The third and final day of the conference was all head knowledge in the classroom. Alas I was not able to shoot the match this year due to time constraints (the match consistently runs late – every year I’ve attended it has been behind).
The first class of the day was a presentation by Karl Rehn about a forthcoming study he performed on the performance of iron sights, lasers, and slide-mounted red dot sights. I won’t spoil his finding except to say I won’t be purchasing a Smith and Wesson Core or Glock MOS any time soon.
The second class was put on by local researcher and LEO John Hearne. John walked us through comprehensive FBI research on the profile of cop-killers and what can be done to alter the “deadly mix” leading to violent confrontations. The statistics were beneficial but the profiling was extremely valuable.
The final class of the day (for me) was Tom Givens’s study of mass shootings. Long story short: gun free zones aren’t and they don’t work. As good as LEO might be, they are still too far away. One thing I did not know is that in the VA school massacre the SWAT team was on campus, less than a mile away at the time the shooter began murdering students. When they arrived on the scene they were unable to easily access the building because the shooter had chained the doors. In another shooting the murderer used his vehicle to block the exit door. The Aurora, CO shooter took precautions to go to the only theater in his area that was a so-called gun free zone. Does anyone really believe a “no guns” sign is going to stop these people? Apparently they do, despite all the evidence and all logic.
