The Watch with Will Kennedy: CMPD Evolves Active Shooter Training

CHARLOTTE, NC — With mass shootings in schools, theaters, churches and workplaces across the country a frightening, and regular, occurrence.

CMPD continues teach locals how to survive in the worst case scenario. And that active shooter training is being updated constantly.

It’s the focus of tonight’s Watch.

“As these active shooters evolve, we evolve as well with the training,” says Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Officer John Frisk.

Mass shootings have become so frequent, and deadly, in the United States that people have to think in advance about how they will respond if the worst happens.

“We’re learning something from every one of these events,” says Frisk. “And then we want to put that in place when we go out there and do our presentation.”

CMPD has done more than 100 presentations already in 2018. And the requests don’t slow down.

As new events unfold across the country, the training changes.

Officer Frisk says the Waffle House shooting outside Nashville, Tennessee last month, where a shooter killed four people, is a valuable lesson.

“If it was going to come down to it, he was going to have to work,” says James Shaw, Jr. “Work to kill me.”

Shaw was in the restaurant when the shooting started. He was able to wrestle the gun away from the shooter.

“The gun was kind of jammed up, and it was pushed down,” Shaw told the media at a press conference after the deadly shooting. “So we were scuffling. And I managed to get him, with one hand on the gun. And then I grabbed it from him, and I threw it over the counter top.”

“He saw the gunman, and he knew that if he didn’t take some kind of action, that potentially there was going to be more victims,” says Frisk. “And, potentially, he could have been killed as well. So he took a very aggressive action, and saved a lot of lives.”

Frisk says the specific situation and location matters. But the training is transferable.

“Maybe you’re at the mall,” says Frisk. “Or maybe you’re at the grocery store. You could be anywhere, and there could be an active shooter. So you take that training with you everywhere you go.”

If you’d like to schedule a CMPD active shooter presentation for your organization, contact Officer Frisk at: jfrisk@cmpd.org