week 1
1. If you were responsible for managing the 1993 WACO incident involving the religious group known as Branch Davidians, how would you have done it differently? Note: Pls do research on this incident outside of just reading the FBI file provided (i.e., to gain insight on the particulars surrounding it)
2. You are a patrol officer and are sent to a domestic disturbance called in by a neighbor. The husband has been drinking and has ordered his wife out of the house, but he has two small children in the house. The wife tells you that the conflicts have been going on for several years, that she is tired of it, and she is leaving him. When you approach the house, it is evident the husband is still in the Crisis Stage, threatening to kill the kids to punish the wife. Is this a hostage situation? Is it negotiable? What techniques would you use to deal with the husband? Now with the 2nd question in mind the below video is provided. Please note it is not a video to show the exact scenario given in question #2, but to highlight the dangers associated in responding to a domestic call (in this video the officer is actually taken hostage) and to highlight just how quickly a hostage situation can change from a reasonable calm to complete chaos. The latter being a reality that as we start this course I want all to keep in mind, i.e., very easy to arm chair quarterback certain scenarios in time (such as that in question#1, which we will closely scrutinize as arguably a lot was done wrong), but in doing so we must remember that often the decisions made in hostage/crisis scenarios are done under the most stressful of circumstances and where time needed to conduct a text book response may simply not be possible. That is not to say that the processes we are going to cover are not effective and or valid (on the contrary they have been proven over time). The point is that, these situations can become so volatile, and in so little time, that even the best approaches can fail. More so, instances such as that which you will see in the video are arguably why some believe so strongly in quick immediate force. Such instances in fact work against allowing hostage negotiations to run its course, as they unfortunately influence decisions in future acts by all involved. For the video, only the first 4 minutes are relevant (Just copy and paste the below in your browser):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8Jw4GBI9_A
This discussion is directly connected to the following Course Learning Objectives: CO1: Differentiate between both hostage and non-hostage, and negotiable and non-negotiable situations; CO3: Recommend actions for negotiating in various circumstances; to include negotiating with individuals with past military experience, and the emotionally disturbed
For now, and to emphasize the point of how earlier incidents helped establish these Golden Rules/Basic Assumptions of Hostage Negotiations , please take note of the following three derived from the Munich incident by detectives Schlossberg and Boltz of the New York Police Department (McMains & Mullins, 2010):
1. Contain the scene
2. Discover and understand the hostage takers motivation
3. Slow things down, i.e., time is on the negotiators side
Yet lessons learned do not always equate into lessons applied…something that will also be highlighted in some of the examples given, which took place after the Munich incident. Subsequently, as you research and respond to both of this week’s Discussion Questions, especially that regarding Waco, I ask you to please keep the above three golden rules in mind.
Evaluation of the Handling of the Branch Davidian Stand-off in Waco, Texas
Hostage Negotiation Study Guide 2010
https://rochesterpoliceexplorers.weebly.com/uploads/8/6/3/6/86365790/hostage.pdf
Practical psychology of hostage and crisis negotiations
