An officer is down in a crowded dining hall during chow. Two inmates armed with shanks hold him hostage while the remaining inmates hover over the officer, taunting him. The facility's emergency response team knows that minutes are precious to his life. They fire two less than lethal beanbag rounds from a launcher and throw two smoke distraction devices, then the team moves in.

While the scenario is a real-life possibility in any prison, this week it is just one example of how officers and technologists are working together during the annual Mock Prison Riot held at the former West Virginia Penitentiary in Moundsville.

The training program and technology showcase is hosted jointly by The Office of Law Enforcement Technology Commercialization (OLETC), the National Institute of Justice (NIJ), and the National Corrections and Law Enforcement Training and Technology Center (NCLETTC).

"People say practice makes perfect, but my motto is 'perfect practice' and that's what we get at Moundsville," said Odell Wood, Commander of the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction Special Tactical and Response Team (STAR).

Ohio has 42 representatives at the Mock Riot this year ranging from tactical group members, hostage and negotiation team members, a weapons of mass destruction coordinator and representatives from the critical incident stress team and tactical rifleman's team.

Ohio, like other tactical teams, will participate in several of the 36 scenarios that will be conducted on the grounds at the former state penitentiary.

In Ohio's case, a rifleman's team member will attempt to take a shot at an irate hostage taker aboard a Blue Bird school bus after negotiations have failed, and in another scenario, Ohio will team-up with West Virginia's emergency response unit to quell a militia-style group of inmates in a combination rescue-yard disturbance scenario.

This is the stuff these guys live for.

"It gives us self-esteem. I train our members all year long. They can showcase their talents on a large scale. There are teams from all over the country and outside the country. It puts them in a realistic, stressful environment in front of a big group," said Wood. "The adrenaline's flowing. It's a real situation. It's real life for them and gives them a hands-on approach."

While these scenarios give the team members a chance to practice what they have been trained to do in emergency situations, they also give the team members an opportunty to use some of the latest cutting edge technologies that are under development for corrections and law enforcement.

This is also a main focus for the event and one that sponsors hope is attractive to the teams.

"That's the spirit of NIJ. It's a way for us to show them and give them access to some of these emerging technologies," said Larry Kosiba, CEO of OLETC.

New and Emerging Technologies

What gives the Mock Riot its unique flavor is the blending of tactical moves with the introduction of less-than-lethal devices, which provides an emergency response team with a multitude of options to do its job.

"A lot of the technologies include gathering communication devices, tactical cameras, and others. You employ the technologies at various levels of force," said Kosiba, who sees the Mock Riot as an educational opportunity for teams that may have never seen or heard of some of the devices that are still under development.

In certain areas of the country, agencies have had the ability to adopt the use of technologies sooner, he said, so, the Mock Riot puts all the teams on a level playing field as they all have a chance to test out and observe what is available to them.

"They get to look at it today and, by the professional input, they get to shape it for tomorrow," said Kosiba. "Then in a year or two they have it in their hands the way they want to use it."

Included in this year's list of technologies are covert video surveillance cameras, high security doors, bone conducting communication devices and surveillance systems using miniature aircraft replicas.

Kosiba said some of these technologies are truly one-of-a-kind, like the surveillance system, and are still in the "bench model" phase.

This miniature surveillance system involves exact-scale replicas of high-end military aircraft that hold tiny surveillance cameras that can be used by emergency response teams. It is the introduction of new technologies like this one to the field that is critical for the manufacturers to develop their products.

"That's why this is so important for the officers who are going to use it. How are they going to integrate these devices and employ them? Are they cost effective?" said Kosiba who said the participating technologists hope to have these important questions answered.

Collins White, President of Defenshield, Inc., agrees that the testing of technologies at the Mock Riot is a top priority for both technologists and the teams.

"Without an expenditure, [the teams] can say we have used this and we like it, but there are some things we'd like changed. That's the best part about the riot, they can get modifications without having to buy it and test it. That helps everybody in the whole food chain because it helps the next guys as well," said White.

White's product, Defenshield, is a stand-alone, ballistic-rated portable shield that stands between six and eight feet tall.

This year Defenshield will be used by officers in three scenarios during which White hopes to gain even more feedback about the product. In previous years, White learned that the size of the shield that corrections teams wanted was smaller in scale - around six feet - and that the newer the facility is, the larger the shield can be, based on ease of officer mobility.

Another technology that is on display this year and will be used in a yard riot scenario, through Sara Inc. of California, is a device that creates acoustic sound waves for crowd control and dispersion. Still under development, the product is designed to have a physical effect on those near it when it is deployed.

Jim Marr of Paradigm Tactical Products will show teams the Frisker device, which is a hand worn metal detector that allows those who use it to still have their hands free to retain full dexterity. According to Marr, the Frisker can detect something as small as a staple behind someone's cheek or a handcuff key in someone's mouth.

He added that the product is best used when the officer has two, one strapped to each hand. It is powered by a nine-volt battery and indicates that it has found metal by vibrating in the wearer's hand.

"It's an officer safety tool as well as a security device," said Marr.

Also in use at the Mock Riot this year is a bone conducting microphone headset developed by Sensory Devices. This microphone and speaker headset differs from a traditional microphone in that it detects the vibrations in a person's face when he or she speaks and converts the vibration into a signal in a hand-held radio. To pick up speech, special bone conduction speakers, which are also in contact with the head, decipher the signal.

The technology is beneficial in a riot situation because the device does not have to cover a person's ears to work. This can allow a person to still hear what is going on around them.

"You would want to have your ears un-occluded so you can hear sounds around you. Also, the microphone works very well in high noise. In a riot it might be very difficult to communicate by regular radio," said Walter Piroth of Sensory Devices.

Other technologies that will be present at the Mock Riot include Quantapoint, a laser imaging product that sees in 360 degrees to map buildings inside and out. The laser produces an image much like a photograph that can be used for mapping a facility, according to Steve Morrison, Executive Director of the National Corrections and Law Enforcement Training and Technology Center.

The year-round training center, which is an outgrowth of the Mock Riot and is permanently located in the grounds of the former West Virginia Penitentiary, also hosted a skills competition for emergency response teams prior to the start of the Mock Riot.

Morrison, who has been involved with the Mock Riot since its inception, said the event has grown to become a vital training opportunity for emergency response teams.

"The Mock Riot continues to provide the capability for partnerships and networking on the technology side and on the scenario side to help practitioners do their job safer and easier," Morrison said.

Learning from each other is another important aspect of the Mock Riot training for participating teams.

Teams Observe and Learn

This year's Mock Riot features 19 teams representing 14 states, including state departments of corrections, the federal Bureau of Prisons, municipal teams and sheriffs' offices. As the event has grown over the years, the opportunities for networking and learning have expanded in multiple ways.

In addition to the technology demonstrations and scenarios, teams can also participate in classroom workshops where they can be certified in the use of some technologies as well as learn new tactics and training dynamics.

"The teams get the opportunity to share the technologies they use and network with other teams. They get to see how other teams would handle a situation they might encounter," said Diane Quinn, Corrections Technology Agent for OLETC.

Ask any practitioner who has been to the Mock Riot before, and they will say it is one of the most positive training experiences they have ever had.

"It's as close to the real riot situation as I have found. You can't train for what they [inmates] are going to do. We train constantly in order for us to be prepared and ready to handle any kind of riot scenario or escape situation," said Steven Wendry, Assistant Team Commander for Michigan DOC's Jackson Region Emergency Response Team.

One reason why the Mock Riot creates such a unique training opportunity is the latitude and planning that is given to the 30-plus scenarios that take place during the event.

Students from nearby colleges and volunteers from some of the participating emergency response teams play the role of inmates and hostages in the scenarios and can make the scenarios challenging for the teams who are responding.

"We have designated individuals who are allowed to go further than others [in the scenarios]. If there is a gas dispense, we may have all the students 'be effected' but we always have one or two participants where it might not have the effect, which is like real life," said Kosiba.

Kosiba said the teams don't know how the "inmates' will act and react in the scenarios, which adds to the element of reality and the seriousness of the tactical maneuvers.

"Some of these teams are the 'last resort' team. When they walk in, this is it. They have gone through negotiations, crowd control and have done everything they can and are looking at every level of involvement," he said.

In addition, by having team members participate in the scenarios as inmates, they get a whole new perspective on how effective certain tactics are and teams also see how other teams approach the scenarios differently.

"It is unique. It gives us a chance to see what other states are doing," said Ken MacEachern, Emergency Services Manager and Classification Director in charge Michigan DOC's emergency response teams.

MacEachern said that the Michigan team, for example, began using shields and other less lethal use-of-force tactics after seeing and practicing them at the Mock Riot.

"It's a learning tool for each team. Everyone brings something to the table. It gives us something to look at when we do needs assessments," said Jay DeBold, Regional STAR Commander for the Ohio DRC.

But in many ways, the value of the event comes down to the teams' ability to respond to life-like situations in a facility that is authentic in scale and scope. When a team conducts a cell extraction at the Mock Riot, they do it in a real-life cell block. And, when a team member uses a distraction device, it looks and feels real to them.

The ability to use technologies, see how they work and respond in a dining hall riot or a cell block disturbance and then provide feedback about their performance is essential to the mission of the Mock Riot. 

"It gives us a chance to use what's out there and critique what's out there. There are some that fit our needs really well and some don't and it gives us an opportunity to communicate with the vendors," said Ohio DRC's Odell Wood.

This is why, every year, participation in the Mock Riot is a "must" for many emergency response teams.

"You can't do this in a facility. You can't throw devices in a facility when it's filled with inmates. This gets them as close to real as you can get," said Kosiba.

Resources:

OLETC - http://www.oletc.org

NCLETTC - http://www.nclettc.org/index2.htm

NIJ - http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/nij/