chutchinson

I want to briefly go over the principles of contact-cover. I hope that everyone was taught this once upon a time.

While working the front line I see a lot of officers (sworn and non-sworn) interacting with subjects and suspects. Most of the time the officer is in some sort of interview stance (but not always). Sadly when more then one officer is present they stand next to each other or one walks away to call information in and/or take notes.

The way I work contact-cover is this. The first officer on scene is the contact officer. Second and any others are cover officers. If you work with a partner then you can decide upon approach who is contact and who is cover.

Contact Officer: Your job as the contact officer is to be the primary officer. You are in command and you do all the talking. Maintain a nice interview stance and a good reactionary gap. Keep your eyes on the subject and take in what they are saying.

Cover Officer: You have the most important job and possibly and easier job then the cover officer. You need to shut up and watch. Make sure you are paying full attention to what your subject is doing. Take note of what they are wearing and look for anything that seems out of the ordinary. Watch and try to pick up any pre-attack indicators that the subject is giving off. Place yourself in a position where you can react but you are not in your subject’s line of sight. If there is more then one subject then position yourself so that you can keep an eye on all of them.

An important part of the contact-cover principal is your positioning. I normally prefer to have the cover officer directly behind the subject. That way as the cover officer I can see my cover and they can see me. Also we can see what is coming up behind either of us and we are in a good position if the subject wants to fight or run. If they decide to fight then they cannot take both of us on at the same time. I see a lot of officers standing next to each other while talking to someone. This doesn’t really help much other then make you both a target.
A lot of the factors relating to positioning will depend on your environment and the situation you are dealing with. For example when I was working as a Peace Officer for a local town my partner and I stopped a car for a minor traffic offence. After approaching the vehicle my partner noticed alcohol in the vehicle and requested the occupants to step out. Once all 3 occupants were outside he had them stand in a group about 10 feet away from the car on the passenger side. He then moved to the driver’s side to begin the search.
He had positioned the passengers in a way where he could watch them through the rear passenger window while conducting a search. Had I been more experienced I would have positioned myself near the passengers. Ideally I would have been in front of our patrol car where I could see my partner, the car and the passengers. This would have allowed me to watch their body language to see if one seemed nervous about where in the car my partner was searching and it would have kept us both safer. However I was a brand spanking new rookie and so I didn’t think of that. I wanted to search the car at the same time. So I did. After my partner redirected me to the proper location I still didn’t know why I was standing no where near the suspect car. After all isn't that where the action was? It was only after the incident that my partner explained it to me.

Take a look at this video.
http://blutube.policeone.com/Media/3...oliceshooting/

The reason I show this video is this. If you carefully watch the video you will notice that as the offender is placing the rifle down on the ground he moves his right arm towards his back. If you stop the video at 00:05 you will notice a sidearm in the suspects hand. The cover officer just happens to be behind the suspect and fires the two shots. If you put it all together it goes something like this.

Contact: Put the gun down! Put it down, down!
(Suspect drops his body and moves his right leg back. He is placing the rifle down with his left hand, his right hand moves behind him and disappears from view. Unknown to the contact officer he is grabbing a sidearm that is tucked into his pants behind him.)
Cover: GUN! (Shots fired)

Now that was contact-cover at its finest (even though it was a training video)…Now I know what your all thinking. Your thinking “that’s great but we aren’t armed”
My answer: So what. It still works.
Let’s take that video and imagine this. You approach a suspicious individual that you have watched for some time via CCTV. You decide with your partner that you will split up and approach from two different directions. This was you can get the most out of your contact-cover. The contact officer approaches and stands about 6 feet away. They identify themselves and ask to see some ID. The suspect responds “sure no problem officer” and drops their right leg back before lifting a shirt slightly to reach into the rear pants pocket. Your cover officer (being very sneaky and making sure the subject does not know there is anyone behind them) see’s a weapon and yells out while diving on the would be attacker.
Sure beats having the cover officer standing beside you and you both being surprised when the seemingly compliant subject pulls a weapon or dives towards you both.

Another important thing is to work out a method of communication between contact and cover. Obviously there won’t be a lot of communication but think of ways for the contact officer to tell the cover officer that it is time for hands on without alerting the subject. One way I like to do this is by taking a phrase from verbal judo. If you as the contact officer believe that you now have no alternative other then to use physical force say “Sir/Ma’am I am begging you, is there anything I can say to change your mind.”
As soon as the cover officer hears “begging” they should already be moving to take down the subject. When done for real the contact officer should not be able to get the whole sentence out before the subject is already on the ground. If you plan on using that then make sure everyone is trained to know what to do and make sure you can articulate why you took the person down. It shouldn’t be too hard if you know the law and you are acting within your authority.

Try rehearsing some of the incidents that you most commonly deal with. If you work with other officers then spend 10 minutes going through contact-cover principles. Decide where the best places to stand would be and how you plan to communicate that it is time for physical force.

Stay Safe,

Chris