issue remains getting time and resources to actually train it. I'm checked off on the box, but I'm not qualified to do it IMO.

It's also a mindset issue. Without team training, it's tough to break out of the independent problem solver mindset that the vast majority of policing requires. I've been lucky to get more training than many thanks to some roles I've taken, and with a military background, team tactics isn't as foreign to me but it's still a shift.