Woods' shooting injury further questioned

Be sure to check out www.MCSDExposed.blogspot.com today for an experienced SWAT team member's review of the initial reports written following the shooting incident on March 15 that injured Deputy Eric Woods of the McHenry County Sheriff's Department.

For example, how close should shooters be to steel targets? Three yards, no closer.

How close were they on March 15? One report indicated the steel target-dog was four feet inside the room. A shot was made on that target by a deputy in the room; that's "in" the room. If a target is four feet inside a room and you are in the room with it, how close are you? Two feet? Three feet?

No wonder Woods got hit.

The reports failed to explain the first-aid treatment at the scene. Woods' leg injury was described to me two days after the shooting (March 17) as a "gusher". Sheriff Nygren calls Woods' injuries similar to "road rash". Reports of the several deputies (three?) attending to Woods should have described carefully how they treated his leg wound. Did they remove his trousers to get an unobstructed view of the wound? Did they cut off the trousers to access to the wound? Or did they merely apply pressure without inspecting the wound itself?

Where is Woods' statement? And Embry's statement? And Lt. Miller's?

Maybe Deputy Woods won't be writing a statement. Maybe he'll keep his mouth shut and talk to his lawyer about an injury claim against MCSD. Not just a worker's compensation claim, but an injury lawsuit because of carelessness on the range.

One report filtering out of the department, and referred to on MCSDExposed, is that Woods was being "hazed"; i.e., he was sent in to the room and positioned so that other deputies could gather around him and shoot, giving him the experience first-hand of the sounds and action of weapons being discharged at close range around him.

Why didn't Woods shoot on the dog target that he would have encountered as first into the room? If you don't take out a snarling, vicious dog that is four feet from you, you just might not get a second chance.

There is much more to be explained about what really happened on March 15.

I recall being on the range one day in Colorado. As the rangemaster called "Ready on the right, ready on the left," I noticed that the deputy to my left was wearing a crossdraw holster on his right side. This meant that he would draw across me. I yelled "Not ready" and the rangemaster stopped the exercise. Then he moved that shooter to the far right end of the line, where he would not draw across another person.

Did anyone on that Monday's SWAT team element question what was being set up? Did any think of the danger of close-in shooting on metal targets? I'd say that Woods is really lucky he did not suffer greater injuries.