Chapter 1

Use-of-Force Training and Scenarios

There is no question that Derek Chauvin’s decision to put his knee on the neck of George Floyd at all, much less for over nine minutes, has been roundly criticized by pundits, attorneys, and many law enforcement entities, such as Andy Scoogman (executive director of the Minnesota Chiefs of Police), John Shane (professor and use-of-force expert at John Jay College of Criminal Justice), and John Peters Jr. (president of the Institute for the Prevention and Management of In-Custody Deaths). Use-of-force experts and members of the Minneapolis Police Department reiterated this criticism during Derek Chauvin’s trial,10 despite the fact that the Minneapolis Police Training Manual did allow for two types of “knee on the neck techniques” as a “non-lethal” use of force.11 A pretrial motion to dismiss the murder and manslaughter charges based on this training manual was denied.

It is also without dispute that Derek Chauvin had seventeen complaints of excessive force filed in his nineteen years of policing.12 What wasn’t clear at the time of Floyd’s death is what his motivations were. It is assumed that it was racially motivated despite no indication that it was, but the narrative of racist police was pushed. Although there is great condemnation for Chauvin’s tactics and the training manual that allows them, some information about the moments leading up to Floyd’s arrest were not revealed until several days later. We will discuss the body-cam footage of Derek Chauvin, his trial and conviction, and the aftermath later in this book. But first, it is necessary for the reader to get a crash course in police use-of-force law and training. Only then can we truly understand the facts and circumstances of these high-profile deaths of Black Americans at the hands of police officers.

Current training on police use of force is in line with criteria established in both federal and Supreme Court rulings. The purpose of the use of force is to gain control and to stop a subject’s action. In order for a use-of-force program to be truly effective, it must be defensible in court. There are four, general use-of-force justifications. Is there a need for force? Was the force applied proportional to the resistance exerted? Is the subject’s injury proportional to the subject’s resistance or threat to the officer or a third party? And finally, was the force applied in good faith in a way that a reasonable, trained police officer would react given the facts the officer had at the time of the encounter? Taken together, one could call this a “totality of circumstances,” meaning that evaluation of an officer’s use of force is dependent on the combined factors involved with a force incident. There are nuances to consider in the use of force which we will discuss later, but a description of the basic use-of-force continuum is necessary before we get into specific types of situations.

The majority of Use of Force tactics discussed in this chapter are from the 2003 book, PPCT Defensive Tactics Student Manual, by Bruce Siddle, Ron Bilyk, Joan Pechtel and Darrell Ross. There are two different philosophies surrounding police use of force, total control theory and One Plus One Theory.13 In total control theory, an intermediate weapon, such as a baton, pepper spray, or a Taser, would be used to control all levels of resistance. In this method, when the resistance level increases, the potential for injury to a subject will increase. To understand how this philosophy is applied, consider the following where an officer is using a collapsible steel baton as their total control, intermediate weapon. In low levels of resistance, the officer may use the baton to assist with a wrist drag takedown or joint lock.

In more active levels of resistance, the officer may use the baton to strike one of the many nerve motor points or an area of large muscle mass. When deadly force is applied against an officer, the officer could use the baton to strike the head and neck or use the baton in a choke hold. The One Plus One Method is a more conservative philosophy of use of force in that it puts emphasis on empty-hand control techniques where the officer is not holding an intermediate or deadly weapon. In this method, in which I was trained, the officer moves up a force continuum in such a way that they can use force one level above the level of resistance. In other words, as the level of resistance increases, the risk of injury to the officer increases, so the amount of force justified increases. An officer may also increase their use of force if the current force applied is ineffective. Conversely, if the techniques are working and the level of resistance decreases, the level of force used by the officer must also decrease. These are the principles of escalation and de-escalation. Understand, however, that it is not necessary for the officer to use each level of force. There are circumstances where an officer is legally justified in skipping empty-hand techniques of control and other situations where the officer can go straight to deadly force. We will discuss these situations as we move through the use-of-force continuum. We must also remember that the law is designed in such a manner that it prioritizes the safety of the officer in a use-of-force situation. The reader may disagree with this legal philosophy, as I’m sure some will, but ponder for a moment what policing would look like if the law didn’t prioritize the lives of officers. Who, in their right mind, would want to be a police officer in those circumstances? What effect would fewer police and fewer tools for police to use have on crime?

In the One Plus One Use-of-Force Method, officers are taught that the amount of force they are legally and ethically able to apply, called levels of control, is on a continuum that matches increases in the subject’s level of resistance, which also exists on a continuum. I will begin by describing the levels of control an officer may utilize on a call for service or an officer-initiated stop (traffic violation, suspicious person, etc.) and the corresponding level of resistance a subject may show to the officer. As the level of resistance increases, the level of control will increase. Sometimes the increase in control will be incremental, and sometimes there are circumstances where the officer skips steps in the use-of-force continuum due to skips in the level of resistance continuum. In other words, sometimes the subject enters the continuum at a much higher level of resistance. In that case, the officer bypasses the lower levels of control and enters the use-of-force continuum at the appropriate level to be one level higher than the level of resistance.

The most basic level of control is officer presence. In any given situation, when an officer arrives on scene or initiates a stop, they are using the level of control of officer presence, because the subject understands that the officer has the legal authority to take away their liberty through arrest. Furthermore, in the United States, all officers are armed with a handgun and, depending on which department they are employed, a multitude of intermediate weapons. Much of the time, officer presence is all that is needed. For example, when an officer initiates a traffic stop, the offending driver is aware of the officer’s presence and, the vast majority of the time, will pull over in a reasonable amount of time depending on the surrounding traffic conditions. In a different example, let’s suppose an officer is called to the scene of a verbal disturbance at a fast-food establishment. The officer arrives because management has called 911 because two patrons, a man and a woman, are having a heated argument in the parking lot. Many times, the arrival of the officer will immediately stop the argument and the two will separate. This, of course, would be the ideal response an officer would desire.

However, sometimes the subject(s) will resist the control of officer presence. The first level of resistance is psychological intimidation. Psychological intimidation includes nonverbal cues that can indicate a subject may intend to resist. Examples include clenched fists, tightening of the jaw muscles, a blank stare, and bowing up to the officer (think puffing out your chest and pacing back and forth). None of the actions at this level of resistance are illegal, but they are clues to the officer that the subject may be combative. At this point, the level of control and the level of resistance are fairly equal. Therefore, according to the One Plus One use-of-force method, the officer can now move to the next level of control on the continuum. It is important to note that the use-of-force law and the officer’s training are geared in such a manner that the advantage lies with the officer. In other words, the officer’s level of control (or use of force) ideally will increase one step ahead of the level of resistance. This rule of law is vital to the officer’s safety and, in many cases, the safety of the subject.

When an officer encounters psychological intimidation, the next level of control is to issue verbal commands. In our previous verbal disturbance example, the officer would instruct the parties to separate and to stop arguing so the officer can investigate whether a crime has occurred or if anyone is threatened with physical harm. Again, most of the time the verbal commands will achieve the desired result. The next level of resistance is verbal noncompliance. This occurs when an officer gives a legal command to a subject and the subject does not comply....