Right before Thanksgiving, Tom was invited to Chicago to present to the Illinois Tactical Officers Association (ITOA). He was asked to relate his experiences during the 1999 World Trade Organization(WTO) Conference riots in Seattle. Tom was heavily involved in the preparation and training in crowd control and less-lethal options. Based on that experience, CRT LL has developed testing protocols to scientifically evaluate different tools.
Toms Speaks in Illinois
Chicago will host both the upcoming G-8 and NATO conferences which are going to be held for the first time in the United States at the same location. The presentation focused on the three core objectives for crowd control: Life safety, incident stabilization, and property protection. He covered less lethal considerations from the physiological and psychological viewpoint, including tactics protestors are using against police officers.
The ultimate goal, of course, is to utilize tactics and tools with the greatest effectiveness while limiting injury and liability of all parties involved.
The Association for Crime Scene Reconstruction recently published one of our articles on collection and analysis of Electronic Control Device (TASER) evidence. The paper provides a nice
overview from the prospective of the crime scene investigator on proper preservation collection of evidence and the types of analysis that can be performed on these devices and their components.
The material from the article provides a splendid teaser for our “From the Box to the Courtroom” Forensics/Excited Delirium course that provides a comprehensive look on starting and maintaining a successful TASER program.
Earlier this month, Tom and Rick traveled to Brussels to give four classes to representatives of the Belgium Federal Police.
The courses, sponsored by A6 Law Enforcement, emphasized on creating a successful TASER program including, training, documentation, the patrol response to Excited Delirium Syndrome, and forensic applications of these devices. We are offering similar training in Oregon next month.
We also toured one of the national criminalistics laboratories, NICC / INCC, where we were given a demonstration of one of the state of the art 3D ballistic imaging instruments.
CRT LL would like to extend our gratitude to A6, NICC, and the Belgium Police for their unbelievable hospitality and generosity during our visit.
On May 9th through 11th, Tom and Rick attended the International Law Enforcement Forum (ILEF) in Vancouver, British Columbia sponsored by the NIJ (National Institute’s of Justice) and the Justice Institute of British Columbia. A special thanks to Joel, Andy, Collin, Ed, and Amanda for putting this together.
The forum provides an excellent platform for information sharing. In addition to the slew of suburb speakers, Tom presented to an international audience the current research and patrol guidelines
in the Seattle area for responding and reporting on subjects with Excited Delirium Syndrome (ExDS). He spoke of two “saves” in the field that can be directly related to the training that the responding officers received. The protocols being utilized to more appropriately handle subjects with this condition are being adapted by departments everywhere. This training is certain to make situations safer for the subjects and the officers contacting them.
On April 12th and 13th 2011, Tom and Rick both representing their departments (Seattle PD and Washington State Patrol respectively) collaborated with the NIJ (National Institutes of Justice) and the Applied Research Laboratory at Penn State University to host a workshop on the phenomena referred to as Excited Delirium Syndrome (ExDS). Although first recognized in 1849, ExDS has historically been a controversial condition as subjects with this syndrome often die during struggles with police.
The focus of the workshop was to create dialog on ExDS between the law enforcement, medical, psychiatric, and research communities. Most of the world’s leading researchers on the subject were in attendance, several of which recently published an article in the Journal of Emergency Medicine further validating the condition.
Tom and medics from the Seattle Fire Department gave a presentation that highlighted 73 ExDS cases in the Seattle area where two saves occurred; thanks to a prompt and thorough response. The workshop group used that presentation to emphasize efforts on the education of the first responder to better address this syndrome and increase survival rate of ExDS patients.
The consensus of the workshop attendees was to simplify the process for the first responder into four steps:
Identify: Observe the signs and behaviors related to this syndrome for early medical intervention. Handle primarily as a medical condition.
Control: Control and/or restrain subject as soon as possible to decrease problems related to a prolonged struggle.
Sedate: Apply sedation in the field as soon as possible to help stop/reverse the process.
Transport: Take to hospital as soon as possible for medical treatment.
The field study in Seattle promises to turn the tide in how these cases are addressed. The education, identification, treatment, and success in these ExDS cases is ongoing and will be the subject of a future publication. Tom will present this material in May at the International Law Enforcement Forum (ILEF) in Vancouver, BC.
