Lessons from Reality TV "Cops"

[JakeGallows]

I started this thread as a place to discuss lessons from the Reality TV Show "Cops". It has been on for 18 seasons, and while I don't really follow it I can't help but watch :rolleyes: and over the past few years I've noticed changes in Police strategy and tactics.

I wasn't necessarily consciously thinking about the tactics or the lessons to be learned from watching it, but those thoughts would frequently pop into my head. I also realize that there are a myriad of thoughts/threads regarding evading law enforcement, but I feel there are both psychological and tactical lessons to be learned from Cops. This is not meant to be a repetition of those other threads. Nor a end-all be-all strategy, instead it should be a way to analyze LEO methods, strengths and weaknesses.

In addition, particularly when you look at Military and SWAT tactics, though standard Police training as well, one of their strong suits is that they examine their training and situations that they are put into in an effort to be better the next time. This is something that we should take into consideration - one-up the one-upper as it were.

For example:
One of the recent changes in tactics I noted was in pulling people over. Especially when LEOs run a tag that comes back stolen or otherwise wanted they radio other units their position. Those other units then get close and as a team they pull the vehicle over, preventing a single unit from being outnumbered, outgunned, or outrun. In the past they would simply find a stolen car and try to pull it over, with markedly decreased success.

[rillistkilla]

I myself have noticed that tactic become more popular as well. The only thing a criminal could do is to steal tags that go to identical cars. So they would not utilize this tactic when pulling over said criminal. Said criminal would then have the option of ambush.

[rillistkilla]

I also thought id share another thought about cops.

I always see on those cop style shows about SWAT teams that they are just regular patrol guys who ride around with full body armor and fully automatic weapons in there squad cars trunk. Should a criminal on a frugal budget ever desire such gear all he would have to do is set up a fake barricade situation and surveil which squad cars are SWAT members, and if possible get there names. And after his survilence all he would have to do is follow the target car to its night-time parking location (usually right at the officers home). Or if he was able to get the targets name, he could even just try a dam phone book (as most cops are known members of the community). All that would be left to do is break into the trunk, which any thirteen year old can do.

You could set up the fake barricade situation easily, simple find an abandoned shithole, board up the windows (wear gloves duh), set up a few cheap untraceble shotguns rigged to go off by remote control. Its not hard just use a RV car with string attached to the trigger. Make a phone call to police with a cell phone no longer in service (all cell phones can dial emergency numbers even if they have no service). Say you just saw some crazy hillbilly shoot at traffic from his house. Have the shotguns near the door and windows, so the first responding officers will think the crazy hillbilly is aiming for them, and they will call SWAT. Wah-Lah.

Any thoughts?

PS - Sorry for the back to back post, I cant find the edit option if there is one.

[knowledgehungry]

In the city where I live cop cars never go to an officer's house at night, when that cop gets off duty the next cop gets the car. I would imagine that is how most large cities police departments work. Remember crime never sleeps, and neither do the police ;).

[JakeGallows]

Ristakilla's point is not an unreasonable one, though you might be asking for trouble breaking into a cop car or a cop's car. I'm sure that there are SWAT members who keep some or all of their equipment in their private vehicles and utilizing that knowledge (either to acquire equipment or incapacitate a SWAT team via their private vehicles) is reasonable.

Another Cops tactic is the PIT (Precision Immobilization Technique or Pursuit Intervention Technique) which appears to have come into vogue recently. Though interestingly if you examine police policies and procedures there are limited times that they can be employed. So for instance LAPD can not (by "can not" I mean "is not supposed to") use the PIT tactic on routine traffic stops. If you have a busted tail light and you run and that's the only thing they have on you, they are not supposed to give chase.

The lesson? Consider examining your hometown's police procedures and policies - they try to get into the mind of a criminal... do it to them.

Sidenote: I wonder if anyone has ever successfully used the PIT against the police? I've seen cruisers get rammed but never PITed.

[nocturnalfrost]

I find it to be a funny, ironic twist that inmates love to watch the show COPS in jail. My thoughts were that I had already had enough of Cops. I don't understand why they always wanted to watch this show.

[Jacks Complete]

JakeGallows, please tell us more about this PIT trick.

In the UK, they tend to let you run (on motorways or other suitable roads), then radio ahead and have a stinger put down. 4 flats later you are surrounded and unable to run. There have been too many deaths due to police drivers (more in the last few years than from drink driving!) so they changed the procedures.

[nbk2000]

Googling with the term "Precision Immobilization Technique" brings up all the relevant information, including video. :)

[JakeGallows]

JacksComplete - you can indeed find all the information you want on google as per NBK. The short version is that they pull to one side of you and use their [right, for the sake of clarity] front quarter panel to push your [left] rear quarter panel to the right. Particularly at medium and high speeds this causes the front car to start fishtailing and spin out or, if done properly, to spin out immediately.

They use the stingers here, though they're referred to as spike-strips. As I consider it further I wonder why they don't use them more often here. Probably a function of the fact that the chases are unpredictable and it's difficult to get ahead of the cars. In addition there have been a number of times when I've watched cars drive crazy routes to avoid the strips. I've seen them almost run over pedestrians, officers and wildlife in order to avoid them. Besides who wants to blow out tires when you can run a car off the road? :D

[Whitey]

Also a lot of the time the suspects car avoids the strips but the police cars don't. Which leads to a cop car going at high speed suddenly having 4 flat tires. Sucks if you are the one driving and all of a sudden you lose control. Also sometimes these chases take place on main roads. So the police have to deploy the spike strip right before the suspect's car passes them, this gives the suspect the option of trying to run over the cop throwing the strip (if he is truly psycho).

Biggest lessons from Cops that are never applied. Keep your friggin mouth shut. Don't give them permission to search.

[Jacks Complete]

That PIT thing is very like the old way of spinning out a car with rear bumper contact.

Against a rear wheel drive car, you can simply nudge the rear bumper with your front bumper. This lifts one wheel, and the diff will spin it up to higher speed, whilst slowing the other wheel. At this point, contact ceases and the faster wheel makes the car spin when it hits the road again. Contact/release takes under a second, and the only defence is to see it coming and take your foot off the gas.

In the UK, the way to tell if they are going to use the stinger is that the chase cars pull back a ways. They fire it from behind cover, then return it fast, so you have 4 flats. This means you won't lose control, and you won't swerve to avoid it, since you won't see it until it is too late, as it deploys.

[nbk2000]

I believe we've had previous threads where we discussed counter-measures to spikestrips, such as sacrificial roller wheels, steel wire 'brooms' to sweep the spikes out of the strip, etc.

Also, PIT can be defeated by training in counter-steering, just as if you had hit a patch of ice on the road. :)

[tmp]

Nocturnalfrost, you're right about inmates watching COPS in jail. I observed
this during my last vacation in the local hoosegow some years ago. Could it
be that they're picking up tips on WHAT NOT TO DO during their next crime
spree ?

Two weeks ago I was waiting for a trainee to arrive and that damn COPS
show was on the telly. What I saw was disgusting ! The pork was using its
reverse sting operation, somewhere in TexASS, to bust crack cocaine users.
I've never understood why the courts allow the cops to pose as drug dealers,
commit felonies by making sales to users and then busting the users for a
fucking possession misdemeanor. IMHO, it's legalized entrapment !

[Sausagemit]

Screw trying to run from cops in a car, that is getting nearly impossible these days. Pretty much the only way you can do it is with a really fast car that doesn't stick out like a sore thumb (an Audi RS4/RS6 or BMW M3/M5 comes to mind, with run flat tires of course).

Why not learn how to run through an urban situation much quicker and more efficiently than the police.

A french guy named David Belle gave it a name, Parkor.

Video of David demonstrating Parkor (http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1854204693582154043&q=david+belle)

Parkor video (http://www.worldwidejam.tv/images/filmentries/controlled_madness.wmv)

[festergrump]

LOL! It makes perfect sense to me. Who better to teach techniques on "How to Flee" than a frenchman? They're masters at it by nature...

[nbk2000]

Well I'm impressed by the frenchie.

He goes from the roof of (what looks like) a 10 story apartment building, to ground level, in 15 seconds. :eek:

That's faster than the elevator could get you down. :)

And faster than the pigs could follow. :D

[c.Tech]

I have heaps of le parkour (AKA free running) videos, unfortunately the best 2, which are better than the French guy's videos, are too big to upload to the forum.

I will email them (only the 2) if people want them, post message me, don’t post in this thread for it will just clog it up with annoying posts.

There are also more videos at www.3run.co.uk
Look at the techniques that could be used to fight and confuse others.

[nbk2000]

There's always Rapidshare. ;)

[Chris The Great]

I've been getting into shape and have decided to take that up when I get some better endurance for running. Useful, and it looks pretty damn fun too.

However, IMO, the best thing is to just make sure you never get in a situation where you need to run from the cops.

I think one thing that not many people think about when running from the cops is that if you stop running and hide, they probably won't see you. If you get enough of a lead, then jump into a dumpster and cover your head with a box, chances are they will go right past you and you can then walk away a while later. I mean, the suspect was running, right? Nobody stops running from the police until they "get away".
They don't round a corner and drop into a dumpster or something.

Just an idea, haven't really tried it myself (yet).

[c.Tech]

There's always Rapidshare. ;)

If I don’t have an account, what’s the point? After nobody downloads them for 30 days they will be deleted.

With e-mail I can send without them getting deleted. First by sending them to myself then forward to anybody that requests.

EDIT: I've reconsidered Rapidshare.

http://rapidshare.de/files/31763677/le-parkour.zip

[Chaosmark]

Yanno, that reminds me of the urban ninja videos of guys who do the same thing, going through a city, mall, etc. and doing that sorta thing. Something to consider working at, even if just to be able to run if (when) the government decides to go off the deep end and comes after us.

[Dank$taVegas]

If I don’t have an account, what’s the point? After nobody downloads them for 30 days they will be deleted.

Links only get deleted after no one downloads them form 30 days. So with them amount of users who frequent this site, and the amount of new member that join regularly, the links will be alive and working for a long time to come.

And the point is you will be reaching a lot more people than just e-mailing them to a few people. Your time uploading them to Rapid Share will be well worth it. I'm sure you don't want hundreds of people E-Mailing you for the files. :)

I have found Rapid Share links working on this site from back in last year 2005. So by all means upload them for the forums, and post them in the Links section of the forum! ;)

[nbk2000]

In addition, it'd be good for anyone who uploads something to Rapidshare, to also include the link in the (now) sticky thread called Lots of Rapidshare Links (http://www.roguesci.org/theforum/links-literature/5388-lots-rapid-share-links.html), in the Links and Literature section, so it's always findable, compared to buried in a thread. :)

[Bugger]

Links are not deleted from rapidshare.de due to "inactivity" if you have a "premium" account with them. I understand that they are now offering a "cheap" type of premium account, for a greatly reduced fee, if you sign up to a porn site, which pays their bills.
BTW To search for rapidshare.de links by subject, try http://www.rapidshared.org . They apparently search the internet, on Google, for web-pages on which people have posted links, all of which contain the search string "rapidshare.de/files/" (in quotation marks)

[JakeGallows]

Otherwise search youtube for "free running", "free runners" - there's plenty of interesting acrobatics to watch.

Chris The Great - I think that hiding in a dumpster or whatever is one possible strategy but I think it depends on the circumstances. If you have plenty of room to run I think that's really a better option. Presumably you were trying to avoid being caught to begin with by minimizing your exposure, hiding as it were. Since it didn't work the first time, a change of strategy is probably in order, and running seems to be it.

If you watch cops, a lot of people do that: Try not to be found doing something naughty, fail, run then hide, they almost always get caught... Staying in one place gives cops the luxury of time which is to your disadvantage.

[nbk2000]

Hiding makes you immobile, thus able to be hemmed in and found.

If you've got a headstart on the pigs, don't ever lose it by stopping and thinking you're going to hide from them.

[Skean Dhu]

Heres a pro driver who won't be taken down by the PIT technique. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9131460987467226554&q=police+chase
somebody has been practicing their drifting...

[BeerWolf]

I have only seen a few episodes of "cops", I don't watch much TV.

But in the ones I have seen the thing that strikes me most is the number of people with warrants out on them, or running drugs, with expired tags on their car.

If you're doing something you don't want to be stopped for, check the car for tags, bad brake lights, etc.

And image management, IE don't look like a doper or lowlife with something to hide.

I get gruff from my friends because I make them wait while I shave before leaving the house on days off. But they also ask me why I get pulled over less often than they do. :)
-BW

[megalomania]

BeerWolf, believe it or not some criminals are not very intelligent! The very reason these people are low life career criminals to begin with is because they can’t hack it anywhere else.

One distinguishing characteristic of highly intelligent persons is thinking and planning ahead. A person of lesser intelligence is prone to impulsiveness in all of their actions. The chess master is already thinking 8 moves ahead, the scumbag criminal holds up a donut shop across from a police station.

These types of criminals take unnecessary risks, like the aforementioned driving with expired plates. They have a complete disdain for any law, and so they disregard even the most basic precautions. These criminals are the low hanging fruit that cops prey on because it is so easy for the cops to look like they are doing their job. These criminals are also the greatest threat to society because they are so visable.

There was a very entertaining TV show titled “America’s Dumbest Criminals” on a few years ago. OK, make that 10 years ago, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0211134/. Every episode featured ineptitude of a tremendous scale. My personal favorite was the crook who broke into a warehouse through the skylight, but couldn’t get back out the way he came in (he had to drop some 6-7 feet), and the doors were well secured from the outside. He had to call 911 on his cell phone for the cops to get him out. :rolleyes:

[anonymous411]

BeerWolf, believe it or not some criminals are not very intelligent! The very reason these people are low life career criminals to begin with is because they can’t hack it anywhere else.

Yep. These are same people who brag about how many times they've been arrested. What's up with that? Where's the honor in letting everyone know you can't outsmart the police and reguarly botch jobs?

One would think the point of pride would be in having an absolutely clean record. Besides, anyone who admits to committing crimes in the first place for any reason-- ever-- is just begging to be made an example of.