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Want to experience a day in the life of a SoCal policeman? Head over to Paintball U.S.A in Santa Clarita -- that's where, the Daily News reports, a group of about 30 local officers trained yesterday on how to respond to a gunfire ambush.
The exercise was led by 65-year-old Roy Burns of InteragencyOne, a company that offers auxiliary police training. A Vietnam vet, Burns told officers to be aggressive, mobile and on their feet, and had this to say about how to fire back at attackers:
"I want to see head shots, guys, incapacitation...You can hit 'em in the body, but they're not going down. You can hit 'em in the heart, they may not go down. Hit 'em in the head, they're going down."
The idea behind the excursion was that it was better for trainees to experience their first ambush with paintballs instead of bullets, and that preparation is key, since three out of four officers shot and killed on duty last year were victims of ambushes.
Burns wasn't the only one who had few kind things to say about would-be attackers. Here are the feelings of 66-year-old trainer Jerry Fritz:
"(Expletive) 'em," he said. "I'm not gonna bleed for nobody. I done all my bleeding in Vietnam."