Police adopt aggressive new strategy to handle future shooting rampages

Don Campbell
The Ottawa Citizen

Saturday, May 18, 2002

Ottawa police are about to dramatically change how they handle shootings like the 1999 rampage at the OC Transpo garage that left four employees and the gunman dead.

Taking the lead from major police forces across North America, the traditional police strategy of "contain, control and negotiate" is soon to give way to a proactive plan dubbed "active shooter" to deal with such situations as the Transpo shooting or the 1999 massacre at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado.

It's a move former police officers say is really just rolling back the clock.

"Literally, it would be a group of officers whose objective is not to contain the subject, but to hunt down the subject," said Ottawa police Chief Vince Bevan.

"It is a very different philosophy from today's, though years ago, when I served in a tactical unit, that was how we were trained.

"I believe inquests and other things helped to formulate the present philosophy. But now it is time to go back to the way we did things, given the climate for these situations."

The shift in philosophy is sparked by a series of shootings in the United States, notably the Columbine shooting, where two teenagers killed 12 students and one teacher before taking their own lives.

And there have been others, including one last month at a German school in which an expelled student killed 13 teachers and four students before killing himself.

Until recently, most police forces responded with caution to such events, securing the scene while waiting for the force's heavily armed tactical units to arrive.

Police statistics, however, shows most of the damage by the shooter or shooters tends to be done within the first 10 to 20 minutes.

Chief Bevan first learned of the shift in philosophy in October 2000, at a conference of police chiefs from major North American cities. Those in attendance had the Columbine experience freshly in their minds.

A committee was established and, by last August, a report was complete. It recommended the formation of an immediate response unit.

Ontario Provincial Police and municipal forces in Montreal, Edmonton and Calgary are adopting the strategy. The budget for the Ottawa unit has already been approved.

Chief Bevan is confident the new unit will be operational within 18 to 24 months, meaning it won't be before 2004.

One of the biggest changes to the new arm of the tactical unit is certain to be the choice of weaponry. For safety reasons, the current assault rifles used by tactical units will have to go and the police service will reinstitute the use of shotguns.

"Anyone who knows anything about the AR15 rifles we use now knows the bullets go a long way, and that's just not suitable for schools or like settings," said Chief Bevan. "Instead, we are going to re-introduce the shotgun program in the downtown core area."

© Copyright  2002 The Ottawa Citizen