Training Inexperienced Marksmen to Shoot at Night: The Effectiveness of a Basic Law Enforcement Night-Shooting Class
| Author | Anne G. Copay,Michael T. Charles |
| DOI | 10.1177/146135570100300306 |
| Published date | 01 June 2001 |
| Date | 01 June 2001 |
| Subject Matter | Applied Paper |
International Journal of Police SCience &
Management
Volume 3 Number 3
Training inexperienced marksmen to
shoot at night: The effectiveness of a
basic law enforcement night-shooting
class
Michael T. Charles and Anne G. Copay*
*Police Training Institute, University of Illinois, 1004 South Fourth Street, Champaign,
II 61820, USA; Tel: (217) 351-6919; E-mail: a-copay@uiuc.edu
Received: 10th October; 2000
Dr
Michael
T.
Charles served as director
of
the
Police Training Institute, University
of
Illinois,
Champaign/Urbana from August 1992 to May
2000. Dr Charlespresently holds professorships
in both the Police Training Institute and the
Department
of
Human Resource Education in
the School
of
Education at the University
of
Illinois at its Urbana/Champaign campus. Dr
Charles has published anumber
of
books and
articles and has presented papers nationally
and internationally on such topics as disaster
management, airline disasters, police pursuits,
jails, police accidents, electronic monitoring,
police officer shooting, women in policing and
police training.
Anne G. Capay received her PhD in organisa-
tional behaviour from the University
of
il-
linois at Urbana-Champaign. She has taught
management and organisational behaviour in the
Department
of
Business Administration at the
University
of
Illinois. She is currently aPhD
candidate in exercise physiology at the Univer-
sity
of
Illinois. For the past four years she has
been conducting avariety
of
research projects
at the Police Training Institute.
ABSTRACT
The purpose
if
this study was to evaluate the
iffectiveness
if
anight-shooting
lecture
and night
sights in improving nighttime shooting
accuracy.
The shooting
scores
if
police
recruits
with and
without night sights were compared before and
after the night-shooting
lecture
in three low-light
shooting conditions: shooting at a back-lighted
target, shooting at a front-lighted target, and
shooting with the assistance
if
aflashlight. The
shooting
scores
did not improve ofter the
lecture
for
shooting at a back-lighted target and
for
shooting with a flashlight, indicating that the
recruits
had not yet mastered the
specific
shooting
techniques taught for these specific low-light
conditions. The shooting
scores
did improve
for
shooting at afront-lighted target, even though no
specificshooting technique, other than what the
recruits
had previously learned in theirfirearms
training, is required in this lighting condition.
Night
sights significantly improved the
scores
when shooting at a back-lighted target.
INTRODUCTION
Crime
statistics
indicate
that
approxi-
mately
90
per
cent
of
the
shootings
involving
law
enforcement
officers
occur
in
low-light
conditions
(Illinois
Law
Enforcement
Training
Standards
Board,
1997).
Over
a
ten-year
period
from
1989
to
1998,
70.5
per
cent
of
the
law
enforcement
officers assaulted
were
as-
saulted
between
the
hours
of
6:01
pm
and
6:00
am.
In
addition,
approximately
61
per
cent
of
those
officers slain
during
this
same
ten-year
period
were
killed
between
InternationalJournal of Police
Science and Management,
Vol.3
No.3,
2001, pp. 25:;-259.
©Henry
Stewart Publications.
1461-3557
Page 255
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