WM police hold ‘SWAT school’ at Tier 1

WM police hold ‘SWAT school’ at Tier 1

Langston: ‘ West Memphis is very fortunate to have this top- tier, world- class facility nearby’

news@theeveningtimes.com West Memphis Police Captain Bob Langston teamed up with Tier 1 Group trainer Rob French to introduce the West Memphis SWAT team to the citizens academy. The WMPD special response group was formed in 1996 and features both West Memphis officers and five reservists employed at T1G.

Langston expressed pride in the relationship with T1G.

“We use T1G facilities a lot and we use them for free,” said Langston. “West Memphis is very fortunate to have this top-tier, world-class facility nearby with such a great working relationship.

We use the driving tracks, and the medical training they have. We come out here to train our SWAT guys a couple times a month.”

The West Memphis Police Department organized a statewide SWAT School based at T1G. The class quickly filled to 24 and 30 other applicants were turned away.

“They ran a five day SWAT school out here, with about 20 different agencies” said French. “They slept here. They ate here. What we normally would have charged would have been about $58,000, but we charged only food.” The SWAT school also served as a try out for new WMPD SWAT members.

In years past police faced a challenge mustering even a small class to run through training, so the department opened the school statewide to ensure enough participants to produce more new hometown members.

“It is hard for us to hire people,” said Langston.

“As hard as it is to find people, it is even harder to find SWAT guys. In times past, within an hour we had four going out and we had two left. On the next day we were down to one person.”

The Department slotted 16 for SWAT officers on its organization chart. Only one new candidate this year was produced from the sixty hour training regiment for the local SWAT team.

“We cannot fill that,” said Langston. “13 is all we can field. Thankfully we have Tier 1 here, I have five of them for our special response team. We call them and they come running.”

T1G buys explosive and weapons in bulk and the WMPD fills some of its weapons needs at the company

cost.

“We purchase guns through them,” said Langston. “Several years ago when we got our rifles, they worked out a purchase for us for their cost.”

How about that new guy?

“He will be on a year probation,” said Langston. “He is our grunt. He’ll carry all our equipment. He works hard. If he is around in a year, he will have earned his patches.”

Langston described the functions of the SWAT team which rolls into duty more than once a month on average. Drug raid and felony arrests formally assessed as high risk for violence mandate calls for SWAT. A SWAT call lasts at least four hours and teams from other areas are scheduled for relief if needed for longer stand-offs.

“If patrol is after somebody that shot at them and runs into a house, then we call out SWAT,” said Langston. “We are not sending patrol officer to go in there and get him out, because they are not equipped for that.”

The SWAT team is filled with officers across the divisions in the police department.

“We have four or five in patrol, some criminal investigators, some in narcotics and other divisions,” said Langston.

By John Rech