Fight Club

My class has just completed our Defensive Tactics training. We managed to make it through with only one major injury (one recruit fractured his collarbone during our fleeing suspect drills), and only a few bumps and bruises. When it came to practicals time, we all passed our scenarios as well, so we are still 24 strong heading into week nine of twenty-two.

Having wrestled in the past, I had a blast learning the various takedowns and holds early in the week. Things took a slightly more somber turn when we started learning potentially life saving techniques such as escaping chokes, disarming suspects, and weapon retention drills. Everything culminated with our practical, which started as a demonstration of what we had learned, and ended in a Redman scenario.

The scenario was very exciting, and I assume, and extremely close recreation of what may actually happen. When my partner and I entered the room, two men were arguing over a woman. Before we had the chance to announce ourselves, a punch was thrown, and we leapt into action. My partner went to assist the victim while I squared up with the suspect. Here's where I made my mistake: when I approached the suspect I stood less than two feet away from him. I tried to calm him down, and went for soft hand control: I put one hand on his chest while telling him to move to another area of the room. At this point the instructor in the suit made me pay for being too close; he nailed me with a crushing left hook square in the jaw.

That made me mad.

Immediately I went to perform a takedown on him. In doing so, I managed to tear his arm guard right off, which earned me another punch to the head. As I pushed him away to reassess, my partner came streaking across the room, Asp in hand, and started laying into the suspect, ending the scenario.

Ultimately we passed, thanks to our teamwork and handling of the situation. After all this excitement, next week is back into the classroom for crime scenes, which doesn't sound nearly as fun.

Stay Safe
-The Rookie

Sorry folks!

I didn't forget about you guys, just been really busy.

Where did we leave off? I think last time I posted was right before DUI week. My certification for DUI stops went off without a hitch. We actually had a simulated DUI stop as our practical, with actual drunk volunteers. We were to conduct our SFSTs, fill out the paperwork related to a DUI arrest, and then present our case to the "magistrate".

Outside of the paperwork, the whole process was pretty fun. To be perfectly honest, I would not have arrested my volunteer since he managed to pass my SFSTs (standardized field sobriety tests). On the street, I actually would have had to let him go, despite his Alco-sensor being over the legal limit, since I didn't have any probable cause to take him to the arrest.

Next up was Firearms. Having never fired or even handled a weapon, I had some initial troubles to get over, and eventually did...or so I thought.

Throughout my qualification practices I consistently scored in the high 50s mid 60s. Unfortunately, that falls short of final weapons qual by between 2-5 bullets on target. I think I have corrected my little mistakes. I still have one more shoot to make, and I'm actually pretty nervous.

Next week is the second of three weeks I've been looking forward to: Defensive Tactics. Something about throwing folks around to relieve frustration just makes me grin.

Keep you posted, and stay safe
-The Rookie