More News

Resident assistants and public safety officers at Mount St. Mary's University sat in a small dining room in Patriot Hall on Thursday, watching as Sgt. John Benner of the Frederick County Sheriff's Office was threatened at gun point.

The gun was made of plastic and the plainclothes gunman was really Benner's fellow deputy, Sgt. Tom Leone, but the exercise was meant to seem real to show the students and officers what an actual hostage situation on campus might be like.

The standard resident assistant (RA) training isn't always so intense, said Barry Titler, director of the school's Department of Public Safety.

But he wanted to provide some hands-on training to the officers within the department, and decided since RAs would be on campus for training during the scheduled exercise, they should be involved as well.

Titler said it was a good opportunity for everyone involved, but he liked that the Sheriff's Office and campus officers had a chance to interact since they would most likely work together in a campus emergency.

"The time to get another emergency responders name is not during an emergency," Titler said.

Preceding the fake hostage situation, Benner gave a lecture about emergency situations on school campuses, referencing the Columbine, Virginia Tech and Amish schoolhouse attacks.

He said RAs would most likely be the leaders of the pack in dorm emergencies, and suggested they think about which rooms in buildings would be the safest to barricade themselves in. He said they should also have a general awareness of people on campus.

"You've chosen to enter this job where you have a responsibility," he said. "I don't want to make you a paranoid freak, but it will benefit you in the long run to think about stuff like that."

He added that RAs should treat all people who live in the dormitories equally, no matter their personal feelings toward them. "That might be where we stop this from happening ... everyday contact," he said.

Benner also stressed that RAs are in the unique position to be able to detect disturbing warning signs in peers, much like the ones Virginia Tech shooter Seung-Hui Cho displayed before killing 32 people in his April 2007 rampage.

"The best metal detector is another human being," he said.

In many documented attacks involving armed gunmen, people have "connected the dots" too late to save anyone, he added.

Cpl. Mike Grunwell, a member of the Sheriff's Office Special Services Team that intervened in the fake hostage situation, also mentioned the Virginia Tech attack.

"A lot of [Cho's] victims did absolutely nothing to protect themselves," he said. "We're not teaching them how to be a superhero; we're teaching them how not to be a victim."

The Special Services Team simulation was also meant to show students and staff how officers would act in an emergency situation. It was made clear team members would be overtly aggressive, treat everyone in the building as a suspect, and focus on stopping the shooter before aiding victims.

Benner said many universities haven't been as proactive as the Emmitsburg school in terms of educating staff and students about emergency situations.

"Kudos to Mount St. Mary's for putting this together," he said. "It's good to experience [an emergency situation] in this setting first."

"It basically stems from our philosophy that we want to get as much training [for emergencies] as possible," said Mike Taberski, the university's Dean of Students.

Some of the RAs who attended the mandatory training said they were glad they did, because it will help them be prepared for potential future situations.

"It would definitely help to keep me more calm in a campus emergency," said sophomore Michael Carroll.

"Just in case it ever happened, we would know [what to do]," said sophomore Sarah Pargan.

E-mail Courtney Pomeroy at cpomeroy@gazette.net.