TexasCHLforum.com

baldeagle wrote:

Excaliber wrote:In this instance he is correct that there is somewhere between .1 and .3 or so seconds in response time lost to moving the trigger finger onto the trigger when a decision has been made to fire, and that having the finger already on the trigger is marginally faster. I can't argue that those very brief time intervals couldn't be critical in a given situation, and in a situation where one was in extreme danger and one already had justification to use deadly force, a finger on the trigger tactic might be appropriate when facing an unrestrained highly dangerous suspect. However, I also maintain that the risk of accidentally shooting someone without either justification or a decision to use deadly force is so high with a finger on the trigger before a decision to fire has been made that, in my opinion and the opinion of many other knowledgeable folks, that practice in most circumstances would constitute gross negligence and be indefensible in light of well documented history and research.

First, thank you for your excellent and informative response, which is your norm.

When I read the article, what I got out of it was that if you are in a life threatening situation and if you know the bad buy(s?) is just around the corner and you know that no one else is at risk (e.g. you are point man and there is zero possibilities of innocent civilians being in the line of fire), then and only then it makes sense to have your finger on the trigger. The examples that I've seen of so-called AD (such as the three youtube videos linked by a commenter in a different thread) are not examples of what is wrong with what Suarez is claiming. Those are examples of extremely poor firearm handling. You don't put your finger on the trigger while drawing or holstering. You don't teach a class with a loaded weapon and you most certainly do not put your finger on the trigger of a loaded gun while teaching a class. I personally don't believe there is such a thing as an AD when the finger is on the trigger. To me an AD is when a gun fires without the trigger being pulled.

I follow your thinking, but bear in mind that you can never know that no innocents are in the line of fire in an area you cannot yet see. Real life just ain't that simple unless you're on the front line in a military free fire zone.

I ran training scenarios that involved building searches where one or more armed felons were known to be hiding, and innocents had fled but it was unknown if all innocent parties had successfully evacuated. Officers had to manage whatever they found just like they do in the field.

On several occasions, officers with a decade or more of experience who searched with finger on the trigger in violation of our department policy and training "shot" unarmed innocents they encountered unexpectedly at close range (e.g., bursting from a hiding place and trying to flee past police to get out of the "danger" area as people in these situations are prone to do). They were immediately challenged by myself or another trainer to justify their use of deadly force. They typically stood there in total shock, realizing that had they taken the same action in the "real world," they would be standing in a position so bad that they knew they'd never recover from it. I got no resistance to my "finger off the trigger" training after that.

I value my life at least as much as the next guy, but I don't put finger on trigger until I've decided to fire right now. Others may see things differently and make different decisions. I've already seen where that goes, and I don't see the point to repeating old mistakes when so many new and creative ones remain available.

baldeagle wrote:

Excaliber wrote:

gigag04 wrote:http://www.warriortalknews.com/2011/01/ ... ering.html

This ludicrous article, among others. If you search on here somewhere we had a little chat about him a while ago.

Mr. Suarez is not on my list of folks whose classes I'd jump through hoops to attend either. I won't elaborate on my reasoning here other than to say that a reading of the article Gigag04 cited above should raise enough red flags to serve as fair warning for anyone who has not come across his work before.

Please elaborate. Innuendo does none of us any good. What is wrong with the article?

Mr. Suarez is out and out wrong about the startle response and sympathetic contraction not causing unintentional discharges, and in my opinion his experiments to disprove these phenomena are not valid because the participants were not surprised or startled and knew what was about to happen. Different and very bad things happen when these events occur suddenly and with complete surprise under high stress conditions.

You can find the basic facts of several such instances here. There was a similar incident several months ago where a Plano undercover officer unintentionally shot a suspect he was attempting to place under arrest. It has been alleged that he accidentally pulled the trigger while trying to activate his weapon mounted flashlight. This may or may not turn out to be the case, but it would be hard to argue that the gun would have fired if his trigger finger had remained outside the trigger guard until and unless a deadly force situation had arisen.

When I went through my first police firearms training at the academy, we were trained to cover a suspect with finger on the trigger. During the following years I personally saw enough close calls (including some of my own) and read enough incident reports to conclude that was an unacceptably dangerous practice. When I assumed command of training operations I made finger off the trigger until a decision has been made to fire an explicit part of the firearms training program. Officers were skeptical until I provided each one with a dozen or so historical incidents of where the finger on the trigger practice had led to tragedy. Was agency liability a concern in changing the practice? Yes. Training officers to do known dangerous things certainly creates liability when those practices lead to disaster. However, the more important consideration was preventing a readily foreseeable tragedy that would devastate an officer, a suspect, and both families if a negligent shooting occurred.

Mr. Suarez had an active police career and speaks from personal experience on the realities of what happens during violent encounters. However, he takes some positions that I would consider irresponsible. This is a major issue when one is a trainer whose words are taken as gospel by others. The article in question is one example.

In this instance he is correct that there is somewhere between .1 and .3 or so seconds in response time lost to moving the trigger finger onto the trigger when a decision has been made to fire, and that having the finger already on the trigger is marginally faster. I can't argue that those very brief time intervals couldn't be critical in a given situation, and in a situation where one was in extreme danger and one already had justification to use deadly force, a finger on the trigger tactic might be appropriate when facing an unrestrained highly dangerous suspect. However, I also maintain that the risk of accidentally shooting someone without either justification or a decision to use deadly force is so high with a finger on the trigger before a decision to fire has been made that, in my opinion and the opinion of many other knowledgeable folks, that practice in most circumstances would constitute gross negligence and be indefensible in light of well documented history and research.

gigag04 wrote:http://www.warriortalknews.com/2011/01/ ... ering.html

This ludicrous article, among others. If you search on here somewhere we had a little chat about him a while ago.

Mr. Suarez is not on my list of folks whose classes I'd jump through hoops to attend either. I won't elaborate on my reasoning here other than to say that a reading of the article Gigag04 cited above should raise enough red flags to serve as fair warning for anyone who has not come across his work before.