Improving the Law Enforcement Response to Active Shooter Incidents: An Analysis of After-Action Reports

Abstract

We examine all publicly available after-action reports (AARs) on active shooter incidents in the U.S. from 1999 through 2022 (n = 31). We conduct a thematic analysis of recommendations provided in the AARs to identify common areas for improvement in the law enforcement response to these incidents. We find considerable overlap in the recommendations across AARs, with themes related to pre-incident planning, training, inter-agency coordination, incident command, and communication being the most common. Findings indicate recurring challenges for law enforcement, suggesting agencies may not be effectively learning from prior active shooter incidents. We discuss the potential of AARs to strengthen agency preparedness and promote organizational learning. We further provide recommendations to improve AARs and to centralize and disseminate their findings.

Keywords

active shooter after-action report (AAR)law enforcement organizational learning

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

ALERRT. (2022). Robb Elementary School Attack Response Assessment and Recommendations. https://schoolshooters.info/sites/default/files/Uvalde-After-Action-Report.pdf

ALERRT. (2024). About ALERRT. Retrieved July 12, 2024, from https://alerrt.org/about

American Psychological Association. (2019). One-third of US adults say fear of mass shootings prevents them from going to certain places or events. https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2019/08/fear-mass-shooting

Blair

J. P.

Sandel

W. L.

Martaindale

M. H.

(2021). Correlates of the number shot and killed in active shooter events. Homicide Studies, 25(4), 335–360. https://doi-org.ez.lib.jjay.cuny.edu/10.1177/1088767920976727

Braun

Clarke

(2006). Using thematic analysis in psychology. Qualitative Research in Psychology, 3(2), 77–101.

Braziel

Straub

Watson

Hoops

(2016). Bringing calm to chaos: A critical incident review of the San Bernardino public safety response to the December 2, 2015 terrorist shooting incident at the Inland Regional Center. Office of Community Policing Services. https://cops.usdoj.gov/RIC/ric.php?page=detail&id=COPS-W0808

Broward County Aviation Department. (2017). Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood international airport: Active shooter incident and post event response, January 6, 2017 after-action report. https://www.policinginstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Ft.-Lauderdale-Hollywood-International-Airport-AAR.pdf

Broward County Sheriff’s Office. (2017). Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood international airport (FLL) active shooter/mass evacuation critical incident. http://www.trbas.com/media/media/acrobat/2017-10/94837910-10093411.pdf

Capellan

J. A.

Gomez

(2018). Change and stability in offender, behaviors, and incident-level characteristics of mass public shootings in the United States, 1984-2015. Journal of Investigative Psychology and Offender Profiling, 15(1), 51–72.

10.

City of Santa Monica Office of Emergency Management. (2014). City of Santa Monica June 7th, 2013 shooting incident. https://schoolshooters.info/sites/default/files/Santa_Monica_Official_Report.pdf

11.

Connecticut State Police. (2012). After action report: Newtown shooting incident. https://portal.ct.gov/-/media/DESPP/DSP/CSPAARpdf.pdf

12.

Donahue

Tuohy

(2006). Lessons We Don’t Learn: A Study of the Lessons of Disasters, Why We Repeat Them, and How We Can Learn Them. Homeland Security Affairs. https://www.hsaj.org/articles/167

13.

Duron

(2021). “Shots fired! We have many people down!”: Common recommendations for managing high-casualty active shooter events in the USA. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 65, 102548

14.

Erickson

W. H.

(2001). The report of governor bill Owens’ columbine review commission. https://schoolshooters.info/sites/default/files/Columbine%20-%20Governor%27s%20Commission%20Report.pdf

15.

Faith

K. S.

Jackson

B. A.

Willis

H. H.

(2011). Text analysis of after action reports to support Improved emergency response planning. Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, 8(1), 57.

16.

Federal Bureau of Investigation. (2021). Active shooter incidents 20-year review, 2000-2019. https://www.fbi.gov/file-repository/active-shooter-incidents-20-year-review-2000-2019-060121.pdf/view

17.

Federal Bureau of Investigation. (2023). Active shooter incidents in the United States in 2022. https://www.fbi.gov/file-repository/active-shooter-incidents-in-the-us-2022-042623.pdf/view

18.

Federal Emergency Management Agency. (2018). 1 October after-action report. https://www.hsdl.org/?abstract&did=814668

19.

Fox

J. A.

DeLateur

M. J.

(2014). Mass shootings in America: Moving beyond Newtown. Homicide Studies, 18(1), 125–145.

20.

Fox

J. A.

Levin

(2003). Mass murder: An analysis of extreme violence. Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies, 5(1), 47–64.

21.

Freilich

J. D.

Chermak

S. M.

Connell

N. M.

Klein

B. R.

Greene-Colozzi

E. A.

(2022). Using open-source data to better understand and respond to American school shootings: Introducing and exploring the American School Shooting Study (TASSS). Journal of School Violence, 21(2), 93–118.

22.

Freilich

J. D.

Chermak

S. M.

Klein

B. K.

(2020). Investigating the applicability of situational crime prevention to the public mass violence context. Criminology & Public Policy, 19(1), 271–293.

23.

Gill

Silver

Horgan

Corner

(2017). Shooting alone: The pre-attack experiences and behaviors of U.S. solo mass murderers. Journal of Forensic Science, 62(3), 710–714.

24.

Greene-Colozzi

E. A.

(2022). Mitigating the harm of public mass shooting incidents through situational crime prevention [Criminal Justice PhD Dissertation]. John Jay College of Criminal Justice; The Graduate Center, City University of New York (CUNY).

25.

Grondahl

Bjorkly

(2016). Research quality and psychological theory in publications on school shooters with multiple victims: A systematic review of the literature. Cogent Psychology 3, 1152759.

26.

Hernández

Kriel

Churchill

(2023, December 5). Someone tell me what to do. ProPublica. https://www.propublica.org/article/uvalde-officer-student-trainings-mass-shootings

27.

Hipple

N. K.

Hunter

B. D.

(2023). After-action reviews and the big black hole of improvement processes. Policing: A Journal of Policy and Practice, 17, paac105. https://doi.org/10.1093/police/paac105

28.

Huff-Corzine

McCutcheon

J. C

Corzine

Jarvis

J. P.

Tetzlaff-Bemiller

M. J.

Weller

Landon

(2014). Shooting for accuracy: Comparing data sources on mass murder. Homicide Studies, 18(1), 105–124.

29.

Investigative Committee on the Robb Elementary School Shooting. (2022). Investigative committee on the Robb elementary school shooting interim report 2022. https://house.texas.gov/_media/pdf/committees/reports/87interim/Robb-Elementary-Investigative-Committee-Report.pdf

30.

Jackson

B. A.

Faith

K. S.

Willis

H. H.

(2010). Assessing the probability, effects, and severity of failure modes: An exploratory analysis using response after-action reports (pp. 95–117). Rand Corporation.

31.

Kuckartz

Rädiker

(2019). Analyzing qualitative data with MAXQDA. Text, audio, and video. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-15671-8

32.

Lankford

Silver

(2020). Why have public mass shootings become more deadly? Assessing how perpetrators’ motives and methods have changed over time. Criminology and Public Policy, 19(1), 37–60.

33.

Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department. (2019). 1 October after-action review. https://www.lvmpd.com/en-us/Documents/1_October_AAR_Final_06062019.pdf

34.

Los Angeles World Airports. (2014). Active shooter incident and resulting airport disruption: A review of response operations. https://www.lawa.org/-/media/lawa-web/projects-and-reports/lawa-t3-after-action-report-march-18-2014.ashx

35.

Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission. (2019a). Initial report submitted to the governor, speaker of the house of representatives and senate president. http://www.fdle.state.fl.us/MSDHS/CommissionReport.pdf

36.

Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission. (2019b). Report submitted to the governor, speaker of the house of representatives and senate president. https://www.fdle.state.fl.us/MSDHS/MSD-Report-2-Public-Version.pdf

37.

Martaindale

M. H.

Blair

J. P.

(2019). The evolution of active shooter response training protocols since Columbine: Lessons from the Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training Center. Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, 35(3), 342–356.

38.

Multnomah County Office of Emergency Management. (2015). Reynolds high school active shooter response: An analysis of the response to the Reynolds High School Shooting on June 10, 2014. https://schoolshooters.info/sites/default/files/Reynolds-High-School-Active-Shooter-Response.pdf

39.

Nagin

Koper

C. S.

Lum

(2020). Policy recommendations for countering mass shootings in the United States. Criminology and Public Policy, 19(1), 1–7.

40.

National Policing Institute. (2019). Recovering and moving forward: Lessons learned and recommendations following the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. https://www.policinginstitute.org/publication/recovering-and-moving-forward-lessons-learned-and-recommendations-following-the-shooting-at-marjory-stoneman-douglas-high-school/

41.

National Policing Institute. (2020). How to conduct an after action review. Office of Community Oriented Policing Services. https://www.policinginstitute.org/publication/how-to-conduct-an-after-action-review/

42.

National Tactical Officers Association. (2024). NTOA announces release of its 2023 impact report. Retrieved July 12, 2024, from https://www.ntoa.org/ntoa-announces-release-of-the-2022-impact-report/

43.

Norton

(2018). Primary law enforcement mistakes during initial critical incident response and timeline of these events: Anatomy of the first 60 [Master of Science in Emergency Services Administration Thesis]. California State University, Long Beach.

44.

Ojasalo

Turunen

Sihvonen

H. M.

(2009, May 11–12). Responsibility and decision-making transfer in public safety and security emergencies: A case study of school shootings [Conference session]. 2009 IEEE Conference on Technologies for Homeland Security, Waltham, MA, United States (pp. 358–365).

45.

Parry

Darling

(2016, January 19). Emergent learning in action: The after action review. The Systems Thinker. https://thesystemsthinker.com/emergent-learning-in-action-the-after-action-review/

46.

Reeping

P. M.

Jacoby

S. F.

Rajan

Branas

(2020). Rapid response to mass shootings. Criminology and Public Policy, 19, 295–315.

47.

Rice

R. M.

Bloomfield

E. F.

(2022). Commemorating disorder in after-action reports: Rhetorics of organizational trauma after the Las Vegas Shooting. Journal of International Crisis and Risk Communication Research, 5(1), 87–112.

48.

Savoia

Agboola

Biddinger

P. D.

(2012). Use of after action reports (AARs) to promote organizational and systems learning in emergency preparedness. International journal of environmental research and public health, 9(8), 2949–2963. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph9082949

49.

Schildkraut

Elsass

H. J.

(2016). Mass shootings: Media, myths, and realities. Praeger Books.

50.

Schildkraut

Naman

B. M.

Stafford

M. C.

(2019). Advancing responses to mass shootings using a routine activities approach. Crime Prevention and Community Safety, 21, 346–361.

51.

Silva

J. R.

(2019). A media distortion analysis of mass shootings [Criminal Justice PhD Dissertation]. John Jay College of Criminal Justice; The Graduate Center, City University of New York (CUNY).

52.

Silva

J. R.

Greene-Colozzi

E. A.

(2021). Mass shootings and routine activities theory: The impact of motivation, target suitability and capable guardianship on fatalities and injuries. Violence and Victims, 16(4), 565–586.

53.

Straub

Cambria

Castor

Gorban

Meade

Waltemeyer

Zeunik

(2017a). Rescue, response, and resilience: A critical incident review of the Orlando public safety response to the attack on the pulse nightclub. Office of Community Oriented Policing Services. https://www.policinginstitute.org/publication/rescue-response-and-resilience-a-critical-incident-review-of-the-orlando-public-safety-response-to-the-attack-on-the-pulse-nightclub/

54.

Straub

Cowell

Zeunik

Gorban

(2017b). Managing the response to a mobile mass shooting: A critical incident review of the Kalamazoo, Michigan, public safety response to the February 20, 2016, mass shooting incident. National Policing Institute. https://www.policinginstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/PF_Managing-the-Response-to-a-Mobile-Mass-Shooting_5.10.17.pdf

55.

TriData Division, System Planning Corporation. (2014). Aurora century 16 theater shooting after action report for the city of Aurora, Colorado. https://www.policinginstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Aurora-Century-16-Theater-Shooting_AAR.pdf

56.

U.S. Department of Justice. (2024). Critical incident review: Active shooter at Robb Elementary School. Office of Community Oriented Policing Services. https://portal.cops.usdoj.gov/resourcecenter/content.ashx/cops-r1141-pub.pdf

57.

Weber

R. O.

Aha

D. W.

(2003). Intelligent delivery of military lessons learned. Decision Support Systems, 34(3), 287–304. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0167-9236(02)00122-7

Supplementary Material

Please find the following supplemental material available below.

For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.

For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.

0.00 MB

0.02 MB