Hello.
My name is Wewai and I was one of the two SWAT officers involved with the situation. I wanna give you my view of the whole situation and wanna solve what went wrong.
The call started with Finlay saying that there is a possible hostage situation at Farm. I didn't think mich of it until a panik came in. So my "partner" and I are getting to the scene by the van and I asked him to stop befor the off road to the farm comes. I wanted to check around the farm, but this idea got denied by the called partner. He shot me in the back, which got me crippled. I almost hit my panic at that moment and would had started shooting if we wouldn't had it cleared out. So i requested a medic to come to the farm. Due to the fact that walking would take way to much time we got back into the van and drove it infront of the perimiter from officers. On the way there, my buddy was telling me over LOOC that he had a mouse problem. At that time two officers where watching over the situation, where Finlay was negotiating. We were just talking to euch other and were listening to what the officers said and waited for the medic. He came very fast, so fast weg had to tell him to slow down and he hit his breaks. After getting healed by him, we wanted to go back to the silos and when i saw the medic on the fence and wanted to asked him to go down there. But befor i was able to do so, Finlay called the medic to go to the him on the farm. Supposendly, because the hostage takers tolled him to. My buddy and I were going back to the silos, and waited there for any other Infos. The next thing i can remember is hearing a shot and seeing a life alert comming up in the upper corner. It was Finlays and I and many others had noch idea what happend. I ran around the corner and saw the Corporal on scene engaging a little bit, befor he told told us to engage, because someone said that SWAT should go first. In the moment i was around these hay quarters, i first was looking down the long way of the barn, befor looking more and more to the right. I saw him and the hostage, but was not able to hear any of them. I aimed from this position to them and was hoping for a good moment to shot him. His side was petty often exposed, but never enough so I was not able to open the fire on him without endangering the hostage. So i waited for around 5-15 seconds until someone started shooting, the hostage got executed and I had a clear line of fire. I shot at him when i saw that. Some seconds after him going down, i did the same, propably a Sniper. While being that, i was just seeing them broth asking if we are senior officers (Negativ answer) and why we endangerd the hostage ultimatly being the fault of his death. I once said that the negotiatior got killed so for me, the negotiations had failed. After comming back to life i gone off duty and went offline.
Just so you know:
We never endangerd the negotiations. My buddy and I were waiting, trying to stay out of there sight and as told about 10x times by Finlay, waited outside of farm. When he mentiond total officers should put there guns away/down, i told my SWAT member to holster his rille. I even did a Joker about this making it slightly more secure, as he wasn't able to shot people by accident now.
About that missclick:
I myself did not relise that the officer got killed by a missclick. I just saw that when i myself was dead allready.
Reason to engage:
A reason to breach and enter a scene with hostages is when there is no way of negotiating and if it's possible, that negotiating is more dangerous for LEO's, victims and bystanders then engaging. I engaged, because I felt like these things were currently active. The guy who were negotiating were killed by his contact, do sending in a other Officer like this sounded like a to big risk. This risk would been a lot smaler if i had heared either an IC reason to shot him(for example: The officer tried to take a gun) or if i had realised that it was a missclick, even thought it is not explaining it IC.
Do I understand the Action Request?:
Yes, i see why you people are upset by a situation ending like this and I understand that you want to ensure this not happening again in the future. But this "SWATs fault!" is not right. We /I just did what I saw as right in my situations with the informations as i had them.
Do i see a fault by me?:
No. I only knew the facts as i stated them above and was not the one shooting him befor the victim was down.
Note:
Due to the fact that i was not called by Finlay, I'm only 90% sure that I'm indeed one of the SWAT officers. I will check my answer for any mistakes tomorrow/today(it is 2 am). I will also watch my own demo, hope to find other infos and going to upload it if needed.
Wewai | Paul Schmidt
