By Elisabeth Strillacci

KANNAPOLIS — In this week’s Citizen Police Academy with Kannapolis police, Lt. Justin Smith gave the run down on use of force by officers, including use of deadly force, and what the state allows and what is policy in Kannapolis.

They are different. The city of Kannapolis requires far more training every year than the state, and the department’s policies are far tighter than the state’s, with good reason.

Use of force is a high-liability situation because of the potential for someone to get hurt. So officers need to have strong training that creates as much of a trained response as possible, to offset the human fear that no one can escape, even police.

Non-lethal or less lethal tools and actions are always preferred to deadly force unless an officer believes there is imminent danger to himself or another person.

To be clear, there is a difference between imminent and immediate danger.

Smith captured it succinctly by reaching back for where his gun would rest on his hip, and saying “this is imminent danger,” and then pulling his arms forward as if he were pointing his weapon at someone, and said “this is immediate danger. If you react to immediate danger, you’re a beat behind.” Imminent danger allows for not just use of force, but deadly use of force that the officer knows can result in death or serious bodily harm. But if it is used to save a life or save himself or someone else from serious injury, it is considered justified.

But there is a continuum of use of force, because the essential goal is to gain compliance. Get a person to do what the officer needs them to do.

“It starts with just the physical presence of the officer in uniform,” he said, “but these days that doesn’t carry the same weight it used to. People are no longer impressed by the uniform when I walk in.”

The next level is verbal commands, telling someone what you need them to do. Smith said that can be done in a respectful manner without insulting anyone or raising the temperature in a situation. If that does not work, the next step is called “soft hands” and Smith demonstrated on one of our classmates, taking his hand and placing his other hand on the back of the classmates’ elbow, locking it in place. It tends to get compliance by firmly encouraging the person to move with the officer.

If that doesn’t work, “hard hands” which can essentially mean punching, hitting more forceful actions to get the individual to submit to the officer’s commands is next, but it isn’t a matter of an officer amping things up.

“The individual the officer is seeking compliance from is the one that determines what level we go to,” said Smith. Chemical munitions are next on their list, which includes OC spray — pepper spray. Pepper spray doesn’t work on everyone, for a number of reasons, but gets sprayed in the eyes and face and takes about 45 minutes to ease. It causes burning and tearing of the eyes, a very runny nose, coughing and because your eyes and mouth are overwhelmed, it makes you stop fighting back. You’re just trying to stop the tears, the burning and take a breath. There is nothing permanently harmful but it is extremely uncomfortable.

The next level is impact weapons, such as a baton, and in this category is now also the Taser. Tasers were once listed in the same category as hard hands, but there have been enough instances of improper use that it has been pushed farther down the list. Taser is a company trade name for a stun gun, and when the prongs are deployed, the officer is supposed to release the trigger, meaning the person gets about five seconds of shock. The farther apart the prongs are when they attach, the more likely the person is to lock up because more muscles are involved. But if an officer, in the heat of the moment, holds the trigger waiting for the shock to stop, it can take quite a few seconds for him or her to realize they need to let go or the current continues.

But if it does its job, a person will typically be immobilized for a short period. For some, there is soreness after but for many, when the current stops, it’s over.

(On a personal note, years ago as a police reporter I agreed to be pepper sprayed and to be Tasered because I wanted to know first hand what I was writing about. Although I didn’t have a sinus infection for two years after the pepper spray, and I hurt like heck for hours after being Tased, I would still prefer the Taser because it’s over much faster. Lt. Smith agreed.)

When you pass this point and nothing is working, if you reach a situation where the person resisting the officer begins to make the officer feel either his life or safety is in danger or that of someone else is in jeopardy, deadly force can and will come into play.

But in truth, that’s a rare occurrence.

Regulations require that the amount of force used in any given situation much be objectively and reasonably necessary and based on the totality of the circumstances, said Smith. Use of force training starts at Basic Law Enforcement Training or BLET and continues until an officer retires. The state requires four hours of training once a year. Kannapolis PD requires more than four times that and training is at least twice a year.

And some of the procedures that require use of force, including deadly use of force, have changed. Smith explained for example that before the school shooting at Columbine High School, the protocol was for first on scene officers to set up a perimeter to secure both those inside the site and those outside, keeping a secure separation, and wait for the SWAT (Special Weapons and Tactics) or what is locally called SRT or Special Response Team to respond and take charge.

After Columbine, that protocol changed and now the first officers on the scene are expected to move into the site and address the threat, and not just stand by outside.

If a situation requires the use of force beyond the level of soft hands, there is a strict protocol on how officers need to react.

As soon as an officer disengages with a person, they need to notify their direct supervisor that there has been a use of force incident, and they need to call for EMS or medical personnel to evaluate the person. The officer takes photos of any injuries or the lack of any injuries. He or she then processes the person and takes them to the magistrate, and if necessary, the jail. Once the person has been delivered, the officer must file both and incident report and an arrest report. They also must file a detailed memo of the incident.

“And while most reports should not include the officer’s emotions, this one should, explicitly, because the officer’s emotions play directly into why use of force was necessary,” said Smith.

Should use of force become use of deadly force and a person dies, another step is triggered. The department, in addition to its own internal investigation, will request an external investigation by the N.C. State Bureau of Investigations or SBI. That can be hard for officers because during that phase, they are placed on paid leave, often having to stay out of the department for some time, then coming back to a desk job for some time, before the investigation is complete.

And the SBI doesn’t file its report with the department. It must file it with the district attorney for the community, who then makes the decision about whether to exonerate or charge the officer. Charging an officer is rare, but it does happen.

In addition to struggling with being away from the job during the investigation, officers can often have a hard time with the fact that the SBI is conducting a criminal investigation and the officer is listed as the suspect. But as Smith explained, it is the same for anyone who goes through it, and it is simply because the investigation involves a criminal event that triggered the officer’s response. It isn’t labeling the officer a criminal but instead referring to the overall situation.

The department does have an early warning system that tracks incidents during an officer’s career, and if there are four or more incidents in a 12-month period, the system will kick out a notification that supervisors should take a look at the overall performance to insure there are no patterns developing that can indicate an issue for an officer. Those reviews can result in additional training, participation in a peer therapy program, disciplinary action, or no action if it’s found there is no cause for concern,

“We put a lot of things in place to help us make sure our officers are OK, that they are performing the job as we expect, and that if there is an issue, we address it quickly,” said Smith.

The last part of the class, we discussed briefly the use of firearms, and Smith listed the four cardinal rules of gun safety: treat all guns as if they are loaded until you personally inspect them; point the muzzle in a safe direction; keep your finger off the trigger until you intend to fire; and be sure you know your target and what is behind it.

This coming week, we will not meet on Thursday but on Saturday when we will get to learn some driving skills as well as round two of firearms instruction.