14 times • FEBRUARY 18, 2016 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT www.qns.com Training day: Ridgewood gets the chance to use police firearms simulator BY ANTHONY GIUDICE agiudice@ridgewoodtimes.com @A_GiudiceReport What would you do if you were a police officer confronted by an armed perpetrator? Residents at the Feb. 16 104th Precinct Community Council meeting in Ridgewood got a chance to make split-second, life-or-death decisions by using the Firearms and Tactics Simulator (FATS) with the assistance of officers from the NYPD Firearms and Tactics Section. The FATS machine is a video-based system that projects a scenario on the screen that police officers may find themselves in, such as dealing with an emotionally disturbed person, or a report of shots fired in a store. The simulation allows the users to decide on how to best handle the situation. The FATS system is used as a decision making tool for new recruits to the force. Officers put stress on the recruits’ bodies by having them work out before using the FATS, then they observe what decisions they make. The recruits are then debriefed on the outcome, if they did a good or bad job handling the situation and what could be done better. It is not only a good tool for recruits, it is a great tool for officers to bring to the community and show people what cops can face on a daily basis. “It was pretty scary actually,” said Len Santoro, president of the 104th Precinct Community Council, of the simulation. “The guy in the simulation has a knife, he could come lunging at me or hurt himself. It’s an effective tool at showing people at how difficult and quick you have to make decisions.” The guns used in the simulation are real guns that have been modified for this purpose. The barrel of the gun was removed and replaced with a device that emits a beam of light that registers as a gunshot in the simulation when the user pulls the trigger. The simulation also uses a modified taser gun and pepper spray canister as options to subdue the perpetrator. According to officers in attendance, the average police-involved shooting lasts around 4.5 seconds, meaning officers have a short period of time to determine how to deal with the situation. Ninety percent of policeinvolved shootings happen within 21 feet, and 75 percent of those happen within 10 feet. Around 160 officers every year are killed, amounting to an officer death almost every other day of the year, the trainers said. This simulation teacher officers how to properly handle their weapons and avoid becoming victims of crime or making fatal mistakes that could result in someone’s death. RIDGEWOOD TIMES/Photos by Anthony Giudice The 104th Precinct Community Council got the chance to use the Firearms and Tactics Simulator. Late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was a proud son of Elmhurst BY ROBERT POZARYCKI rpozarycki@qns.com @robbpoz Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who died suddenly on a Texas ranch on Feb. 13 at the age of 79, was a proud child of Queens. Scalia was born in Trenton, N.J., but the family later relocated to Elmhurst. The graduate of P.S. 13 would go on to serve on the Supreme Court for nearly 30 years as one of its most conservative members. Though he practiced law elsewhere throughout the country during his career, Scalia held an affinity for his childhood home. In a 2013 first-person article for New York Magazine, he remembered playing in the P.S. 13 schoolyard and in the street, sledding in a local cemetery, camping out in vacant lots and having a crush on a schoolgirl. “It was a wonderful place. You had the subway; the world was your oyster. There was just enough responsibility that was put on young people that any New Yorker would acquire a certain cockiness,” he wrote. After graduating from P.S. 13, Scalia went to Xavier High School in Manhattan, then Georgetown University, where he graduated in 1957. He would go on to receive his judicial degree from Harvard Law School, where he would meet the woman who would become his wife, Maureen McCarthy. Scalia spent the first decade of his legal career in private practice. He entered government in 1972, when President Richard Nixon appointed him general counsel to the Office of Telecommunications Policy. He would later be named assistant attorney general for the Office of Legal Council. In 1982, President Ronald Reagan appointed Scalia a seat on the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. Four years later, Reagan nominated Scalia as an associate justice to the Supreme Court; he would be unanimously confirmed by the Senate. At the time of his death, Scalia was the longest-serving Supreme Court justice on the bench. During his tenure, he was known for his staunch conservative beliefs and quick wit in drafting majority and minority opinions on cases that came before the court. Scalia is survived by his wife, nine children and 28 grandchildren. Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that all flags across New York City will fly at half-mast through Feb. 22 in Scalia’s memory. “We mourn tonight for the loss of Justice Antonin Scalia,” de Blasio said in a statement Saturday night. “He was a proud New Yorker, and New Yorkers were proud to have one of their own serve as Supreme Court Justice. The first lady and I send our thoughts and prayers to his wife, children and other family members.” As for who will take Scalia’s place on the court, that may not be answered for quite some time. President Barack Obama said he would send a nominee to the Senate for confirmation hearings, but Senate Republican leaders indicated only hours after Scalia’s death was announced that they would not entertain another Obama nominee. They would prefer the seat remain vacant until the next president takes office in 2017.
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