S. K. Industries Law Enforcement Page

The purpose of the S. K. Industries Law Enforcement Page is to answer the questions pertaining to the use of laser gunsights specific to Police work, and to assist in the formation of policy.

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The use of laser aimers on handguns by regular duty officers has greatly increased since 1990 when visible laser diode laser aimers became available. I will try to provide this page as a objective source for the information needed to advance the usage of lasers by law enforcement.

Over the years several thousand law enforcement personel have incorporated some type of laser to their duty weapon. This number is a small percentage of the whole law enforcement community. These officers are a valuble source of information that needs to be shared with the entire LE community and civilians as well. Every one of these officers has a story or two. We encourage these officers to contact SKInd. with your laser related LE story. If we can create a database with this info, we could provide a source to those that need to make the decision that could save your life. The laser when used properly will substantially de-escalate situations that would normally require shooting. And when the laser is used for shooting, the resulting tactical advantage has kept more than one cop alive. Many myths and misconceptions remain about what any laser can and can't do. In order to discuss the use of a laser by LE, we must assume that that laser has been accepted for use only after a grueling evaluation. We must assume that the laser must remain on a preset alignment even after repeated firing and abuse of the weapon. The laser should allow the officer to use the same holster. The laser must have a activator that in no way interferes with the shooters grip, trigger pull, or thinking process. These are the most important criteria. Battery life, expense, recharge-ability, warranty, and upgrade-abillity are also important factors.

Laser Etiquette

A new laser is going to be a novelty for some time after installation. There have been episodes where officers lost laser rights for the whole dept. because they were playing with their laser and pointed it at the wrong person. The first step in laser training must be in laser etiquette and laser saftey. This is a area that needs to be included in the formation of new dept. laser policy. A Police officer must be held to a higher standard with regard to laser gun-sights. The Public's perception of the officer's use of the laser will determine the future of laser usage in law enforcement. The same level of respect you have for your weapon should be extended to your laser. A laser is not a toy. The proliferation of cheap laser pointers is causing an increase in the type of disturbance that lasers can cause when abused.
Because the laser is connected to a gun, you would think that laser saftey rules are redundant. Never point the laser at anything you are not prepared to shoot. Only make adjustments at the range. If you must point the laser down the street to see how far it goes, take the slide off your frame first. Avoid pointing the laser into the eyes of the person the gun is pointed at. If you must to get the person's attention, you may do this for a moment, ( see tactics and saftey ). People have been programed by the movies to associate the red dot with guns. It would seem that there is a direct corelation between a person's guilt, and their response to the laser dot.

Laser Saftey

The FDA says that it would take 2000 seconds of point blank exposure directly at the eye with a Class IIIa 635nm. diode laser to sustain any perceptable damage to the eye. Most people will experience discomfort if they catch a laser beam in the eye. The effect is worse with eye glasses. The optical power of the laser beam is diluted over the area of the laser spot as the beam travels further away from the source and diverges. The potential for eye damage also decreases with distance. The normal human response to laser light is to blink and avert your eyes. This prevents a 2000 second exposure. With Infra-Red lasers the light is invisible and does not cause the human to look away. This is why the IR laser is concidered so much more dangerous. IR lasers must only have momentary switches for for activators for this reason.

Lasers and the public

Some agencies may have trouble convincing officials of the benefits of laser sight usage by law enforcement. They may fear potential law suits or some perceived liability From the stand point of the city fathers that may be concerned about potential legal problems we say, that if a laser can stop one bad shooting the benefits far outweigh any imagined danger. There is also the theory that the increase in accurate shooting ability provided by the laser sight will cause the officer to be attacked in court because a suspect was shot center mass when the laser would have allowed the officer to wound instead. This attitude becomes stronger as you go up in rank.

Tactics and Psychology

The laser aiming system is a tool that serves many functions. It allows the shooter to better control the location their bullet will impact, and it is a powerfull psychological weapon that enhances a officer's control of a situation.

What a laser gunsight does on a duty weapon is introduce a new step in the process of drawing the weapon and firing. Now there is the period of the laser activation after the gun has been drawn. The laser sight serves as an serious alternative to lethal force by promoting compliance at the moment when the target is most likely about to be shot. A runner will think about stopping when they see the laser spot. Individuals in vehicles that are slow to follow instuctions will respond when a laser is put into the drivers mirror. In many situations you may not wish to activate the laser immediatly. Often today a suspect will not cooperate even with a gun pointed at them. Maybe they think you aren't that close, or they can run and you will miss. When the laser is finally activated the matter of the gun becomes very personel and urgent. Feedback suggests that lasers on duty weapons reduce the occurance of suspects needing to be shot by 90%, the remaining being suicidal types. Even among the suicidal types, the laser convinces many that maybe they didn't want to get it there. The threat of a face shot will disuade someone suicidal who wants to look good in an open casket.

As mentioned earlier, Hollywood has done a good job of programing people about lasers. A person who finds themselves spotted by a laser dot will allways react the same way. What is important is that they realize that the laser is on them. If a bad guy is rolling around on the ground with your partner you may want to spot him in the face and let him know he should stop fighting. This works well. In a stand off situation it helps to verbally point out the laser spot on the persons chest. Once their attention has been directed to the laser spot, they will try to brush it off or move. At that moment they are not looking at the source of the laser. Unless they want to be dead instantly, they pay very good attention to the laser spot. Another way to demonstrate the laser is to breifly scan the suspects face. At this point you might say something to the effect of," do you know what that is?". Then you bring the laser to the chest and say," look at your chest". This works well. Immediate cooperation should result. The laser also acts as a force multiplier by making it easier to cover multiple persons with one gun. When dealing with a group, bringing the laser momentarily to bear on each target will make it very personal for that person. They will know that you can bring the weapon back to bear on them with lethal precision instantly.

Training will ensure that the laser is not viewed as a magic shield. Laser training can lead to a major improvement in an officer's shooting abilities and that will enhance confidence and reduces stress. The laser also acts as a positive psychological device for the officer using the laser, and the non laser equiped officers who work with them. The officer's abillity to intimidate increases. In situations where more than one officer is drawn on a suspect in a stand-off situation, the sight of the laser spot reduces stress and tension for all the officers involved. To do this the laser needs to run continuously for the duration. The longest situation of this type that was reported back to SK, lasted 45 min. The suspect was suicidal and had a rifle. He was eventually shot; but prior to that, the laser was on him for 45 minutes. There were two rookies at the scene that night. They both reported that the constant presence of the laser spot on the suspect's body, gave them more confidence and reduced the stress of the ordeal. Some departments have deployed small numbers of lasers and alerted the public through the media that the laser was being used. The gun being in the holster, bad guys never knew who had a laser and every officer gained a psychological advantage.

Other uses for Laser
in Law Enforcement

The laser can be used in several non shooting functions. As a signal the laser can be very effective. A team member might signal a direction to go or a place to look. A sniper under cover can signal a command post if needed. A officer behind a barricade can fire their weapon without exposure if assisted by a second officer observing the target from a safe vantage. There is no better way to direct fire, when you are ducking behind a shield with a handgun pointed around the edge. The Annie Oakley trick with the mirror is child's play with a laser. Lasers work well with K9 units to train and identify persons to recieve the K9's attention. This can prevent confusion in groups of people. A laser might also be used to point out a person in a group by a air unit, or a witness in a car. The laser is now being discovered as a great way to plot a bullet's path, by shining a laser through holes and such. Lasers blinking coded bursts of light will be used as keys. Master laser shutdown keys are being devised to turn off cars in the event of a felony pursuit. The system will be passed off to the public as a security device. New cars will hall have this built into the tail lights. The police officer shoots the back of the car with a coded laser beam that activates the built in kill switch. In this aplication, the laser is more selective than a radio signal and it is less destructive than the electro-pulse systems that can kill a computer or pace-maker as well as a motor. Some people are using larger lasers to act as a dis-orientating device to be shined into a suspects eyes. S. K. Industries does not approve of this practice. A white light is much safer for this technique and more socially humane.

About Lasers and Laser Light

The main thing to remember about a laser is that it is one color. Yes you can take a Kyrpton and add a Argon and make white light which you could split up with filters and make a rainbow of color. Forget about that. What has allways made lasers special was the narrow band of wavelength that the laser produced. The electro-magnetic spectrum is a big huge ruler. We see a small part which is visible to "us". You can call this the rainbow. On the left side of the rainbow is the Ultra-Violet and on the right is the Infra-Red. Just remember that the IR side has the big numbers. The red side of the rainbow is about 700nm. The Purple side stops around 200nm. The increment used to divide the ruler is the nanometer. A millionth of a meter. On either side of the rainbow on the electro magnet spectrum, it goes on forever. On one side the waves of energy get longer and longer. On the other side they get infinitely smaller. Out of all this we Earth humans have created TV, microwaves, X-rays, AM, FM, Radar, not to mention flash lights.
As our species progress, we will discover all sorts of interesting things to do with elements of the electro magnetic spectrum. Because lasers are exactly one color they are perfect for as a reference in measuring devices. We know that a laser producing a certain color will be "X" wavelength. We can use "X" wavelength as a unit of measure. If "X" wavelength is really small then you can make very tight toleraces on what ever you are trying to make or measure. Anything from eye-glasses to computer chips, to the Space Telescope. Before the laser, lens makers were not much better off than Sir Isaak Newton. Lens polishers used sun light to measure lens. Then they used mercury vapor lamps which were mono-chromatic. The first red visible lasers allowed lens polishers to push the edge of what was previously possible. The immediate result was a improvement by a factor of twenty. This Allowed the Perkin-Elmer Co. to build the first machines that printed the semi-conductor wafers. This fueled companies like Texas Instruments and Motorola. The rest is history. The American's lost their monopoly on semiconductor machines when the Japanese changed the light bulb. They simply went to a light source that put out a shorter wave-length. This gave them the ability to print wafers that had smaller lines closer together decreasing the distance the electrons had to flow, making for a faster semi-conductor.

The human eye and brain veiw color differantly than animals. To us the yellow region of the rainbow appears the most bright. As you travel from either side of the rainbow towards the center, the apparent brightness will increase in a bell curve peaking at yellow. Commercially available laser diodes haven't reached the top. The next big advance will come with blue and green lasers in the 400-500 range. The state of the art technology is to put a phase doubling crystal in front of a IR laser that puts out a 1000nm and fold the light into a 500nm. beam. This is difficult to do, and the crystals are expensive. It makes the laser bigger, take more power, and require very tight thermal tolerance. Eventually the problems will be overcome and we should have green laser diodes. One company has developed a blue/violet laser diode that does not require a crystal making it suitable for use as a laser gun sight. The wave-length of this diode is shorter than the green, and much shorter than the red. This will allow very high data storage for computers. When the industry volume increases the commercial availability will allow for use in laser gun sights. This is probably the closest we will come to actual "day-light" lasers.

Myths about Laser Gun Sights

#1 The laser is going to expose my position. When someone is down range of your laser, they will be able to follow the beam back to you. You must be in the path of the laser to do this. When you are in the path of the laser, you are not thinking about where the laser is coming from. You are focused on the spot on your chest.

#2 If more than one laser is present there will be confusion. When the gun in your hand has a laser on it, your brain will be able to identify your laser spot instantly. This is all you have to do, is know which spot is yours.

#3 The shooter will get lazy and depend on the laser. When you first start shooting a weapon with a laser, your faults become apparent and you tend to make corrections. These changes affect how you opperate even the non laser equiped weapon. Shooting stance and style need not change. The shooter may continue to use the iron sights, just better.

#4 The officer will try to use the laser in daylight when they should be using the iron sights. This is no different than a flash light. There is a time and a place. Its all about training. It should be easy to identify times when the laser should be used. Even if you could see the laser spot in the day light, you wouldn't risk your life looking for it.

Officer Feedback

It is only right that this letter be the first that we present here. Please read this letter as it very well describes why we are doing this.

Det. Steven Groom
Pend Orial DTF Unit
PO Box 5075
Newport, WA 99156

Steven Kelley
S. K. Industries
1370 N. Dynamics #F
Anahiem, CA 92806

Ref: Shooting on 10/26/92

On Oct. 26, 1992 I was involved in a warrant arrest that led to a shootout during handcuffing. The incident started at about 1906 pm when our sheriff's dispatcher received a report of an intoxicated male jumping in front of cars on a remote road north of Newport Washington.
I arrived aprox 5 minutes after the call was reported. During my investigation I received the identification of the male and confirmed that he was the intoxicated pedestrian. When checking the suspect I was notified that the 43 year old male had two outstanding bench warrants from Spokane, Washington. The bail amount totaled $75 for both warrants
While arresting the suspect I provided instructions for him to turn his back to me and place his hands together behind his back. With lightning speed the suspect drew a Browning High Power 9mm out of the rear waist of his pants then fired at me. Our distance was approx 5 to 8 feet apart.
Using officer safe tactics I was able to roll off center to my right, drop to the ground and return fire at the same time. All of my moves were in one motion. The only light available was from my vehicle lights. I was able to use the red dot (beam) of my laser to place shots into the center of the suspects chest. I was not forced to aim with the use of standard sights. I placed shots into the heart and liver of the suspect making him unable to continue the attack.
With the use of the SK laser I was able to respond faster with more accuracy to defend my life. I survived the deadly encounter with no injuries.
Surviving the gun fight has been beneficial to me. I am now a field training officer and head of out Drug Task Force. I am guest instructor for the Washington State Police Academy in Spokane.
I am convinced that the SK Laser provided my day to day officer saftey skills the edge to assist me with surviving a deadly encounter. Today I am the proud father of an 18 month old son,

Steven Groom
Deputy Sheriff
Pend Oreille County
Sheriff's Department

To: law17gun@aol.com

I'm a police officer (20+ years) in an area that borders urban wild lands
in California.

One of my duties is to eliminate the suffering of deer that are severely
injured by automobiles, usually at night.

Approximately five years ago I had a LAW 17 Laser installed on my 10 MM
Glock.

Prior to this combination I would have some difficulty lining up the:
flashlight / sights / deer (head) / and backstop as the animals are usually
thrashing, and sometimes mobile. I took this difficulty for granted as
just the way it is. After I put the Glock LAW 17 combination together I
found out differently. I euthanized injured animals much more quickly,
using fewer shots fired with more effect. On two occasions I successfully
made shots that I never would have attempted with conventional sights on
moving targets at night.

The implications for other successes are obvious, at night I have this
additional advantage.

I've also discovered that I can practice instinctive point shooting with my
unloaded firearm with the use of the laser. Point at your target, activate
the laser. . . did you get it? Also you'll have your laser quickly point
out how steady (or unsteady) you hold on target.

My personal opinion, the patrol officer having a laser on his duty weapon
is a safety innovation that easily rivals the bullet proof vest.

Hello, I hope this e-mail finds you well. I wanted to let you know that I got my Glock back yesterday from the warranty work. I don't remember it ever working this good. I think your company is the easiest and most fair to deal with that I have ever seen. I appreciate everything and have recommended you to several fellow officers. Thanks again, and keep up the great work.
Sincerely Yours,
Bill Brown

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