B6 EZ SU THE WASHINGTON POST.FRIDAY, DECEMBER 11 , 2020
BY ALEX MANN
The yellow Taser buzzed as the
instructor readied it, then it
snapped when it projected two
probes into the back of recruit
officer Dondre Phillips.
Phillips grunted as his body
seized up in spasms with the
electrical current. Two “spotters”
gently guided him to the ground.
Sgt. Todd Betz, the instructor,
quipped: How’d it feel?
“Horrible, sir,” responded Phil-
lips, 28.
In less than five seconds, it was
a lesson in tactics and compas-
sion. Recruits at the Anne Arun-
del County Police Academy in
Davidsonville have to understand
the capability of their weapons
but also know what it feels like to
be on the receiving end.
“It felt like I was holding on to a
bolt of lightning — instant pain
throughout my body.. .” Phillips
said after class. “I think it builds
empathy. I w ould be more cau-
tious using [the Taser] on a civil-
ian.”
Over two weeks that started at
the end of October, the academy’s
91st recruit class was introduced
to the various weapons a police
officer carries on his or her belt.
They have been tested on the
functions of each law enforce-
ment tool and, under tight super-
vision, fired thousands of rounds
on the range and drilled on ex-
pandable batons, Tasers and pep-
per spray. In a c ontrolled environ-
ment, recruits are tased and ex-
posed to pepper spray.
Anne Arundel County officers
reported using force less in 2019
than in any of the previous four
years, according to department
data. Officers were dispatched to
more than 400,500 incidents, re-
sulting in about 13,000 arrests.
Police filed 135 use-of-force re-
ports last year, down 14 percent
from the year before.
An officer is required to file a
use-of-force report when they use
a weapon or a civilian is injured
during an arrest, among other
scenarios. A department tally
showed officers used their hands
188 times, Tasers 30 times, pepper
spray six times, batons three
times and firearms twice. Some-
one died both times officers fired
their handguns.
At a time when the nation is
watching an officer’s every move
through the lenses of smart-
phones, Anne Arundel academy
instructors are cutting no corners
to ensure these recruits do not
end up on YouTube for a violent
encounter on the street. They
teach when to deploy each weap-
on if necessary, and how much
force they should use. Recruits
are put under stress, so they learn
to control their reaction.
Instructors say they would
rather a recruit fail on campus in
Davidsonville than on the road
with real lives — officers’ and
civilians’ — on the line. So they
give the class plenty of opportuni-
ties to falter through written
tests, discussions of viral videos
involving police, tabletop scenar-
ios and realistic reactionary drills
where recruits use replica weap-
ons on actors.
Lt. Greg Speed, executive offi-
cer of the training division, said
the academy curriculum is de-
signed to make the recruits mess
up, so instructors can correct
mistakes early. It is shaping the
way they think.
“Even though it might be justi-
fied, how do we get them not to
escalate to force?”On the firing range
On the dimly lit, indoor firing
range, the smell of gunpowder
was pungent, and the sound of
gunfire deafening as recruit offi-
cers Virginia Hernandez, 30, and
Deonna Diggs, 24, cycled throughdrills under the watchful eye of
instructors wearing bright red.
The structure was built 20
years ago; before that, officers
practiced in the elements. The
handguns are newer, as the de-
partment recently switched to the
9mm Glock 17.
Before the line of about 10
recruits hung paper targets dot-
ted with different colored shapes
and the images of bowling pins
numbered 1-7. With ear protec-
tion, instructors’ commands were
barely audible from a few feet
away.
An instructor shouted out com-
mands: red three, for example. In
turn, the recruits shot the red
shapes and bowling pin No. 3.
Instructors checked for accuracy.
Such drills force the recruits to
scan and act swiftly, said Sgt. Brad
Rattell, a firearms instructor.
Shooting is the last resort, but if
an officer has to pick a red shirt
out of a crowd someday, he or she
better be ready.
“We need thinkers,” Rattell
said, acknowledging the learning
curve can be steeper for some.
Hernandez and Diggs had gone
to the shooting range a handful of
times to prepare for the academy.
But the precision of the police
techniques was challenging.
Hernandez said she learned
quickly despite being nervous.
Diggs said she had a break-through toward the end of her
first week on the range. Her bul-
lets veered low and left at first.
Firearms are more familiar to
Phillips — who was in the M arine
Corps — and recruit officer Jason
Blair, 39. Blair was an officer in
Arizona for six years, a tenure
during which he worked patrol,
plainclothes and on the SWAT
team.Defensive tact ics
Repetitions on the range is not
the only type of training the re-
cruits do again and again. About
100 yards from the shooting
range a few days later, Blair and
Phillips participated in a differ-
ent drill that all recruits go
through — defense tactics.
On one side of the wrestling
mat, recruits geared up in boxing
gloves and masks. On the other,
recruits positioned themselves on
top of each other to try out tech-
niques resembling wrestling
moves.
Instructors yelled out pointers
as the recruits cycled in and out.
“Keep your hands up!” they yelled
on the boxing side. “That’s a bad
position, gotta get out of there!”
they’d tell the recruits who got
pinned under a classmate. If the
spars got too heated, instructors
reminded recruits to keep it at 30
percent physicality.
The boxing side was intendedto teach recruits how to protect
their heads if a fight broke out
and to expose them to the feeling
of getting hit. The wrestling
moves show recruits how to get
out from underneath an aggres-
sor using just their hands and
body leverage.
But real-life encounters will be
more hectic and stressful. To test
the recruits’ resolve and simulate
that stress, instructors blindfold-
ed them during reactionary drills.
When Phillips’s blindfold was
removed, an actor clad in black
protective gear, and resembling a
juggernaut, yelled, “Fight me.”
Phillips sidestepped, grabbed
for his retractable baton, a plastic
one used for training, and swung
it at the officer. Betz stopped the
drill. And then they ran it back.
This time, the actor carried a
baseball bat. Phillips was pumped
up from the first encounter when
Betz removed his hood the second
time. He reached for his replica
firearm, only for the actor to say
he was walking to the ballfield.
“I was assuming it was going to
be a life-or-death scenario when
really it was not,” Phillips said.
All 44 recruits ran through this
drill. There were five renditions.
The first time the actor wanted to
fight, the second time he was
walking to the baseball field; the
third was a suicidal man with a
knife; the fourth, a man with agun who wanted to kill police and
the fifth, a person asking for
directions. Each required a cer-
tain level of force. Or none at all.
“You’re just walking through
the neighborhood, and this
what’s in front of you,” Betz said.
During these drills, recruits
have a replica of every weapon on
their belt — except for the Taser,
which is real — so instructors can
gauge their thinking in each situ-
ation. It is a scenario-by-scenario
and recruit-by-recruit analysis as
to whether they chose the right
weapon. Whereas a baton might
be appropriate for one officer, a
smaller recruit might have to use
the Taser to subdue the same
subject.
In the classroom, instructors
like Betz have been playing videos
of violent police encounters with
people. Sometimes the officer did
the right thing; other times, they
erred, per Betz’s instruction. He
tried to get each recruit to think
about what they would do in that
situation. The point is not to
judge the officers on screen but to
learn from their actions.
It is a staple of the academy
and in-service training, Speed
said.
“We owe it to ourselves and the
public to review public use of
force,” Speed said. “What options
did we have?... I f we as a staff
don’t look at (the videos), how do
we do better?”
Diggs said she did a drill with a
partner and wished she had acted
sooner to prevent the actor from
being tased. She said training had
changed her mind-set on the vid-
eos she sees involving police, in-
cluding those that have come up
in discussions with her family. “It
makes you understand that some
situations are taken too lightly,
and some situations are taken too
harmful.”
It is incumbent upon the re-
cruits to do their evaluations after
each video and drill.
“It will help save lives of offi-
cers and help save lives of citi-
zens,” Blair said.
Blair has been hardened by his
experiences but keeps an open
mind. He said he was shot at in
Arizona but that he never wants
to shoot anyone on the job. “Our
goal is to get everyone home safe.”
When faced in training with
the gun-wielding actor, Blair gave
one command and fired the fake
handgun. No hesitation.
Blair passed his last test of the
day without using weapons or
force. When the instructor re-
moved his hood, the actor was
right up in his face. Startled, Blair
jumped back and analyzed. The
actor was holding a black object.
It was a cellphone.
— Baltimore SunMARYLAND
At the police academy, recruits learn what it feels like to be shot by a Taser
Future Anne Arundel
officers get lessons in
tactics and compassionALEX MANN/CAPITAL GAZETTE
“Keep your hands up!”: Recruit officer Jason Blair shields his head from a punch at the Anne Arundel County Police Academy in
Davidsonville. Instructors teach recruits how to protect themselves with th eir hands in case they are attacked on the job.10,000 DEATHS
have been disproportionately hit,
though these disparities have
narrowed over time as the virus
spread to rural, predominantly
White areas in Maryland and
Virginia. Across all three regions,than 60. In Maryland, 31 individ-
uals under the age of 30 have lost
their lives — including a 1-year-
old boy, whose death was an-
nounced last week.
Black and Latino communitiesdozen new fatalities daily to less
than three; in October, there was
a stretch of eight blissful days in
which the city reported no new
deaths.
But that period has ended. In
just the first days of December,
about 500 residents of D.C., Mary-
land and Virginia lost their lives
to covid-19. If these daily num-
bers persist — and experts say
they’re actually likely to increase
— December is poised to overtake
May as the region’s deadliest
month on record.
[email protected]to serve as hot spots for covid-19
deaths. The District’s 19 long-
term care facilities are linked to
25 percent of the city’s more than
700 fatalities; in Maryland, nurs-
ing homes, assisted-living facili-
ties and group homes represent
2,400 deaths — nearly half the
state’s total toll.
After thousands of deaths in
April and May, the region’s strin-
gent restrictions on social activity
allowed the number of monthly
covid-19 fatalities to plummet,
dipping to 690 in August. The
District went from reporting aabout 35 percent of fatalities have
been African Americans, who ac-
count for just a quarter of the
population.
Nursing homes and other long-
term care facilities also continuedents of Maryland and 51 deaths
per 100,000 residents of Virginia,
according to a Washington Post
database. That compares with a
high of 198 deaths per 100,000
people in New York state, and a
low of 14 deaths per 100,000 in
Vermont.
Those who died in Maryland,
Virginia and the District were
activists, writers, firefighters and
pastors. They worked in our gro-
cery stores, drove our public bus-
es and taught our children. Hor-
ace and Violet Saunders, both 96,
died days apart after a 75-year
love story. Lawrence Nokes, 69, of
Carroll County, Md., died a week
after finding out that his wife —
“his light,” his children said —
had also been fatally stricken by
the virus that he probably
brought home from his job at a
nursing home.
The early assumption that the
virus would devastate only the
elderly and the infirm has unrav-
eled over eight months. Wogene
Debele, 43, died before she could
see her newborn son; Terrance
Burke, a 54-year-old high school
basketball coach who worked out
regularly, was among the first
public school employees to lose
his life. One-tenth of the victims
in Virginia have been younger
VIRUS FROM B1
In region’s fatalities, coronavirus strikes across generations
Source: D.C., Maryland and Virginia health departments THE WASHINGTON POSTCovid-19 deaths in D.C., Maryland
and Virginia through Nov.March April MayJune July Aug. Sept.Oct.Nov.582,3781,9371,131(^748690663)
842 936
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500
1, 000
1,500
2,000
2,500
CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY IMAGES
Morgan Dean-McMillan prepares cremation containers for coronavirus victims May 11 in Millersville,
Md. As of Thursda y, seven of every 10,000 people in D.C., Maryland and Virginia had died of covid-19.
S0129-6x2
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