Awareness is the best way to avoid an attack.  Once the attack happens, even under good circumstances, you are likely in for a world of hurt.  This comes to us from Gabe Suarez’s Warrior Talk newsletter:

Fred was temporarily assigned to county jail until he caught the chain for a nickel at CDC…probably Soledad. He was a convict, and the ink on his arms was a resume of murders and other miscellaneous violence. Fred worked for me. His main goal in life was to be able to write to his wife and kids while he was inside. Funny what a pad of paper and a few pencils and envelops can get you.

I asked him once when we were out of earshot. He had stabbed plenty of enemies in his life, many never accounted for in the legal system.

“You grab the shank like this”, he showed it held in forward grip close to the body. “Slap ‘em in the face like this…then run it in hard and fast until he drops. Shank ‘em in the guts and in the balls”. He explained how that worked well against one target…specially if he was bigger than you.

“If you have two or three you need to take, grab it like this”, he showed reverse grip. “Attack the face, then when they block, trap the hand and stab hard into the neck…leave that guy and go for the next one, then come back for seconds”.

Most guys that study the knife study from the perceived notion of defending against the knife. They begin with the premise that they are unarmed and that the bad man has the knife. In reality that is as difficult a place to begin as facing a skilled gunman already pointed in at 5 yards, finger on the trigger, and you have no gun. Why do we do that to ourselves? If at the beginning of the fight, you are thinking, “Oh me … oh my…I am going to get in legal hot water for this”, you have already lost.

Perhaps its time to get the mind right about this subject and leave the nonsense and foolishness aside. If we change the point of view to a man armed with a knife, the entire table changes. Perhaps it is time to leave the “Unarmed Good Guy facing The Knife Armed bad Guy” illusion and look at reality through different, darker, and more violent eyes.

My thanks to Gabe Suarez for the permission to reprint the article here.  I strongly encourage you to check out his training and to sign up for his free Warrior Talk newsletter.

Of course, I instantly like Yojimbo 2.  It has an aggressively profiled blade, good ergonomics in the G10 handles, and a nice heft for a defensive folder.  It is very ruggedly constructed.

I swapped the polished steel pocketclip for a black one from a Spyderco Delica 4.  The clip holes are drilled to the same dimensions, but the Yojimbo 2 has English standard threaded screws, while the Delica screws have metric threading.  Keep the same screws.

Mr. Janich posted on Spydercoforums.com that you can order a black clip and black screws for a Para-Military 2 and the whole shebang will fit on the Yojiimbo 2.  I am personally hoping they do a black coated blade and black hardware version of this knife as a sprint run down the road.

Distributors have temporarily run out of this knife, but most sites say they will be restocked on or about 12/20/11.  The Yojimbo 2 was in pre-order status for months, so the initial shipment from Golden, CO has dried up quickly.

I intend on carrying this knife on duty, so I’ll have a better review of how it performs forthcoming.  In the meantime, I took a few photos…

Randall is a police officer who likes sharp and pointy things.

Ed. note:  At the time of this writing, there is a single Yojimbo 2 knife in stock at Amazon.com, and they promise delivery by Christmas Eve.  If you click this link, we get a small portion of any sales made on Amazon.

Here’s what then happened in the next few seconds:

Look at how fast this suspect attacked the officer with the knife:

05:01:55 – The officer stops his patrol car and shifts into park.

05:00:00 – The suspect exits his car.

05:00:02 – The suspect is slashes the officer in the face with a butcher knife.

If you’ve never seen a perfect example of the Tueller Drill, you now have.  Dennis Teuller was a police officer with the Salt Lake City PD, and he did a number of experiments regarding distance and reaction time.

The classic Teuller Drill essentially demonstrated a subject standing 21′ away from an officer can close the distance and stab an officer in about 1.5 seconds.  The average officer can probably draw his firearm and fire one shot in about the same amount of time.

The distance between the officer attacked and the suspect when he exited the car?  About 22′.

I know there are some people who might think the officers waited too long to start shooting the suspect.  Technically, the criticism would be correct insomuch as deadly force was justified prior to the actual use of deadly force.  However, reaction time isn’t an easy thing to calculate when under stress and in bad lighting conditions.

Reaction Time and Stress

In a reaction time study I reported on here, under ideal conditions, a police officer who knew he was going to be attacked with deadly force (no decision making involved), had a reaction time from threat to first shot of 0.39 seconds.  Keep in mind that is under ideal conditions:  lighting, weather and full knowledge of the threat.

In anything less than ideal conditions, reaction time will become longer.  Officers who are in body alarm response (aka “fight or flight”) suffer from various vision and cognitive effects, meaning reaction time can be slowed as the officers try to see what is in the suspect’s hand and form a proper response to the threat.

Lighting Conditions

As I reported in the article Visual Perception in Low Light, under non-threatening/non-stressful conditions well rested recruits had a great deal of difficulty in identifying known threats in low light.  In low light conditions, objects in the hand are very difficult to identify with any certainty.  In the dynamic conditions of a violent encounter, threat identification becomes vastly more difficult.

The shooting happened at about 5 am.  It was dark out with mainly lights from the patrol cars illuminating the scene.  The white light from the patrol cars were pointed in various directions, though at least one officer pointed his spotlight on the driver’s door (good job!)

The strobe effect of the emergency lights on the cars can also hinder the ability of officers to clearly identify an object or action.

The lighting conditions on the scene may have been enough alone to slow the officers reaction time simply because they were not able to instantly identify the knife.

Lessons:

• An end of the pursuit is not the end of the incident.
• Deadly attacks happen extremely fast.
• Distance is time and safety.
• Never give up.

Ultimately, the officer was injured and the suspect was killed.  The suspect was shot seven times and died at the hospital.  The shooting was ruled as a justified homicide.

Stay safe!

(A full, unedited copy of the video is available for download in the Blue Crew membership area.)

First production began in March 2011.  I received one in May.  I have been carrying it on duty for two months and I am impressed with its features and durability.

Randall is a twenty-three year sworn police officer in a mid-sized Florida police department.  He has been an FTO, K9 Handler, Detective, and SWAT Team Leader.  He is currently the Midnight Shift K9 Sergeant and department SWAT Coordinator.

One officer attempts to deploy a Taser, which fails to stop the subject.  The suspect advances on the officers and the second officer shoots the suspect.  Portions of the confrontation were captured on a video camera worn by one of the officers:

Prior to the officers’ arrival, the complainant, a 13-year-old girl and her mother, reported the suspect was violent, and he had attacked them.  Both the young girl and her mother advised dispatch they needed medical assistance.  So, the officers had reason to believe the suspect would be violent.

The entire incident happened extremely quickly.  The video starts with the officers walking toward the complainant’s apartment.  About 14 seconds later, the officers make contact with a clearly distraught complainant, who points out the suspect to the officers.  One officer remains with the complainant, while the second approaches the suspect.

About 15 seconds later, the suspect threatens the second officer with the knife, and the first officer goes to assist his partner.  Within the next 16 seconds, officers attempt to deploy a Taser and give the suspect multiple warnings to drop the knife.  When the suspect ignores their lawful commands and advances on officers, the suspect is shot.

Total time from approaching the apartment to shots fired: 45 seconds.

The officers did a good job, and the incident is fairly straightforward for any officer responding to a similar incident.

Key Training Points:

• Be prepared to use force quickly.  This incident happened in less than one minute.
• Watch your approach – suspects will not always be at the address to which you are responding.  They may be across the street, in another apartment, in the wood line and/or waiting to ambush you.
• Tasers are a great tool, but not always effective.  When dealing with an armed subject only attempt to use a Taser if you have deadly force cover.  That way if the Taser fails, your backup can still apply lethal force.
• Continue shooting until the threat is stopped.  The suspect in this case did not stop until after multiple shots were fired.  Don’t get into the “double tap and re-assess” mindset.  Be ready to shoot as many times as it takes.

[Ed. note - This is part four in a series on police knives. Also take a look at Randall's prior articles on the KA-BAR TDI, neck knives and general carry and training with knives.]

Let’s talk about folding knives.

I must admit to an infatuation with balisong, or butterfly, knives.  For me it is part heritage and part love of toys.  I had a three-inch Benchmade Bali-Song that rode in the top right pocket of my BDU shirt when I was in K9.

I could take the balisong out with either hand, but it was secure in the buttoned pocket.  I could open the blade with one hand. The knife had the advantage of three pins securing the blade to the handles, which made it superior in strength to a single pivot pin folding knife.

The all-stainless steel balisong was a little heavy for shirt pocket carry, but it did give me many hours of playtime while giving the dog a break during the night shift.

Sal Glesser of Spyderco, Inc. invented their trademarked round opening hole and the knife mounted clothing clip, which were introduced in the Clipit line of knives in 1981.  As the Clipits caught on, these industry revolutionizing innovations would later change how most cops wore a knife.

In 1984, Spyderco introduced the Police Model.  It had the round opening hole, clothing clip, and stainless steel construction.  The blade was 4 1/8”.  At 5.5 ozs, the knife was a bit heavy, but its long slim handle made it carry easily in the pocket.  The clip point blade, at over 4 inches, was seen by knife combatives instructors to be of the length that can reach vital organs when used to pierce the torso.

Early versions of the Police Model were referred to as P.I.G.s, for “Pride Integrity Guts,” which was stamped into the blades.  This knife is still popular and is in current production.  Over the years, variations have been made with handles in aluminum, titanium, G-10, and carbon fiber.  They have been made with plain, serrated, or part serrated blades of varying stainless steels.

In the early 1980’s, the one-handed opening Spyderco Clipits influenced other knife makers.  Previously, cheap switchblades and butterfly knives were the only knives you could easily open with one hand.  After the arrival of the blade hole, makers began putting thumb studs on the rear of the blades to circumvent Spyderco’s patent.  Spyderco licensed the opening hole to other companies such as Benchmade, Inc. and later Emerson Knives, Inc.

Spyderco did not sit back and rest on the original Clipits’ laurels.  The company began producing numerous variations of their knives.  A state-of-the-art lightweight folding knife is their Endura4.  The current knife is the fourth generation of this design.

The Endura4 is a mid-lock folder with the blade opening hole and clothing clip, but it has improvements Spyderco has worked at for decades.  The handles slabs are FRN, or fiberglass reinforced nylon.  These slabs have what Spyderco calls “bi-directional texturing” for a sure grip wet or dry.  Beneath the FRN are skeletonized stainless steel liners to give the knife rigidity.

The knife blade is advanced VG-10 stainless steel and is flat saber-ground for strength.  The blade can be had in a black titanium carbonitride coating to subdue the blade and protect it from corrosion.  The knife’s clip can be mounted on any of the four corners for convenience.  Because the knife has a reversible clip and is a lock-back, with the unlocking mechanism on the spine, the whole knife is ambidextrous.

I have carried an Endura4, clipped in my non-dominant side pants pocket, for the last year.  I carry the knife for both utility and as a back-up weapon in case of a gun-grab.  Our department trains officers to lock down your gun with the dominant hand if someone is trying to take your firearm from the holster, then take violent action to prevent it.  The non-dominant hand is available for empty-handed strikes or to access another weapon.

I carry the Endura4 in the left front pocket and an Emerson La Griffe knife in the 5.11 boot on my left foot.  In a standing position, the pocket knife is accessible.  If the fight were to go to the ground, which isn’t my preference, I was taught to roll on to the holstered gun to keep it away from the suspect.  This leaves me free to grab either knife, or kick from this ground-fighting position while protecting my head with the arms until I can gain distance.

This is not meant as a tutorial for a gun-grab, only to illustrate my department’s position and my preference for blade carry based upon it.  Always follow your department’s S.O.P’s, General Orders, or training when employing any combative techniques.

While the Endura4 has made a home in my pocket, I recently received a test and evaluation knife from another manufacturer.  I’ll be moving its pocket clip to the left side of the knife and trying it out on my next shift.  I’ll let you know how it works.

Randall is a twenty-three year sworn police officer in a mid-sized Florida police department.  He has been an FTO, K9 Handler, Detective and SWAT Team Leader.  He is currently the Midnight Shift K9 Sergeant and department SWAT Coordinator.

This leads me to the KA-BAR TDI.  TDI is an acronym for Tactical Defense Institute, a law enforcement training facility in West Union, Ohio.  The TDI knife was designed by Vietnam veteran and thirty-seven year sworn police officer Lt. John Benner.

Mr. Benner is the President and Chief Instructor of TDI.  My critique of the TDI knife is in no way meant to detract from the distinguished career or training concepts of Mr. Benner.

In early 2010, I purchased a TDI and wore it threaded in my under-belt and behind the double magazine pouch of my duty rig, the TDI’s recommended location.  It was fairly unobtrusive, but noticeable none-the-less.  The more I wore it, the more self-conscious I became about its handle sticking forward.  I tried it in the reverse, but it still felt exposed.

It reminded me of the old cross-draw revolver holsters the Florida Highway Patrol troopers wore in the 1970’s.  FHP’s holster rational at the time was that they transported prisoners in uncaged cars with the bad guys in the front passenger seat.  Naturally a right-hander would want his firearm away from his handcuffed rider.

Despite FHP’s good reasoning, that big Colt revolver’s wood grip jutting forward fairly begged to be grabbed by a perp (and sometimes it was).  I began to feel the same way about my TDI.  Thus, it went into the box of things I didn’t feel safe with on duty.

Then I read a news story.  On 12/24/2010, Austin, TX Police Officer Frank Wilson became involved in a foot chase with suspect Maurice Pierce.  According to Austin Police Assistant Chief David Carter, during a struggle, Pierce grabbed a knife from Ofc. Wilson’s duty belt and stabbed Wilson in the neck.

Though suffering life-threatening injuries, Wilson remained in the fight and shot Pierce during the attack.  Wilson survived, but Pierce was found dead several blocks away.  Because of this incident, Austin PD revised its duty knife policy to only allow officers to carry folding knives in a case on the belt or “secreted on their persons,” according to APD Commander Brian Manley.

I do not know what kind of knife Ofc. Wilson was carrying.  The circumstances and policy revision would indicate a sheath-mounted fixed blade.  I do know that I feel that having a knife’s handle readily accessible to a suspect is the kind of officer safety I do not practice.

I have gone back to pocket carry of a folder and boot carry of a small fixed blade.  I have related the story of Ofc. Wilson to the troops I noticed wearing a TDI on duty.  I leave it to them to decide how they feel about its carry.

It is my opinion that the TDI knife’s one shortcoming could be fixed if the sheath had some sort of simple retention device similar to those used on handgun security holsters.  It may increase the price a bit, but it would be well worth it.

My next installment will be a discussion of some common and not-so-common police folding knives.

Randall is a twenty-three year sworn police officer in a mid-sized Florida police department.  He has been an FTO, K9 Handler, Detective and SWAT Team Leader.  He is currently the Midnight Shift K9 Sergeant and department SWAT Coordinator.

Neck knives are generally small, slim blades with a low profile that can be mounted in a variety of ways.  They are named after the carry method of wearing the knife around the neck in a small sheath, either hung there with 550 paracord or a break-away neck chain (or ball chain).

I do not recommend paracord for a neck knife for the same reasons cops don’t wear regular neckties.  Paracord makes a handy ligature or garrote with which to strangle its wearer.  For safety, a break-away chain will part after only a few pounds of pressure.

If a neck knife is worn suspended from a chain inside the uniform shirt, it may shift during physical movement and render itself unreachable.  This is fine for civilian carry under a shirt (observing the local laws) or LEO off-duty wear, but is not functional for a patrol officer or deputy.

Neck knives can be carried in a front or rear pocket with the lanyard or cord attached to the belt.  When drawing the knife in this fashion, you pull the knife out of the sheath with one hand as the lanyard becomes taut.  The knife and sheath part company with the force of the draw.

Today’s neck knife sheaths regularly come made from Kydex, Zytel, Concealex, or some other molded-plastic derivative.  This makes the sheaths impervious to weather.  It also gives them a variety of mounting options.  One of these is strapping, zip-tying, or M.O.L.L.E. attaching them to concealed body armor.  One of my friends has his small knife sheath secured to a ballistic vest strap so he can access the knife by reaching just inside his uniform shirt at the collar.

Though we talked about boot knives in Part I, 5.ll has a nifty pocket sewn into the upper portion of their boots.  This pocket accepts either 5.11’s Side Kick sheath, or one that shares similar dimensions.  I found that my Emerson La Griffe neck sheath is extremely snug in this pocket.  I actually had trouble removing the sheath with the boot off of my foot.

I have been experimenting with this exception to my no-boot-knives rule, as the 5.11 boot/sheath set up is very secure.  Additionally, the handles of both knives are diminutive, making them tough for an adversary to notice (or grab).  Both traits are a departure from older, more cumbersome, boot knives.

The 5.11 Side Kick boot knife, Fred Perrin-designed La Griffe, and Columbia River Knife and Tool Bear Claw all share a 1” hole at the forward part of the handle to accept your index finger.  These knives are difficult to disarm because of their integrated grip in the hand and their short (1.75” to 2.375”) blades.  They are potent back-up weapons in skilled hands.

Stay tuned for Part III.  I’ll discuss my take on the KA-BAR TDI.

Randall is a twenty-three year sworn police officer in a mid-sized Florida police department.  He has been an FTO, K9 Handler, Detective and SWAT Team Leader.  He is currently the Midnight Shift K9 Sergeant and department SWAT Coordinator.

I just posted a review of the BLACKHAWK! Be-Wharned knife over at GunsHolstersAndGear.com.  If you are looking for an excellent self-defense or duty knife, this one is worth looking at.

Well, I think it is time for cops, and administrators, to publicly acknowledge that knives are self defense tools in deadly force situations.  More importantly, it is time for departments to incorporate knives into their training so the officers have the needed skills to use the knife if they ever have to.

Don’t think cops use knives to save their lives in a struggle?  A Sacramento County (CA) deputy sheriff did just that this past week, when a motorist tried to take his duty gun on a traffic stop.  I don’t know if this deputy had any knife training, or if he just instinctively reacted, but he did use the knife to stop the attacker from taking his firearm.  I carry a Ka-Bar TDI knife behind my duty belt for just this situation.

I’m not a knife expert.  But I do know there are some quality trainers out there that can help you get the training you need, or help your department structure a program that would incorporate knives into use-of-force training.

Make sure you check out Randall’s series of articles on Police Knives:

• Police Knives: Steel at the Ready Part I
• Police Knives: Steel at the Ready Part II
• Police Knives: Steel at the Ready Part III

Richard is a police officer with a medium sized, central Florida department, and previously worked for a Metro-Atlanta agency.  He has served as a field training officer, court officer, corporal, sergeant, lieutenant, watch commander, commander of a field training and evaluation program, and general pain in the butt to management-types looking to cut training hours.

Stay safe!

However, Tasers are not 100% reliable. For the Taser to work properly there has to be a completed circuit with electricity flowing through a wide section of muscle mass. The failure of a Taser to effectively work can happen if only one probe hits the suspect, or the probes land too close together, or there is a faulty battery, or thick clothes do not allow the probes to get close to the skin. I’ve seen Tasers fail to incapacitate in each of these situations. The point is: the X26 is effective but not 100%.

There is an understandable reluctance by police officers to use deadly force. Cops are not evil people and they do not want to harm or kill anyone. So, many times when a police officer faces a situation in which deadly force is the appropriate level of force, the officer may hesitate or seek some other lower level of force, which generally decreases their own safety. While in some respects this is admirable, the fact is the officer must survive and win the encounter, not just for his or her own well being, but for the community as a whole. For if the officer is incapacitated or killed due to their attempt at a lower force option, their killer is now free to harm other innocents…perhaps even with the officers own weapons.

If a police officer encounters a suspect armed with a deadly weapon, the officer’s appropriate response will be deadly force, not a Taser. A suicidal subject armed with a knife or a gun needs to see the business end of your AR, shotgun, or pistol…not the blast doors of a ‘green’ X26 cartridge. If you have appropriate deadly force cover (say your two zone partners are in a position of advantage covering the suspect with .223 rifles), then you might –in certain circumstances– attempt to use a Taser to subdue the suspect. The idea is that your backup can employ deadly force should the Taser attempt go wrong.

Keep in mind that the vast majority of us have Taser cartridges that are good to a maximum of 21′ or 25′. Perhaps 21′ sounds familiar? That distance should be known to all police officers as it relates to the Tueller Drill. The Tueller Drill was developed by Sgt. Dennis Tueller of the Salt Lake City PD. Sgt. Tueller discovered that an average person could cover 21′ and begin stabbing an officer in 1.5 seconds: the same amount of time an officer could draw his weapon and put a round on the threat. That, of course, does not take into account that a fatal shot is not likely to instantly stop the attack.

So, if you encounter a violent subject armed with an edged weapon AND you have lethal force cover AND you want to try to use a Taser, you better hope it works. If it doesn’t, you will likely have a subject on top of you in less than two seconds. Your partners better be very accurate and very quick. Even then you stand a pretty decent shot at getting hurt.

If the subject has a firearm, you don’t even have 1.5 seconds, as they just have to point and pull the trigger.

So, read your department SOP’s, know your state laws of the use of force, and work out plans with your zone partners before you encounter a deadly force situation in which you may want to try a Taser.

Ghost Hawk Neck Knife

The Ghost Hawk Neck Knife offered for sale by GG&G is a concealable knife of an unusual shape and design. The knife weighs a mere 1.65 ounces and comes with a Kydex sheath for wearing around the neck. The knife, which is only 0.1″ thick, could easily be concealed under a t-shirt, sweater, or sweat shirt.

Like any weapon, the Ghost Hawk Neck Knife could be carried by both the good guys and the bad guys. A lot of you probably already carry some type of knife around your neck or on your vest already. When doing searches, just keep in mind that your suspect can carry weapons in these places also. Too often, I have seen veteran officers search the waist bands and pockets very well, but practically ignore the neck, chest, and back.

On average, 1358 officers each year are attacked with an edged weapon. The breaks down to 3 to 4 edged weapon assaults per day on police officers.

I suspect that even the most timid administrator will agree that a machete is a deadly weapon, but what about a Swiss Army knife with a 1″ blade? The truth is, the smaller the blade, typically, the more deadly it is. In “The Dynamics of Stab Wounds,” researchers found that an adequately sharp blade of any length can inflict a fatal slash wound to an area such as the neck. Additionally, they found that:

“The ideal weapon is, in fact, a short thin-bladed knife, with a stiff blade, about 7 cm (about 2.75″) in length…”

A blade of less than 3″ may be the ideal weapon? How many people do you encounter each day with a pocket knife that meets that length? Especially now that the folding knives with the pocket clips have become fashionable.

What training have you had in simply disarming a subject who has a knife clipped to his pocket? Police training programs and policies need to address this issue. While we all may be able to agree that a knife is a deadly weapon, a lot of cops do not perceive the small knife as being dangerous. Trainers need to teach officers that all edged weapons are dangerous, and how to deal with them in the safest manner possible.

I will, of course, have more on this subject in the near future.

Stay safe!