OPINION

MIKE MASTERSON: Numbers tell tale

You may recall Ed Monk's name from his ongoing lawsuit involving his treatment at the state Capitol in 2017 when he unsuccessfully tried to visit with Sen. Stephanie Flowers. Arkansas State Police reported Monk had caused such a ruckus on the grounds that he had to be physically escorted away by Capitol Police. The problem was that Monk said he was nowhere near the Capitol that day.

I'm talking about him again today not because of the accusation but because of what the man does for a living: teaching courses on how to deal with an active shooter threatening innocents in this deeply troubled society.

A West Point graduate who gives these presentations for free, Monk just completed a four-hour session on active shooter threats at the annual National Tactical Officers Conference and has another scheduled in Seattle in June. He offered details I found interesting and relevant for everyone who might find themselves in such a terrible situation.

For instance, he told me the shooter is usually a young male who attacks in a gun-free zone where no one likely will have one of their own. "The time it will take to get a police officer to the location to hopefully stop him (usually 5-10 minutes) provides him enough time to shoot double digits of people, even higher."

Monk explained that the average attacker begins his shooting with more than one gun and starts with a rifle or shotgun while carrying a lot of ammunition. "Once the attack starts, on average, he will shoot one person every 10 seconds until someone stops him. This means if allowed to shoot for one minute, we can expect six-12 people shot." If allowed to shoot for five minutes, the average length of an attack, he said about 30 people will have been shot. "He will then likely commit suicide rather than be captured or shot himself.

"The Parkland school in Florida attack lasted 5:32 and 34 people were shot," he said. "So the most important planning factor to save lives at an active-shooter attack is time and math as opposed to emotion and politics. The sooner someone stops the shooter, the fewer people will be shot, and fewer injured will die because we can get EMS trauma care to them and transport to a hospital more quickly. The longer we wait to stop the killer, the more will be shot, and more of the wounded will die due to the delay in medical treatment."

He said there's a one- to four-minute average delay between the first shot and the initial 911 call. This happens because potential victims are trying to survive at the moment. And those who overhear the shooting initially aren't certain what's happening. "Many first think it's fireworks, construction, or other cause making the sounds," Monk said.

The typical active-shooting attack follows this progression: The initial 911 call is made two to three minutes after the first shot. About a minute afterward the 911 operator dispatches police to the location. Police arrive at the location from three to six minutes later where it takes another one to three minutes to enter the building if they locate and can stop the shooter.

"This represents an average total of six to seven minutes on an ideal day, from first shot to the killer being stopped, which translates to 30 to 40 victims," Monk said. "If we don't want that high number of victims, we cannot use that plan." Using that plan, he said, almost always results in double- and triple-digit victims (see Pulse nightclub attack in Orlando).

"Every active-shooter attack we have had in this country where a good citizen who is armed, or a police officer was present (close enough to hear or see the shooting when it started) and armed and willing to act aggressively to stop the threat, there have been between one and nine victims." Armed citizens, he said, have stopped more active-shooter attacks in the first few minutes than cops because police understandably are almost never present in those early minutes unless they were off-duty.

The best odds of holding the number of victims to single digits is stopping the active shooter within the first 30-45 seconds, Monk said. The only mathematical way to achieve that is "to have a good person present, armed and willing to act. Simply having an armed person on property, or somewhere in the building is not sufficient if that armed person cannot detect the attack when it starts. There would still be that inevitable phone-radio-travel-search delay, allowing the shooter the time he needs to harm even more people."

He said almost every active shooter avoids initiating the attack in front of police, thus allowing the delay that statistics show leads to a much higher body count. "Armed citizens have never shot the wrong person while stopping an active shooter. However, cops have on four occasions. The only two cops to die responding to an active shooter (not counting attacks against them) were both accidentally shot by other cops."

Monk has compiled a lot more relevant information. My hope is those reading gain knowledge from the most basic elements he shared here.

------------v------------

Mike Masterson is a longtime Arkansas journalist. Email him at [email protected].

Editorial on 04/09/2019

Upcoming Events