A TRAGIC LESSON IN OFF

A TRAGIC LESSON IN OFF-DUTY SURVIVAL

Off-duty, hungry and in civilian clothes, Officer Cornel Young Jr. stopped at an all-night diner at 1:40 a.m. to get a take-out steak sandwich. What he got instead were bullets to the kidney, liver and brain -- fatal fire from unexpected and tragic sources: 2 officers from his own department.

Young, 29, with 3 years on the job in Providence (RI), was added to the growing list of victims of the obscenely named phenomenon called "friendly" fire less than 3 weeks ago.

Since then, the tactical lessons that could be learned from what by all reasonable accounts was a terrible mistake have been obliterated by a
firestorm of controversy and rage.

Young was the son of the highest-ranking black officer on Providence PD, a major who directs the agency's community services division. Neither of the 2 officers who shot him is African-American. According to the department's initial reconstruction of what happened, they mistook him for an armed suspect in the midst of a potentially violent, fast-action call.

But some angry activist voices have sensationally charged that the shooting was a deliberate assassination, or at best an intemperate reaction by the shooters that was influenced by racial bias. Demands have been made that the 2 officers be fired and charged with murder.

These allegations will be officially resolved -- though probably never put to rest -- by a state grand jury and a special investigative team announced last week by the RI attorney general. If protesters get their way, there will also be an "independent" investigation conducted by some unnamed task force outside RI. In addition, the FBI has opened "a preliminary civil rights inquiry" into the case.

Meanwhile, it is important to explore what might be called the "blood lessons" of Young's unfortunate slaying from an officer-survival standpoint. By assessing this case for tactical teaching points, it's possible that ALL officers -- whether off-duty or on, and regardless of race -- can be made safer.

Young's shooting went down 1/28/00 in the icy parking lot of a joint called Fidas Restaurant, a popular destination in Providence for young people leaving nearby nightclubs and bars after closing. Described as "a ramshackle assemblage of wood paneling and Formica that smells of grease," the place is a common flashpoint for assaults, disorderly conduct and sundry violence. In the '80s, a small-time hood was murdered there in "gangland" style.

In the last moments of Officer Young's life, here's how the action played out, according to what investigators have pieced together so far:

As Young, enjoying a night off, was waiting inside to pick up a post-midnight snack, a catfight broke out between 2 women in their 20s who were already in the place and 2 others about the same ages who had just arrived. There was a "stray glance" someone didn't like, "quick-tempered words," a "nasty quarrel," pushing and shoving. Then one of the newcomers smashed a glass and slashed at her rivals with a jagged shard. While an employee called 911, the manager ordered everybody out.

As the screaming bunch spilled into the parking lot, 2 companions of the newcomers who'd been waiting outside in a Chevy Camaro got involved. One, a sometime stripper in her 20s, reportedly has a rap sheet in ME that includes armed robbery. The other was a boyfriend, a 30-year-old career criminal currently on probation for escape and car theft.

As the fight escalated, this woman yelled to her boyfriend: "Get the gun!" He grabbed a .22-cal. Jennings semi-auto from the Chevy and was brandishing it when 2 uniformed officers rolled up in response to the 911 dispatch.

From inside, Young saw the flashing overheads and drew his off-duty pistol. It's believed he told people inside the diner to "get down," that he was a police officer. Then in what the Providence chief later called "an act of heroism," he charged out into the parking lot through the same door the brawlers had tumbled through, apparently intending to help his fellow cops.

Those officers, guns out, were yelling at the career criminal to put his gun down ("Drop the weapon! Drop the weapon! Drop the weapon!"). When they spotted Young, they yelled the same command at him. If Young identified himself as a cop in the parking lot -- and the evidence so far strongly suggests he did not -- they didn't hear him in the hubbub.

The career criminal complied with the officers' commands without firing a shot. Officer Young ignored their orders and continued to grip his pistol. He pointed it at the suspect, but the officers were "close to his line of fire," according to a PD spokesman. It's speculated that Young may not have registered that the uniforms were directing their commands at him, a fellow officer, but thought instead that they were just trying to get the suspect disarmed.

After "several" commands, the officers apparently perceived Young as a resistant second suspect, with the imminent capability of shooting them. Both opened fire on him. He went down, less than a minute after the officers were dispatched the scene. He died later at a hospital after "massive blood loss" from wounds to his abdomen, chest and head, the first RI LEO in memory to be killed by fire from his own.

One of the shooters was a rookie, working only his eighth night on patrol. The other, who'd recently been involved and cleared of any wrongdoing in another minority shooting, graduated from the same police academy class as Officer Young.

Typically these classes consist of about 25 cadets, but in this case the department says there were 50. Some critics in the black community insist
that the officer from Young's class "must" have recognized him. With only 33 blacks on Providence PD, all "should be fully known by their [468] fellow police officers," according to the local NAACP president. The fact that the lighting was dim, that Young was wearing a baseball cap and that a decision had to be made in milliseconds cuts no ice with those who hold this point of view.

The gentlest critics charge that the shooting was a form of "racial profiling;" because he was black, Young was "automatically" considered to be a threatening suspect by the uniformed partners. The most extreme activists have broached the possibility (with no known evidence) that he was deliberately shot, as a racist outburst against blacks on the department. With the flames of discontent crackling higher and higher on unbridled talk of racism, clergymen at Young's wake "had to set up a room for angry people after 2 men began punching walls," according to one report.

According to the FBI, there were 28 officers unintentionally shot to death by colleagues in the U.S. and its territories during a recent 10-year period. Five were killed during training exercises; the rest were mistaken for suspects or struck by stray bullets during shootouts.

In the wake of Young's death, Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz, a frequent police critic, has claimed that an off-duty black officer who is not in uniform is "statistically more likely to be shot than a white police officer. We're talking instinctive action. You can't expect refined sociological calculation when you're in a crisis situation."

But a spokesman for Providence PD insists that had Young been white, "under the same set of circumstances, we'd be in the same situation we're in now. This is not a black-and-white issue. The only color here is blue. ANY officer in plainclothes needs to be concerned that people will recognize him."

In the Street Survival Seminar, Calibre Press teaches that when you intervene in a police matter off-duty and in civilian clothes, you assume many risks, regardless of racial considerations. Not the least of these is the unpredictable results of uniformed officers showing up and not realizing you are in law enforcement.

Consequently, in a special block of instruction on off-duty survival, the Seminar advocates a very CONSERVATIVE approach to intervention in potentially violent situations when you are not on-duty and do not have your usual full complement of police equipment, including your uniform.

Here are some highlights from the presentation:

1. First, when you encounter a situation off-duty that seems to require police action, you must CONSCIOUSLY EVALUATE whether YOUR involvement is necessary or desirable, given the circumstances. How important and urgent is the need for your intervention? Will there really be SERIOUS harm done if you don't intervene?

Considering that you are likely to be alone (or possibly with your family), that you will probably lack certain important pieces of gear (radio, vest, OC, handcuffs, for example), that there may be multiple suspects involved (and/or hidden suspects you're unaware of), that there may be environmental factors working against you (lack of cover, crowds of civilians, darkness, etc.), that your intervention may actually spark an escalation of violence, your best plan of action may be to:

-- go to a safe location

-- call 911

-- continue to assess the situation in Condition Yellow or Condition Orange

-- gather accurate intelligence like a good witness until uniformed troops arrive.

Remember: you have NO legal obligation in any jurisdiction to get involved -- if intervention requires that you behave recklessly, carelessly or suicidally. If your department policy mandates that you "take action" when witnessing a crime off-duty, that obligation can generally be fulfilled by calling the police and monitoring the situation from a safe vantage point.

2. Most survival-conscious officers have trained themselves to NOT intervene off-duty UNLESS their life or the life of another innocent party is IMMINENTLY in danger. In other words you intercede ONLY when deadly force is justified -- not "just" to make an arrest.

3. If you do decide you must get involved, try to have someone call 911 to advise that you are an off-duty police officer at the scene. Get them to describe you and your clothing, if possible. This will affect the mind-set of responding officers.

4. When uniformed cops arrive, have your badge out and visible if you carry your shield off duty (some officers carry only their photo credentials). But don't rely on this gesture to provide much, if any, protection. At a distance, in dim light and under high stress, your badge may not be seen. Or it may not be given credibility if the officers don't recognize you personally.

(According to witnesses, Officer. Young did not have his badge out when he entered the restaurant parking lot. It was in his pocket and was discovered only when a patrolman was searching for his ID as he lay bleeding on the ground after he was shot.)

5. Some trainers advise to hold your badge next to your gun for the best chance of being seen, since the eyes of responding officers are most likely to go immediately to your drawn firearm. However, you're probably safer to REHOLSTER your gun when other officers arrive, unless doing so would put you, them or innocent civilians in jeopardy. Until they sort out who's who, your gun is probably your greatest personal liability in the presence of arriving officers.

6. If you have cover, maintain it. You can communicate verbally from there.

7. Make your hands visible. Having responding officers see that you are unarmed and non-threatening will work to calm them and protect you.

8. Verbally identify yourself as a cop -- not once and not in a normal tone of voice, but REPEATEDLY and VERY LOUD. Keep shouting out: "Police! Don't shoot! Off-duty officer!" until you get acknowledgement and directions as to what you should do. Remember that the noise and excitement of the scene, combined with stress-induced auditory blocking, may prevent responding officers from hearing you initially.

9. When commands are issued, follow them promptly and completely. Expect to be treated like a suspect until your LE status can be verified.

10. And finally, the most important rule of all: If you have a gun in your hand, NEVER, EVER turn toward an armed on-duty officer.

When Newsline discussed these guidelines with a spokesman for the RI attorney general's, he said all were relevant to the Young case.

As things stand now, the career criminal who was brandishing the .22 when the uniforms arrived in the restaurant parking lot has been charged with felony murder, on grounds that he initiated the violent series of events that resulted in Young's death by flashing the first gun, even though he did not shoot the young officer.

He's Hispanic, and charging him has infuriated some minority citizens, too. The executive director of the state's ACLU chapter says he's a "convenient scapegoat," while police are the guilty shooters. He "dropped his weapon and was not actively involved in criminal activity," the executive director told a reporter. Supporters of the suspect have picketed Superior Court, chanting slogans and holding signs that read: "No Justice, No Peace, No Racist Police."

Last week [2/10/00], a Methodist minister who once worked with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was quoted in a Providence newspaper as saying that police officers "should be disarmed." Pointing out that "80% of police calls don't involve weapons" and that "female officers routinely disarm suspects without ever drawing their guns," he recommended in all seriousness that the department "store weapons at the police station and call for them only
if they're needed."

An essayist in the newspaper, identified as the director of the RI Committee for Nonviolence Initiatives and a board member of the Center for Police and Community, enthusiastically took up the cry. "Had the 3 officers' weapons been safely stored at the police station" on the night Young was killed, she wrote, "everyone might have benefited." Without guns, the responding officers "might have relied on the authority that comes with being uniformed police to quell the disturbance," and Cornel Young might still be with us, she declared.

She called for "serious evaluation of police policies and training," with an eye toward revising deadly force guidelines to give more emphasis to warning shots and to "firing to disarm" (wound only). In her Eden, officers would be permitted to "shoot to kill" only after they have been fired on first.

Cornel Young's father, on the other hand, says he is angered at the protests over his son's death and "by the thought that some people may be using [the slaying] to advance their own causes." What he wants, he says, is to find out exactly what happened "to make sure this doesn't happen again anywhere, to any cop of any color."

Fortunately, while this drama continues to unfold, the officers who fired on Young have access to peer counselors and to mental health professionals. Providence PD has brought in an officer who killed another cop several years ago in a similar (white/black) incident to help them deal with the trauma they're experiencing. The officers, on paid administrative leave during the investigation, have spent most of their time since the shooting in seclusion and counseling.

"I can't believe this is happening," the rookie officer was quoted as saying last weekend. "This is all a nightmare. It hurts. It hurts a lot. You see the city tearing apart over this.

"I wish it were me laying in the ground right now," he said, crying. "I really wish it was me."

Cornel Young Jr., meanwhile, was posthumously promoted to sergeant in time for his funeral.

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