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Police shooting robbers who wear vests
allen griggs
Member Posts: 35,620 ✭✭✭✭
I am new to these forums and I imagine you guys discussed this already. I am talking about a few years ago two guys robbed a bank in California. They walked out in the streets. Both guys were wearing body armor and packing AKs and they had beau coup magazines. They were spraying serious ammo at many cops. The cops were completely baffled, they were trying to shoot it out with 9mm handguns, they were outgunned, lots of cops got shot. Finally the cops went to a sporting goods store and got some civilian M16s and shot down the bad guys. The cops then got the city to buy them a bunch of M16s as I recall, so they would not be "outgunned" again. Now, the police response seemed stupid, to me. I know how I would have handled this had it happened on a November day and had I been cruising through LA in my pickup. I would have stopped 3 or 4 blocks away from the mayhem, and gotten out my deer rifle,a 30-06 Oberndorf Mauser with a 2-7 scope on it. To have snuck up and taken out a bad guy standing in the middle of the street spraying wildly with an AK would have been pretty easy. I have twice the range of the bad guy and considerably more power and accuracy. I don't believe the vest could stop that round, even at 200 yards and even using hunting ammo. Tactically, I am saying that my deer rifle is superior to that dinky .223 round. Strategically, I think it is bad for law enforcement to want to address a situation like this by spraying auto or semi-auto fire around a city. That is fine for the bad guys, but risky for civilians and other law enforcment. It seems to me that the police lack an understanding of ballistics, among other things. Plus, you could buy 4 or 5 nice deer rifles for what one M16 costs, and you could put bolt action rifles in the trunks of a lot of police cars. Send these guys to the range 4 times a year and pay them a bonus.
"Not as deep as a well, or as wide as a church door, but it is enough."
"Not as deep as a well, or as wide as a church door, but it is enough."
Comments
"Not as deep as a well, or as wide as a church door, but it is enough."
"I have made it a rule never to smoke more than one cigar at a time."
Mark Twain
keep lots of extra uppers for your ar..you can change often enough to keep the thing from over heating...what ever caliber fits the moment..~Secret Select Society of Suave Stylish Smoking Jackets~
"Not as deep as a well, or as wide as a church door, but it is enough."
SSG idsman75, U.S. ARMY
Rich
Remember,"your woman may not find you handsome, But atleast she'll find ya handy". I love that show..............
I think these CA shooters had "plate" (level 4) which can stop some rifle rounds; and I never heard the final report as to which rounds actually ended-up stopping these guys--I don't know if the rifles from the sporting goods store were what stopped them.
And Allen,
The problem with 30.06 (especially in a city) is if police have to shoot someone without any body armor. The round can go right through the bad guy, through most house walls, out the other side, ending up who knows where.
The senario in CA you describe is the exception; it does not match most police situations which require shooting.
A few shots of frangible 308 should strip that armor right off, and won't over penetrate
Don't worry about the bullet with your name on it, worry about the fragmentation grenade addressed 'To Occupant'.
In fairness those patrol officers who had handguns were probably terrified as I would have been, and just tried to keep out of sight for the most part. This makes a great argument for an issued patrol rifle that has good accuracy up to at least 150 - 200 yrds. Precise fire would have ended it. After all the bad guys were not hiding.
"We become what we habitually do. If we act rightly, we become upright men. If we habitually act wrongly, or weakly, we become weak and corrupt" - *ARISTOTLE*
**Like Grandad used to say--"It'll feel better when it quits hurtin"
Cops aren't shooters?
Oxymoron.
Don't worry about the bullet with your name on it, worry about the fragmentation grenade addressed 'To Occupant'.
Don't worry about the bullet with your name on it, worry about the fragmentation grenade addressed 'To Occupant'.
"Not as deep as a well, or as wide as a church door, but it is enough."
PC=BS
Supermonkey, on body armor, level 3 and above will stop most all slugs. What it takes to penetrate them is a high level vest is a POINTED bullet. Almost all handguns, andd most shotgun slugs, use blunt bullets, that is why most all vests can stop them, most rifle calibers are pointed bullets and that is why they are so hard to stop, especially high velocity bullets. Almost no vest will stop most rifle bullets, and those capable of it are very bulky and heavy, most using plates in them that require AP type ammo to penetrate.
The second admendment GUARANTEES the other nine and the Constitution!
"Not as deep as a well, or as wide as a church door, but it is enough."
The second admendment GUARANTEES the other nine and the Constitution!
Edited by - S&W Man on 04/24/2002 01:41:15
One could make a soft vest (kevlar, or spectra--a polyethelene) which would "stop" a 30.06 bullet, but if the energy is not dissipated properly, the blunt trama from the impact can kill.
This is also a problem with ballistic armored helmets; rounds can be stopped, but the energy from the bullet can rotate the head with enough force to cause death or severe injury.
Clouder..
http://www.snowcrest.net/marnells/officer.htm -- analysis of the shootout
http://www.bulletproofme.com/ -- NIJ threat levels
http://www.nlectc.org/txtfiles/selectapp2001.html -- NIJ guide to police body armor
As shown in the above sites, Level IV plates defeat 30-06 AP ammunition, although they warn that such a bullet hits like a sledgehammer and can fracture the sternum easily. The company linked above also sells Level IIIA helmets with Level IV inserts, but they warn that a 30-06 AP bullet to the helmet is still lethal due to blunt trauma. It doesn't seem practical to wear a level IV vest everywhere either.
As for the North Hollywood shootout, they killed one guy with a rifle shot to the head and the other guy shot himself. The gun shop mentioned above didn't supply the officers with M16's; I read a report on the shootout that said the store just gave them slugs for their patrol shotguns, which seems much more plausible than just handing out highly regulated assault weapons to panicked patrol officers.
Several years ago near Pleasonton, Tx, a "disgruntled" civilian called in a false 911 call then set up to ambush responding officers. Two deputy sheriffs and a state trooper were shot and killed. A fellow LEO friend of mine was on the Tx DPS swat team at the time. He was called to the scene, and told me later that the trooper was hit inside his patrol unit by a 7.62X39 round fired from a SKS. Even this "mild" rifle round penetrated the door of the patrol unit, the the left side of the vest, and exited by penetrating the right side of the vest.
Our state legislature has now made it a felony for a convicted felon to be in possession of body armor. Of course, me and all my fellow LEO's are breathing easier now that we know no bad guys will be wearing kevlar when we confront them. It's bound to work. Since more and more gun control laws have gone into effect, it's become damn near impossible for violent felons to get their hands on guns (and if you believe this, give me a call...I have a nice beach house in Lubbock with a wonderful view of the ocean I'd like to sell you CHEAP).
"Not as deep as a well, or as wide as a church door, but it is enough."
"Not as deep as a well, or as wide as a church door, but it is enough."
I would say that being SHOT AT will often have a detrimental effect on anyone's marksmanship. Not too many of us can hit the X ring with bullets coming at us.
Shotguns with slugs are the bane of armor. Even if it fails to defeat the armor, it will ruin the wearer's day.
I did a very unscientific test of various police loads and body armor. Armor was wrapped around a big stack of newspaper that had soaked overnight and was sodden. The assembly was sat in a chair. Then we shot it from about 10 feet with different loads. We changed out the body armor when it no longer presented any place to shoot at that was not already shot. The armor was of varying levels, from IIA to IIIA.
We would shoot and then check the paper bundle for blunt trauma.
The .38 Special made a little dimple. The 9mm +P+ made a bigger dimple. The .40 made a still bigger dimple, but not as deep. The 12 gauge with 00 Buck made a dimple big enough to seriously injure the wearer.
Then we shot the armor with a 12 gauge slug, the Foster type, not the modern sabot. It defeated the front armor panel. Then it penetrated about 10 inches of wet newspaper. Then it defeated the back panel. after that, it perforated the steel chair back and kept on going.
I make it a point to always have a few 12 gauge slugs in easy reach.
SIG pistol armorer/FFL Dealer/Full time Peace Officer, Moderator of General Discussion Board on Gunbroker. Visit www.gunbroker.com, the best gun auction site on the Net! Email davidnunn@texoma.net
"Not as deep as a well, or as wide as a church door, but it is enough."