Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting Suspect - Robert Bowers

Both CNN and the New York Times (along with other media sources) have published profiles of Robert Bowers, the man who killed at least 11 people in and around the Tree of Life synagogue, in Pittsburgh, PA.

What is being reported is that Mr. Bowers had a commercial driver's license (CDL), had no criminal history and was not known to law enforcement, owned a few guns and had a concealed carry permit.

Mr. Bowers posted frequently on-line, expressing a dislike / hatred for Jews and a dislike for President Trump and polices of the current administration.

There can be no sympathy, no possible justification, for Mr. Bowers' actions. But we must recognize that there is a growing schism of hate in the United States. People do not just snap, but have events in their lives over time that lead them to commit these atrocities.

What events, real or imagined, led Mr. Bowers to become a mass-murderer? We don't yet know, and perhaps we will never know. But we can be almost certain that there are others who feel hate towards others and are moving ever closer to the next atrocity in our communities.

Another Soldier Death on JBLM

According to the Tacoma News Tribune (November 5, 2018) a Soldier assigned to the 4th Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment, 2-2 Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 7th Infantry Division was killed in training incident on Joint Base Lewis-McChord.

“There was an incident that occurred out in a training area, where a soldier did indeed unfortunately lose his life,” 7th Infantry Division spokesman Lt. Col. Roger Cabiness told The News Tribune.

Spc. Drew Watters, 23, of Evansville, Indiana, died on Sunday, but no other details about his death have been given.. The incident is under investigation.
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There seems to have been a large number of JBLM Soldier deaths over the past few months. Our thoughts and prayers for the family of Spc. Watters and the other JBLM Soldiers who have recently died.

3 Children Killed at School Bus Stop

Alyssa Shepherd, 24, has been charged with three counts of reckless homicide and one count of passing a school bus causing injury. Three children died last week after a Shepherd hit them while they crossed a highway to their school bus. She says she didn't recognize it was a school bus until it was too late. (KOMO 4 News, November 5, 2018)
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Passing stopped school buses is all too common, and tragically results in the death or injury of children getting to or from their bus.

There can be no excuse for passing a stopped school bus, but it does happen. In another example, just a few days ago, a 7-year-old boy was killed at school bus stop in Pennsylvania by hit-and-run driver.

To improve the safety of children at school bus stops, we need to re-think these school bus stop locations. Rather than have school buses stop at every driveway along a road, school bus stops should be consolidated in areas where the bus can pull safely off the road, protecting the children as they load and unload the bus.

It simply is not safe for children to cross the street at every driveway to board school buses. Yes, drivers are supposed to stop for school buses, but they don't always do so.

 

Operating in Hostile and Non-Permissive Environments:
A Survival and Resource Guide for Those Who Go in Harm’s Way

 

Military personnel deployed to a combat area, their supporting contractors overseas, government civilian employees overseas, non-government organizations (NGOs), journalists working on international stories, businesses attempting to establish a foothold in developing countries, and individual travelers to remote areas of the world can all find themselves in hostile and non-permissive environments. This guide covers a broad range of subjects that are intended to aid individuals, living and working in dangerous areas, in being safer in their daily lives and in being better able to protect themselves and survive in case of an emergency, disaster, or hostile action.

 

 

 

Counterintelligence (CI) Awareness

The Counterintelligence (CI) Awareness Program's purpose is to make DoD and Industry Security personnel aware of their responsibility to report unusual activities or behaviors and various threats from foreign intelligence entities, other illicit collectors of US defense information, and/or terrorists.
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Defeating the Bulletproof Vest

An article in The National Interest (May 5, 2018) 5 Ways to Get a Bullet through a 'Bulletproof' Vest discussed ways of defeating body armor. Modern concealable body armor ("bulletproof vests") are very effective at stopping bullets fired from handguns from penetrating them, but this does not mean that an adversary wearing concealable body armor can't be defeated.

One recommendation is to shoot for the pelvic region. While I do agree that the pelvis is a viable target, it must be understood that there are no organs or structures inside the area commonly known as the pelvic region that are responsible for Central Nervous System function. To medically stop a threat, we need to incapacitate them.  Incapacitation of the human body occurs in one of two ways, destructive trauma to the central nervous system which results in life function/consciousness failure or significant blood loss that leads to life function/consciousness failure.

To immobilize a threat we have to sever or collapse a load bearing structure, shatter bone and injure supporting muscle groups to the point that the threat is unable to stand and/or move. Can a bullet shatter bone?  Absolutely if bone is struck it can break and shatter bone, but this is far from guaranteed (it’s also likely the bullet will punch through the pelvic bone without shattering it). Can a bullet destroy a muscle's ability to operate?  Absolutely, in fact this is more likely than bone destruction, though of the two, bone destruction is more likely to cause immobilization.

Heavier bullets, .45ACP, 10mm, .44 Magnum will be more effective than 9mm, .38 Spcl, when making pelvic region shots.

The Mozambique Drill has a shooter fire two shots center of mass on a target and follow up with a shot to the head. This is an excellent drill to practice. Make it a habit to follow up each of your shooting strings with a head shot.

Note too that while concealable body armor protects the front and back of the wearer, the sides may be unarmored, and there is no ballistic armor in the armpit area.

Ballistic armor can often be defeated with non-firearm weapons such as crossbows. Although, heavier soft armor and hard plates can defeat bolts and arrows as well.

So, if you find yourself in a gunfight against someone wearing concealable body armor, your handgun bullets are unlikely to penetrate the armor, but you can defeat the armor by focusing your shots on the head and the pelvis.

 

Operating in Hostile and Non-Permissive Environments:
A Survival and Resource Guide for Those Who Go in Harm’s Way

 



Military personnel deployed to a combat area, their supporting contractors overseas, government civilian employees overseas, non-government organizations (NGOs), journalists working on international stories, businesses attempting to establish a foothold in developing countries, and individual travelers to remote areas of the world can all find themselves in hostile and non-permissive environments. This guide covers a broad range of subjects that are intended to aid individuals, living and working in dangerous areas, in being safer in their daily lives and in being better able to protect themselves and survive in case of an emergency, disaster, or hostile action.

Law Enforcement Failed to See the Threat of White Nationalism

New York Times Magazine (November 3, 2018) has published a new article on White Nationalism in the United States.

Data compiled by the University of Maryland’s Global Terrorism Database shows that the number of terror-related incidents has more than tripled in the United States since 2013, and the number of those killed has quadrupled. In 2017, there were 65 incidents totaling 95 deaths. In a recent analysis of the data by the news site Quartz, roughly 60 percent of those incidents were driven by racist, anti-Muslim, anti-Semitic, antigovernment or other right-wing ideologies. Left-wing ideologies, like radical environmentalism, were responsible for 11 attacks. Muslim extremists committed just seven attacks.

 According to a recent report by the nonpartisan Stimson Center, between 2002 and 2017, the United States spent $2.8 trillion — 16 percent of the overall federal budget — on counterterrorism. Terrorist attacks by Muslim extremists killed 100 people in the United States during that time. Between 2008 and 2017, domestic extremists killed 387 in the United States, according to the 2018 Anti-Defamation League report.
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White Nationalism is a significant concern, but one that is too often ignored.

Groups like Atomwaffen are recruiting on our military installations and are active in our community.

White Nationalists hold conventions in our cities.

The challenge faced by law enforcement is how to identify and prevent criminal activity while at the same time protecting the rights of free speech and assembly. Mass surveillance is not the answer, but neither is turning a blind eye to White Nationalists recruiting members on our military installations.

That Sign Telling You How Fast You’re Driving May Be Spying On You

The next time you drive past one of those road signs with a digital readout showing how fast you’re going, don’t simply assume it’s there to remind you not to speed. It may actually be capturing your license plate data.

According to recently released US federal contracting data, the Drug Enforcement Administration will be expanding the footprint of its nationwide surveillance network with the purchase of “multiple” trailer-mounted speed displays “to be retrofitted as mobile LPR [License Plate Reader] platforms.”

The DEA launched its National License Plate Reader Program in 2008; it was publicly revealed for the first time during a congressional hearing four years after that. The DEA’s most recent budget describes the program as “a federation of independent federal, state, local, and tribal law enforcement license plate readers linked into a cooperative system, designed to enhance the ability of law enforcement agencies to interdict drug traffickers, money launderers or other criminal activities on high drug and money trafficking corridors and other public roadways throughout the U.S.,” primarily along the southwest border region, and the country’s northeast and southeast corridors.

“License plate readers are inherently a form of mass surveillance,” investigative researcher Dave Maass of the nonprofit Electronic Frontier Foundation told Quartz. “You look at something like a wiretap and most of the time it’s looking for a specific person and capturing specific conversations with that person. But here they are collecting information on everybody, not all of whom have been accused of a crime, in case they may one day commit a crime. This is un-American.”

The DEA does not release how much of the data it collects is connected to crimes. The nonprofit American Civil Liberties Union of Maryland found that only 47 out of every 1 million plates scanned by police in the state, or 0.005%, were linked to a serious crime. The Atlanta PD captured data from 128.5 million license plates last year; 786,580 of those—0.6%—were suspected of having a connection to a crime. Of 22 million license plates recorded in Austin, Texas during that same period, 3,200 of them—0.01%—were linked to alleged criminal activity.

Jay Stanley, a senior policy analyst with the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, told Quartz he thinks it’s wrong for the government to arbitrarily collect such a broad swath of data in the first place. Holding onto it for future analysis only makes things worse, he said.

However, the law enforcement community at large argues that none of this data is being used to spy on everyday Americans.

“We don’t know when somebody’s going to commit a crime, we don’t know when somebody’s going to run over somebody and take off,” said Joe Giacalone. “So that data should be there forever. We never know when we’re going to need it.”

Kabrina Chang, a professor of law and ethics at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business told Quartz, “We as a society have to think long and hard about the consequences. I don’t think anyone would begrudge law enforcement help in doing their jobs; we all want them to do their jobs really, really well. But what are we willing to give up?”  (Quartz, October 1, 2018)
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This type of mass surveillance is extremely concerning. When only a small fraction of a percent of the data collected by the government (with LPR) is linked to a serious crime we have to ask whether the collection of such data should be continued.