2 Weeks After Boston Bombings, Cherry Hill Police Train for the Worst

Crouched behind a SWAT team member in heavy body armor and a bulletproof shield, Cherry Hill Detective Sgt. Joseph Vitarelli searched beneath an EMS uniform to find and seal a chest wound, as a fellow officer provided covering fire a few yards away.

The pool of blood beside him wasn’t real, and the EMT Vitarelli was treating was a dummy—but the situation is exactly what police need to prepare for, Cooper University Hospital staff, who ran the drill, told the two dozen officers who worked in the wind and rain Monday to learn how to respond to active shooter and mass casualty scenarios.

Patrol officers can’t just be beat cops any longer—they have to be able to respond immediately, even before EMTs get to the scene, in order to save victims, whether civilians or fellow emergency responders, said Chris Taylor, and emergency medical services coordinator with Cooper.

He stressed the need to help those worst off, referencing SALT triage, which groups victims in green, yellow, red and black. Taylor said responding officers have to focus solely on the victims who would be red-tagged—the ones who can't get out on their own, but could still survive with help.

“We’re worried about the bleeding, nothing else,” he said. “You could die in two to three minutes…don’t waste time.”

Taylor and Dr. Ryan Sexton, an emergency medical specialist, ran officers through the situations they might face, and explained how to use various field dressings, part of kits the police department is considering carrying in patrol cars.

Part of the difficulty in trying to help the wounded in mass casualty situations is the unseen damage done by bullets and shrapnel, Sexton said. Unlike some of the horrific, graphic images from the Boston bombings, wounds that look minor on the surface could be much worse—and could extend well beyond a bullet’s entrance wound, thanks to pressure waves internally, he said.

“You could be shot down here,” Sexton said, pointing to his stomach, “and have a lung injury up here.”

Sexton and Taylor’s presence at the training was part of a pilot program at Cooper designed to teach officers how to respond to mass shootings and other attacks, and cost Cherry Hill nothing. Though it had been planned months ago, the timing seemed grimly appropriate, just two weeks after the Boston Marathon bombings and wild police battle days later with the two men who allegedly were responsible for that attack.

While such an attack might seem unlikely in Cherry Hill, the possibility still exists—in fact, there was a mass shooting at an office building on Kings Highway in 1972—and it’s better to have that knowledge than try to learn in the middle of a potentially deadly situation, said Lt. Sean Redmond, who heads up the department’s training unit.

“We’d be selling our officers short if we didn’t show them this stuff,” said Redmond. “I think we’re a bit ahead of the curve.”

As officers trained on the medical techniques, on the other side of a 12-foot-high concrete barrier wall, patrol officers ran through drills that look nothing like the standard pistol qualifying—like the tactical medical training, shooting drills are grounded in real-life situations. Officers practice shooting with partially loaded magazines, run a course requiring them to reload and even practice firing from their back.

The latter was added following an incident in Gloucester Township last year, when a prisoner wrestled control of an officer’s duty weapon before being shot and killed, forcing other officers to return fire after being knocked down—a situation that’s not usually in a standard training regimen, Remond said.

“I’m trying to focus on more real-world situations,” he said. “It just seems more appropriate…it goes to the heart of what we do on patrol.”

Cherry Hill’s fortunate, Redmond said, in that both police Chief Richard DelCampo and township government are supportive of those outside-the-box training plans, giving officers leeway to beyond the basics and shape training to address the ever-changing agenda of the times.

“We’re in a very good spot here,” Redmond said.