Abstract
Objectives
Test whether current law enforcement officers believe that they should immediately enter an active shooter scene before waiting on additional officers.
Methods
Quasi-experimental vignette design with random assignment to 10 vignettes from a universe of 324. The sample consisted of 796 current law enforcement officers from 43 states, which responded to a total of 7394 vignettes. This report utilized a mixed effects logistic model to assess the appropriateness of the hypothetical officer’s actions in responding to an active shooter event.
Results
Respondents were between 14 and 80 times more likely to agree with the hypothetical officer’s decision to immediately enter an active shooter scene when a driving force was present (i.e., ongoing gunfire or injured victims). This agreement varied across models as we explore different interaction effects.
Conclusions
Law enforcement agree with the public sentiment that officers should immediately enter active shooter locations if there is an ongoing threat.
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Funding
The authors disclose receipt of partial financial support for the execution of this project: U.S. DOJ—Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS Office) Award # 15JCOPS-21-GK-02120-SPAS.
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Endnotes
Equation 1 Multilevel logistic regression equation with level 1 explanatory variables.
Log[pij/(1 − pij)] = β0j + β1xij
Equation 2. Multilevel logistic regression equation with level 2 explanatory variables.
β0j = β0 + uij
Equation 3. Combined multilevel logistic regression equation with level 1 and 2 explanatory variables.
Log[pij/(1 − pij)] = β0 + β1xij + uij
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Appendices
Appendix 1: Vignette including all factors
On a Saturday at 3:00 pm, a police dispatcher broadcasts across the radio that there is a shooting in progress at a convenience store (max occupancy 20 people)/a grocery store (max occupancy 500 people)/a large mall (max occupancy 5000). About 3 min later, patrol unit armed with a pistol/a patrol unit armed with a pistol and rifle arrives on scene. As the first unit arrives on scene, radio traffic indicates that additional backup units are less than 2 min/2 to 5 min/more than 5 min from arriving on scene. The scene appears normal with nobody in distress/is somewhat chaotic, with several people running from the main door of the building/is somewhat chaotic, with several wounded and bleeding people running from the main door of the building. Continuous, rapid gunfire/no gunfire is heard coming from the building. The decision is made to wait for additional officers before entering the building/to establish a perimeter and wait for a SWAT team to enter the building/to immediately enter the building.
Appendix 2
Table 4
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Martaindale, M.H., Sandel, W.L. & Blair, J.P. Wait for backup or not? How police officers view their role when responding to an active shooter event. J Exp Criminol (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11292-023-09592-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11292-023-09592-8