Best Practices aMaury MurgaDo
tHE tHrEat oF tEcHnology Gadgets are great, but you still need essential skills to stay safe.
P
eople who use the words officer safety and survival fall into two camps: the serious and the dismissive. Those who take officer safety seriously tend to stay on top of trends, work within an overall strategy, and are flexible in matching their tactics with the situation. These officers are usually the proactive ones who are seldom recognized for their efforts. They are informal leaders and avid trainers. The dismissive ones are the complete opposite. Those in the dismissive camp gamble with their lives on a daily basis by ignoring the basic tenets of officer safety and survival. They make it easier to become a victim or a casualty. They put others at risk because they have no strategy and use poor tactics. These are the officers that consistently duck training but are first in line when it comes to going to lunch. They value time off with the family and yet seldom do anything to ensure that they get back to them safely. Officer safety remains a paramount concern even if some choose to ignore it. Many agencies spend a great deal of time, energy, and money on the high liability aspects of the job. Their officers routinely shoot, practice combatives, and work on their emergency driving skills. However, the same agencies ignore the everyday and less appreciated threats and distractions. We are losing our basic skills by relying too much on modern toys to do our jobs for us. In today’s world, one of the biggest unrecognized threats to officer safety and survival is technology.
Digital Distractions There is no denying that the use of technology has made an
officer’s life more efficient. But that efficiency has come at an overlooked price: compromising aspects of the officer’s safety. The down side to technology is that it creates an inherent loss in environmental awareness. Take for example the use of in-car Mobile Data Computers (MDC). With an MDC, you have easy access to law enforcement databases at the local, state, and federal levels. The problem is not with information but in how you obtain it. In order to understand where I am coming from, you first have to ask, “Am I at a complete stop at a traffic light, safely parked completing a report, or am I driving and typing while accessing the information?” As a watch commander, I sometimes had to handle citizen complaints about officers swerving on the road (even 16
POLICE JULY 2011
Devoting all of your attention to a gadget like an MDC leaves you vulnerable to attack in your vehicle.
going off the road). The complainant was driving behind an officer and it was obvious to the driver that the officer’s attention was on his computer instead of on driving. I don’t have any research to show how many crashes have involved MDCs as a contributing factor, nor am I even sure anyone tracks MDC use that way. Regardless, the potential for disaster remains high. The MDC has become a crutch for expediency. More importantly, it has helped make some officers soft in their safety and survival skills. Officers play more and more license tag bingo while they drive. Using their radio is becoming archaic. I know of an agency that has stopped allowing license plates to be run on the radio as they prefer them run on the MDC instead. While it’s not practical or even advisable to not use your MDC or in-car computer, it’s important to use it as safely as possible. Do what you can to keep your eyes on the road.
cEll PHonEs What agency doesn’t have a policy restricting cell phone use while driving? And yet you can see officers and command staff alike using them while they drive. There is research galore on the dangers of cell phone use while driving. Still, we are all guilty of it; I am no exception. But we are hypocrites as we complain when other people do it. I guess we feel we have special skills that civilians don’t. And while we’re at it, let’s be honest with ourselves and look at how much of our phone use is business and just how much of it is personal. As if talking on the phone weren’t bad enough, there is an even worse distraction (more like addiction) while driving: texting. At least if you use your phone like a phone, you can For more Best Practices go to www.PoliceMag.com/bestpractices