Reconsider training to land punches to the head

Duane Wolfe

Tip: As a martial artist and use-of-force instructor, I’m a firm believer in realistic training. To truly train, you need to practice in a realistic manner on realistic targets. If you truly want to train for a situation where you use a punch on a suspect's head, here is my suggestion.

The human head weighs around 10 pounds — it is supported by the neck and moves around. 

Go to your local bowling alley and see if you can get an old 10 pound bowling ball. Bolt the bowling ball to a spring on the end of a post for the most realistic results or attach an eye bolt and hang it from a rope or chain.

Start hitting the ball lightly, and as your fists get used to the impact gradually increase your power because, after all, the bowling ball is hard, round and weighs around 10 pounds just like a human head and if you aren’t careful you could seriously injure your hand or wrist.

Yes, I’m kidding about the training. But I’m not kidding about punching people in the head, for several reasons.

1.)    Several large metropolitan departments discovered that their most common use of force injury was a sprain or break to the dominant hand or wrist caused by striking a suspect in the head with a closed fist. When they changed their training to the use of open hand strikes those injuries dramatically dropped.
2.)    Any of the major sports that utilize punches to the head in its’ repertoire of techniques always have the participants wrap their hands and wear a glove when they go at it. This is done to try and reduce the likelihood of a sprain or a breaking of the small bones of the hand (commonly called a boxers fracture).
3.)    No matter how much you practice, no matter how good you are at it, you can injure yourself. In August 1988, heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson was involved in a fight in a bar against a former boxing opponent. According to a news report, “Tyson said he punched Green above the eye but damaged his own right hand in the process, causing a hairline fracture to the third metacarpal.”

Unlike a boxer or MMA fighter who injures their hand in a fight, a referee won’t be there to intervene. You’ll still need to cuff the suspect, get your keys out to double lock them, unlock the squad car door, drive to the jail, and book your prisoner. 

You won’t have the luxury of several months or more before you have to perform at your next scheduled fight. What you get is light duty if you’re lucky and perhaps a career ending injury if you aren’t.

In a sporting match one fighter never escalates the level of force when the uninjured fighter discovers their opponent is injured, but in street confrontations they do.

The open palm strike is less likely to injure your hand when you strike the head. 

A martial arts instructor and a boxer were having a discussion about the open hand strike versus the punch. The boxer said he would like to determine which one you could hit harder with. The martial artist told him he had a way to measure it. They went out into the parking lot and he picked up a fair size stone — a round, hard object. He hit it with a palm strike and sent it flying across the parking lot. 

He retrieved the rock, handed it to the boxer and said, “Your turn.”

The boxer declined to participate in the experiment. 

In law enforcement we call that a “clue.”

You may want to reconsider your current training if it involves punching to the head. The choice, of course, is yours. If you are a trainer you may want to reconsider what you teach. As a trainer your duty is to teach your officers tactics that work and reduce the likelihood of injury to keep them safer and healthier as a result of your teachings. 

How many sounds can betray your position?

You’ve probably long since developed “muscle memory” to quickly turn down your portable radio (if you don’t have an ear piece, I encourage you to consider getting one), but have you thought about all the other things you carry around that might make a sound that betrays your position in a silent environment? 

It’s not uncommon these days for officers to carry two (or more) mobile phones, wear a digital watch, and have a set of keys rivaling those you might see dangling from the belt of the hospital janitor. Add your loose change from that 10-7 you just had at the local diner, and you can quickly become a walking noisemaker. 

Remember, you may need to go into stealth mode with little to no warning or “prep time.” Turning the ringers off your phones can become a fairly lengthy process, the more phones you have to carry. And remember that a ringer set on “vibrate” mode can sound as loud as a bugle when maximum stealth is the name of the game.

I don’t personally know anybody who has that hourly chime set on their watch, but I suspect someone reading this knows “that guy” on the department. Turn that thing off. 

Make it a habit to ensure that those jangling keys are secured in a keeper, and your loose change is stowed in your squad (as opposed to your pockets). If you absolutely insist on keeping coins in your pocket, consider keeping them in one of those oval-shaped rubber coin purses. 

I’ve long since forgotten where I heard this (or read it), but it’s a pretty good idea to jump up and down a few times in the squad room before your shift — and every so often during your shift — to be certain you’re not making any unwanted sounds. 

Stay safe out there my friends.

Are you a proactive, reactive, or inactive officer?

Rich Von Voigt

What type of officer are you and what do you expect of others with whom you work?

Are you a proactive officer, a reactive officer, or an inactive officer?

Sometimes you don't get what you expect from others or even give what is expected of you.

Here are a few things to consider.

Proactive officers come to work with a willingness to do the job and take every job as it comes and they tend to move about the day or night paying attention to the beat they have the people around them and also look out for their fellow officers.

They move with professional, courteous and tactical skills in most cases. Basically they are paying attention to detail and survival. Will back up on other calls.

Reactive officers come to work with the mindset, “If I get a call I'll handle it, do the best I need to do and move on to the next call as assigned. I'm here. Call me if you need me.”

They pay attention to personal issues tactical or otherwise. May back up if assigned otherwise may move in the direction of another officer depends on who, what, where etc.

Inactive officers are in it for a paycheck, benefits, and could really not be bothered with anything they need to do or take part in anything they are not assigned to do. They even tend to be second (or third!) at their own assigned calls. They have little or no use for tactical training. They just try to get in and out of a tour with little or no involvement.

We all know (and have worked with) these three personalities and we all know how they make us feel.

Which cop are you?

Be careful out there and please we don't have anyone else to call when we are in trouble take care of one another. Look after your brother and sister officers. Like them or not, socialize with them or not, you are the life line and they are yours. Be safe, be smart, be tactical, be alert, be there for each other.

How not to carry your cell phone.

Glen R. Kerley
Biloxi Police Department, Mississippi

I've seen this practice at many departments and by all kinds of officers. With cell phones growing in size, the question of where to put them also becomes as large.  

What I have noticed is officers clipping their cell phones to the flap on their magazine pouches. 

This is a horrible idea on many levels — but let’s just focus on one. 

If you become involved in a deadly-force encounter, the release of adrenaline will reduce your ability to feel, manipulate, and even open a magazine pouch which is now obstructed. 

Of all places to carry a cell phone, an area where you access equipment with life-and-death implications is probably the worst choice.

Don't get distracted

Rich Von Voigt
Riverhead, New York

In this modern era of electronics and personal devices, we’re all busy texting and checking apps. Just about everyone has a smartphone, handheld computer, and some type of recording/playing and listening device hanging off their body. 

As LEOs, we are certainly no different than everyone else in that regard—we have these things in order to have access to our sports, news, and other information. But unlike Joe Citizen, we still need to pay attention to our police radio, computer, and the rest of the world moving around us.

Don’t let all this modern technology distract you from what's important now. Pay attention keep your eyes moving away from the computer, or that cell phone. Use your mirrors on the cruiser even when you are not driving, you know those eyes on the back of your head.

The things that get officers hurt the most are, complacency, distractions, hesitation, and being unprofessional. Pay attention out there. 

Be safe, and “think tactical always.”

As another poster once said, “Get your head out of your Apps.”

iPad Sound Blaster

This may not have a lot to do with officer safety but Got an iPad? Want to hear it better with out phones.

It's OK to feel OK when you have to take a life

Submitted by:
Chuck Remsberg, PoliceOne Columnist

The officer who approached international trainer Brian Willis at a speaking engagement recently is not unique, unfortunately. He’d shot and killed a suspect who was trying to kill him—and he was troubled because he didn’t feel any anguish about it. He worried that that made him “some kind of a psycho.”
“We make a mistake by telling officers that if they kill an offender they’re going to have emotional turmoil afterward,” Willis says. “For a long time, we’ve heard statistics quoted about the high percentage of officers who take a life and then leave the profession because they can’t cope.
“But research conducted by Dr. Audrey Honig, the chief psychologist for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, has proven that’s a myth. The majority adjust very well after a shooting and are fine with what they’ve done. Yet by continuing to emphasize the negative possibilities, we create the expectation that you’re supposed to feel bad. If you don’t, you question yourself.”
With rare exception, Willis points out, assailants are killed because they pose a mortal threat to the officer involved or someone else. “In a critical moment, the officer does what needs to be done and he saves a life by doing it.
“It’s okay to be at peace with that. It’s okay to be okay.”
He cites the case of an officer who was attacked from behind by a suspect and knocked unconscious.
“When he came to, the suspect was beating him with a flashlight and had the officer’s sidearm out of its holster. The officer fought desperately to keep the suspect from shooting him.
“Then he remembered the rescue knife he carried in the trauma-plate pocket of his vest. He pulled it and slashed the suspect’s throat. Then he gained control of the gun and shot him dead.
“That officer was roasted in the media for what he did. But he had this perspective: ‘What I did was lawful, what I did was reasonable, and what I did saved my life. I can live with that.’ He wasn’t gloating by any means, but he was emotionally at peace with what he did and how he did it.”
Willis believes it’s important for officers to hear from trainers, supervisors, and administrators that it’s okay to be in that frame of mind after a fatal shooting. “By the same token,” he says, “it’s okay not to be okay. It is critically important to seek professional counseling if you are troubled. It’s a courageous sign of strength to recognize the symptoms of post-traumatic stress and to get help if you are bothered, rather than destroy yourself, your family, and your career.”
In training, Willis says, “we tend to dance around the word ‘kill’ and instead just talk about ‘stopping the threat.’ But the reality is that you may have to take a life someday as part of your duty. And that moment may be very up close, even at contact range.
“Thinking about that possibility and its personal implications well in advance can help you achieve the peace of mind afterward that you will likely deserve.”