9-Year-Old Accidentally Shoots Her Instructor Dead - With An Uzi -
On The Gun Range
On The Gun Range
(and The Lessons For Ferguson, Missouri)
This is a
very tragic case for both parties. For the victims my heartfelt
sympathy. Training children is often fraught with complications. You
are dealing with young persons who often just don't think before
doing something. It may be because they are absent-minded or just
get too excited to remember your advice.
The training
range is one such place where excitement often gets the better of
premeditated thought. There is no guidance in such situations.
There is no guarantee that such an incident can never happen again.
This is one such situation where there are no rules. No devised
test can prepare you for a situation where a child does something
'stupid'.
I suppose
the one thing that future instructors can do is to always be
vigilant, no matter how normal the situation. It's like security.
It is,
sadly, impossible to be 100% vigilant 100% of the time in such an
environment – but this is the only way to avoid accidents during
training on the Gun Range.
I recall an
incident many years ago, where, let me put it this way, I was asked to
'accompany', let's call them, a 'tactical' response team, somewhere in
the world.
The Officer
in question 'forgot' a very important procedure – which, in other
circumstances, could have resulted either in his/ her death and the
death of a colleague, simply, because, I am convinced, the Officer
'forgot' a basic rule.
I knew
immediately what the issue was, but in those split seconds
where the
Officer and his/her colleague could have been killed, the rule had
been simply forgotten.
If a grown
experienced individual, probably having worked a long or difficult
shift can (sometimes) forget something so basic, then how in heavens
name can one expect a 9-year-old to remember everything all at once?
I want to go
back to Ferguson, Missouri and the shooting to death of Michael
Brown, a Black teenager by a White Police Officer.
We now know
that at least 11 possibly 12 or 13 shots were fired at the victim,
Michael Brown. Where the factors of racism, fear, absence of
community policing and, in this Officer's case, probably minimal
(ever) contact with Black people except in the course of his work as
an arresting Officer, come into play, all combine in an explosive
combination when confronted with a youngster who simply does
something 'stupid' – does not obey the instructions of the Officer.
I am just guessing – and we will probably never know the full
truth – but all of the factors I mention earlier - racism,
harassment of the Black community and their alienation from the
'White' Police Force in Ferguson, Missouri because of the
disproportionate make-up of the force – 95-98%% - White in a
predominantly Black neighborhood where poverty abounds, crime and or fear of Black people grips the White segregated community in their very own 'White ghetto', and a feeling that each night in Ferguson, for some (perhaps many) White Officers, is more like a bad night in Fallujah than normal Policing (so
distant are they from the local people and their problems, their
hopes for themselves and their children , their desires, their
feelings, as human beings.) It's a crazy unreal situation - and
man-made - caused by conscious racism – being reflected every day
and night in the physical presence of the Officers whose task should
be 'To Protect and Serve'.
I have no
doubt that such is reflected in many parts of the country and in many
parts of the world where, either consciously or unconsciously, the
same pattern as in Ferguson, Missouri, exists.
Well that's
my take on a double tragedy.
Perhaps they
both might invite Steven Seagal, Chuck Norris, Woopi Goldberg, James
Earl Jones, Michael Moore, Karl Malone and President Jimmy Carter as
celebrities with national and international status, and as a 'task
force', to sometime offer the benefit of their wide and diverse
experiences to what are situations requiring a different mindset –
and after significant grass roots reform and overhaul at the local
and political levels in Missouri?
Patrick Emek
