My rundown of the Miami Shootout....

[BigBoy99]

The new Chief was retired from Howard County, Maryland County Police as a Lieutenant. The M14s, M1903s, and M1s were given away to another Agency. The M-16s were converted to semi-auto and then put away in storage along with the MP-5 SMGs. His reasoning was that He did not feel comfortable with our fire power on the streets.

He must subscribe to the People's Republic of Maryland government policies. The honest people (and police officers) can not be trusted with weapons. Criminals are OK to have what ever they can get!

If too much firepower is a problem, why not go back to they way England was -- The Bobbie's only carried a whistle.

 

[WR Moore]

One factor I've never seen mentioned about the 1987 FBI incident: boredom.

The team searching for Platt & Mattix had been swanning around Miami for about 6 weeks before they finally stumbled upon them. I expect that whatever preparation and alertness they had on day 1 had pretty much dissapated by the time they actually met the robbers.

 

[Rangerpat]

[ His reasoning was that He did not feel comfortable with our fire power on the streets. QUOTE]

I don't understand that reasoning at all...

What was he afraid of happening, the Police Department was going to overthrow the city government?

 

[federali]

Complacency

The FBI agents were on a stakeout but, perhaps, didn't really expect to find their targets. Their shotguns were in their trunks.

It is my understanding that of the two perps, Platt did all the shooting and Mattix never fired a shot.

Platt was wounded early in the gun battle, yet, inflicted all the damage he did after suffering what should have been a fatal wound.

The FBI is a bureaucracy. As such, they have written policies for everything, including the type of arms to be carried. Despite what was known about Platt and Mattix, there were no rifles or carbines available to them that day.

Incidentally, Platt and Mattix would also visit remote places where they would find people target shooting. They would be-friend these people, then ambush and kill them, taking their guns are vehicles.

One last thought: Shortly after the 1986 shootout, I was attending classes at the S&W Academy when one of their excellent instructors, Bill Borroughs, summed up the gun battle in but three words:
They (the FBI) were outfought. In effect, Platt and Mattix nearly won on mindset alone.

 

[mc5aw]

And there are those guys whom I've mentioned in bear threads. One killed an African lion and the other a Kodiak bear with their knives. Some folks just manage to beat the odds. I'm here myself purely by the grace of God after a couple of hazardous experiences. I'm sure that others are. My son is danged lucky to have survived several close combat events in Iraq. In one case, the man firing right next to him was killed.

But as lucky as I've been, I'm glad that I've never had to shoot it out with somebody like Platt or Matix. That's just plain hazardous to your health.

In re-reading accounts of such shootings and confrontations, it makes most of our collective discussions about caliber and sidearm moot. An armed, violent, and determined aggressor is going to be a very formidable adversary irrespective of what we CCW, especially if he has the element of surprise on his side and the stress factor is ratcheted up to maximum level.

 

[Sayoc01]

I live in Miami & am familiar with the shootout.I had lunch after all the what if's....why's & everyones "views"..with a police officer who went over everything "afterwards"he had 20 yrs.as a Leo & 20 yrs.SF(retired 20th group).He said Jim....the agents "KNEW"these were "bad & trained"...we did too.The agents ...should have called us for backup...when they saw these guys!! They chose "not'too...he said "they" were FBI....& thought they were enough.We all knew these guys were well armed & good....as stated FBI had their good stuff in the trunk.He said these guys trained together ,knew what to do....and "moved"!He just shook his head & said they should have called for backup!My friend is dead now agent orange got him.I remember some other comments but can't use them on this forum or I would be banned for life!
Jim

 

[williamlayton]

Lord only knows what a man will do under these circumstances.
Blessings

 

[BigDaddy7972]

This arose from the age old 'caliber wars' raging on another thread.

The essentials of the Miami Shootout:

One assailant was a Marine, the other a Ranger.

Eight agents were in the actual shootout

Agents had shotguns, 9mm pistols and revolvers

There was a collision, the agents are shook up because the crooks had a bigger car. One guy lost his .357 when it flew out the door, another his service revolver. One had an S&W model 36 back up gun which he used.

Crook wounds officer though a car door with a mini-14 and another who was running.

One crook shot in the forearm

One crook shot and unconscious out of the fight.

Agent shot in the hand and couldn't reload his revolver.

Crook shot through arm into chest, one of the shots that would be fatal later. He was then shot in the thigh and foot.

Crook now shoots a .357 but is shot in the forearm and drops the gun.

Crook shot again in arm and it penetrates to the shoulder blade, not a serious wound.

Crook fired the mini-14 and paralyzed one agent and wounded another with shrapnel.

Crook continued fighting by using his left hand to operate the gun.

Agent's gun hit, rendering it inoperative. While working on the gun, crook advances aggressively and kills two agents and wounds one.

Crook tries to drive away in agents car, is shot at 5 times with a shotgun, wounding both feet.

Other crook regains consciousness, jumps in car.

Agents fire four rounds but miss.

Confusion reigns and accounts differ, but crook fires three shots from a Dan Wesson.

Agent comes toward the car and fires six shots from a .357. Rounds 4,5 and 6 being fatal to both crooks.

About 145 shots were fired and it lasted about 5 minutes.

Neither crook was hopped up on drugs.


It seems to me that in this particular encounter:

Though there were several shotguns, they were pretty ineffective. One was wounded by shotgun fire on both sides.

The .223 was highly effective. Five out of eight agents were seriously wounded and one hurt by shrapnel.

Most of the agents shots hit the crooks in the extremities.

Platt, one of the crooks was tough as nails and one mean mamma-jamma.


Some conclusions were:

Revolvers are too hard to reload and don't have enough shots.

Only two agents were wearing light ballistic vests and even they were inadequate against the .223.

Everybody knows the FBI changed to 10mm, which didn't work out.

I've drawn some of my own conclusions:

If there is such a thing as bad luck, it seems the agents got it because there were many interferences in them fighting effectively.

I don't think the agents needed bigger handguns, they needed quick access to some rifles.

I'm surprised that the shotguns weren't more effective. Not that they should have decided the fight, but there was very little effect to either side.

I'm NOT faulting marksmanship because of the complexity, cover and circumstances in the fight plus being outgunned, but a few more body shots by the agents would have slowed Platt down some. Very unfortunately, there were better armed agents on the way that didn't arrive in time.

If you are SURE you are getting into an armed encounter, take a car that isn't a tin cans, wear vests and have some heavier weapons.

It takes a lot of guts to be an agent or LEO.

Thanks for posting this. Your post seems to examine the shootout without an agenda, something I rarely see when this subject is discussed. It seems like everyone is an expert from the living room of their homes and has the notion that they would have done a better job or have a better idea. I'm not against examining this or discussing it so that we may learn from it but only for that purpose. I see it used far too often to lambast the FBI or to promote ones favorite caliber.
Having said that, I am not a fanboy of the FBI. To me, cops are cops no matter what badge they carry. On that day, those FBI agents went up against a couple of bad fellas. They didn't run, they didn't hide, they took them on head on. Were some tactics bad? Maybe. Should they have chosen different weapons? Maybe. Do they wish some things were done differently? Probably. But they did the job they were paid to do. Unfortunately at a very high cost. Policemen run TO the sound of gunfire, not away from it. And that's what those FBI agents did. And for that we should always remember them for it and thank them.
I'm sorry for the rant. I just think that sometimes the heroics of the agents that day get lost in some folks agendas. Not necessarily just here, but on a lot of other forums as well.
But just to show you how things have come full circle, heres and interesting tidbit. I've worked many " task forces " with federal agents, especially the FBI. One of them was in response to a couple of serial bank robbers that were hitting us here in Chicago hard and heavy. These were some bad dudes that were doing the "takedown " type robberies. All the FBI agents on the task force were armed with some type of long gun in addition to their pistols while the CPD Officers were only armed with our trusty six shot revolvers. Some things go full circle I guess.

 

[mc5aw]

Thanks for posting this. Your post seems to examine the shootout without an agenda, something I rarely see when this subject is discussed. It seems like everyone is an expert from the living room of their homes and has the notion that they would have done a better job or have a better idea. I'm not against examining this or discussing it so that we may learn from it but only for that purpose. I see it used far too often to lambast the FBI or to promote ones favorite caliber.
Having said that, I am not a fanboy of the FBI. To me, cops are cops no matter what badge they carry. On that day, those FBI agents went up against a couple of bad fellas. They didn't run, they didn't hide, they took them on head on. Were some tactics bad? Maybe. Should they have chosen different weapons? Maybe. Do they wish some things were done differently? Probably. But they did the job they were paid to do. Unfortunately at a very high cost. Policemen run TO the sound of gunfire, not away from it. And that's what those FBI agents did. And for that we should always remember them for it and thank them.
I'm sorry for the rant. I just think that sometimes the heroics of the agents that day get lost in some folks agendas. Not necessarily just here, but on a lot of other forums as well.
But just to show you how things have come full circle, heres and interesting tidbit. I've worked many " task forces " with federal agents, especially the FBI. One of them was in response to a couple of serial bank robbers that were hitting us here in Chicago hard and heavy. These were some bad dudes that were doing the "takedown " type robberies. All the FBI agents on the task force were armed with some type of long gun in addition to their pistols while the CPD Officers were only armed with our trusty six shot revolvers. Some things go full circle I guess.

Did this case, or any similar one, change the policy of keeping weaponry in the LEO vehicle's trunk? It would seem that no matter how much firepower LE has at its disposal, inaccessibility in an emergency scenario renders such weaponry useless.

 

[rwsmith]

I'll be they do and No

An AR15 or AR10 in the Feds cars evens up the fight.
Bet they carry something similar in the cars now ???

Did they know these bad guys were this heavily armed?
You don't go hunting Bear with .22's....


Chuck

I'll bet they do carry rifles, if they're smart. They don't have to pull them out first thing but have them if they need them.

They were not expecting any such kind of resistance. They had been saying crooks in general were better armed, but this got a LOT of attention.

The police in the LA Shootout thought they had a 'routine' bank robbery' and instead met up with two guys in nearly full armor and heavy weapons who WANTED to wreak havoc on police. They were drugged up with, surprisingly, Phenobarbital, not hopped up in a rage but calm and methodical.

 

[rwsmith]

I think that the police....

What a pity that LE learns sometimes through grim experience when logic would suggest having rifles before they regretted a lack of them.

I think that police philosophy in the older days was to use a minimum of force needed to stop a situation and not escalate the problem, but these events proved that times were changing. Look how many instances there are of police shooting first and asking questions later. It's a result of the same thing. Killing police is a primary motivator or in some cases even more so than robbing and stealing. The thing that disappoints me is that this tends to make the police look like trigger happy barbarians, at least in a large portion of the public eye.

 

[rwsmith]

Good points...

The FBI agents were on a stakeout but, perhaps, didn't really expect to find their targets. Their shotguns were in their trunks.

It is my understanding that of the two perps, Platt did all the shooting and Mattix never fired a shot.

Platt was wounded early in the gun battle, yet, inflicted all the damage he did after suffering what should have been a fatal wound.

The FBI is a bureaucracy. As such, they have written policies for everything, including the type of arms to be carried. Despite what was known about Platt and Mattix, there were no rifles or carbines available to them that day.

Incidentally, Platt and Mattix would also visit remote places where they would find people target shooting. They would be-friend these people, then ambush and kill them, taking their guns are vehicles.

One last thought: Shortly after the 1986 shootout, I was attending classes at the S&W Academy when one of their excellent instructors, Bill Borroughs, summed up the gun battle in but three words:
They (the FBI) were outfought. In effect, Platt and Mattix nearly won on mindset alone.

The six agents that were involved in the operation but not in the shootout itself had a H&K submachine guns and M16s.

Outfought? Yeah, if Platt had been a good guy in a movie we would have cheered him like Rambo. A real one man army.

 

[Hellraiser]

This has been well and truly flogged.

This: Line-Duty-FBI-Murders
is pretty accurate, tracks well with the official findings.

I saw that... Gross and Soul played totally out-of-character parts in that movie... absolutely chilling. If the real bad-guy dudes were near as committed to mayhem as those two actin' in the movie... the Feds were confronted with some real, scary hard-ankles.

 

[jimmyj]

After this incident I was attending a class of "Officer Safety". One day the instructor asked knowing the information available to the FBI Agents before the shooting incident, how would we have handled it ?When Jimmy's turn came, I stated that, I in an unmarked car would have pulled up next to the suspects' vehicle and shotgunned both suspects though the car's window. W E L L, this did not find favor with the instructor. (I "THINK" during the rest of the class, He kept looking at me, kind of weird ?)

 

[shouldazagged]

Adequately arming law enforcement officers doesn't fall within my definition of "militarization of the police". It's simply acknowledgement of what LEO's may be up against at any time.

That doesn't mean I'd favor truck-mounted M-2 .50's or RPGs, but a sufficiently effective handgun, a rifle and a shotgun certainly should be readily available.

 

[rwsmith]

Something that would have stopped it.....

Both in the Miami and LA shootouts the bad guys didn't have head protection. Shots to the head would likely have ended the whole thing. Head shots would be much more feasible with rifles. It does seem that the Ithaca model 37 long shotguns with the buckshot would have been capable of making a head shot. However, I don't know what the choke on the bore was. If it were open bore (very likely for police work) it may not have been as effective at the ranges they were working.

 

[federali]

Hindsight

The infamous 1986 Miami shootout will always be a topic for discussion, not so much to criticize the FBI, whose men displayed exceptional bravery that day, but so that we may learn from whatever mistakes were made and, hopefully, not repeat them.

While the shootout, in my opinion, represents a failure of tactics, to include firearms choice and location, another even more tragic shootout may be studied because it pointed out failures in training: The 1970 Newhall (CA) incident leaving four CHPs officers dead. This shooting is slowly fading from memory as it happened 45 years ago when most current LEOs were not yet born.

Here are two easy questions regarding Newhall: Why were empty shell casings found in the pocket of one of the deceased officers?
Why did one wounded officer who had partially reloaded his revolver, continue trying to finish loading instead of closing the cylinder and engaging the approaching gunman?

This may sound like thread drift but in reality, it further underscores the need to dissect both good and bad shootings in an effort to understand what happened with a view to reducing or eliminating LEO casualties.

Emotions can sometimes creep into these discussions at the expense of objectivity. For most of us, whether we're CCWs or retired LEOs, we will never have to face the situations faced by the FBI in Miami or the CHPs at Newhall.

 

[ColbyBruce]

I believe jimmyj, in his last entry, got it right.

 

[S&W Fan]

In addition to Dr. Anderson's writings which I posted the link to there's a youtube video produced by the FBI that includes SA Mireles talking about his actions in addition to those of the others. Worth a watch for sure.

Platt and Mattix met while both were in the Army, Matix had previously served in the Marine Corps. Matix became an MP, Platt was a Ranger, served in Viet Nam, both honorably discharged. Neither had a criminal history prior to their Florida crime spree though there were suspicious circumstances deaths of prior wives for each in which they were investigated. A couple of sick, twisted hardened criminals.

As far as Newhall, there was an article on policeone.com in May of 2012 debunking the myth that Officer Pence dumped his empty shells in his pants pocket.

 

[rwsmith]

It might get worse.....

If agencies fight Mexican drug gangs they had surely better be 'militarized'. 'Militarized' is just a word. If the police use their military-type weapons offensively except to the extent to capture criminals, that's 'militarization'. If they use the weapons only to do a better job, that's 'well prepared".

PS: For a beaten up subject we sure have garnered some good discussion here.