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Old 08-03-2020, 03:23 AM
 
3,730 posts, read 1,769,010 times
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I guess SWAT now stands for Social Workers And Therapists!


Quote:

The highly trained Transit SWAT team that was once celebrated for capturing Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has been dissolved.
https://hotair.com/archives/jazz-sha...rathon-bomber/
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Old 08-03-2020, 07:41 AM
 
2,279 posts, read 1,345,917 times
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Why the transit police needed a SWAT team is beyond me.
SWAT team should be used in very limited occasions, you need very few of them.
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Old 08-03-2020, 08:01 AM
 
15,804 posts, read 20,539,754 times
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Makes sense. They haven't been used, and there are other regional swat teams that are primary SWAT teams. The North Metro SWAT team played a major role in Tsarnaev's capture. I believe the Transit SWAT was only used in a supporting role.

https://www.policemag.com/341126/taking-down-tsarnaev


Plus you have Boston SWAT, North Eastern Massachusetts Law Enforcement Council SWAT team, Franklin County Regional response team, The Mass State Police Special Tactical operations team, etc etc. There are plenty of SWAT teams in MA, this is really a non-story. All the members are officers so they are just going back to regular duties vs training for situations they never get called up for.
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Old 08-03-2020, 08:59 AM
 
3,808 posts, read 3,147,756 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by BostonMike7 View Post
Plus you have Boston SWAT, North Eastern Massachusetts Law Enforcement Council SWAT team, Franklin County Regional response team, The Mass State Police Special Tactical operations team, etc etc. There are plenty of SWAT teams in MA, this is really a non-story.
A conservative media website peddling a non-story to boot-lick law enforcement? I'm terribly surprised ...

Apparently these "conservatives" have either forgotten or abandoned their small-gov trope ... for example, providing training and equipment to a SWAT team which hasn't been utilized in quote "several years". As a fiscal conservative, I applaud cut's like this. Now if only we could get non-PD flagmen.
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Old 08-03-2020, 09:39 AM
 
9,120 posts, read 6,334,220 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Shrewsburried View Post
As a fiscal conservative, I applaud cut's like this. Now if only we could get non-PD flagmen.
^^^ I strongly agree with this statement. The rest of the post which I did not quote was a little inflammatory though.
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Old 08-03-2020, 10:22 AM
 
Location: Providence, RI
12,888 posts, read 22,057,707 times
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Over the past 30-40 years (especially post 9/11 when terrorism was perceived as a huge threat) Police departments from small towns to big cities across the U.S. received a massive influx of war/combat equipment (the clip from the Oxford County, ME Sheriff requesting a mine requesting vehicle due to the county “facing a previously unimaginable threat from terrorist activities” had me laughing pretty good) and formed special units trained to use it. A lot of this is overkill, and while they can often get the equipment for free (military surplus), the cost to keep these units up and running (inc. equipment maintenance and operating costs) is a lot for city, town, and county budgets to handle. There's certainly plenty of room to cut a lot of this fat out of budgets across the country. If the Transit Police SWAT unit hasn't been used much in recent years, there's probably little need for it. Particularly with BPD and MSP covering the same turf with similar teams and equipment. This is nothingburger.

Agreed re: non-PD flagman too. The fact that those aren't a thing here is a testament to the power and influence police unions still have.
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Old 08-03-2020, 12:21 PM
 
9,889 posts, read 7,230,972 times
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Don't forget that in 2012, Keene, NH got a BearCat APC as surplus from the military citing the annual Pumpkin Festival as a terrorist target. They had one chance in 2014 to use it when beer soaked college kids created a stir and tossed bottles at the local constabulary. After being tear gassed and pepper sprayed, the students shouted to the police "Bring Out The BearCat!!" The police declined.

It has never been used.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/investi...-riots-n229996
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Old 08-03-2020, 01:48 PM
 
Location: The ghetto
17,791 posts, read 9,233,277 times
Reputation: 13337
It's like insurance. It's expensive and you may never need it but you still gotta have it.
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Old 08-03-2020, 01:57 PM
 
3,808 posts, read 3,147,756 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by redplum33 View Post
It's like insurance. It's expensive and you may never need it but you still gotta have it.
And you still have it, as outlined by BostonMike. Your analogy assumes there aren't already insurance policies available (i.e., deployable).
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Old 08-03-2020, 02:05 PM
 
Location: Providence, RI
12,888 posts, read 22,057,707 times
Reputation: 14145
Quote:
Originally Posted by redplum33 View Post
It's like insurance. It's expensive and you may never need it but you still gotta have it.
Not really. The Transit Police SWAT unit is redundant with the State Police and Boston Police (not to mention nearby departments with similar capabilities). In an insurance analogy it's like having three policies in case of the same extremely rare occurrence. Nobody needs that.
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