Domestic Terrorism
Order Instructions:
Background:
1. You are the Principal the local Shining Star Elementary School. Your school contains 400 students and is part of a four-school cluster. Your cluster is part of a school district that contains over 100 schools from all levels.
2. You are the emergency manager for this county of over 300,000 people. Your position is to prepare the county for disasters in an area where the worst expected disaster is fire from storms or drought. Wind storms are the next worst expected disaster. Your county is surrounded by counties of equal or larger sizes in a larger city with a population of five million persons. Shining Star Elementary School is in your county.
3. You are the Mayor of a town within the county that contains the Shining Star Elementary School. The city police and fire department work for you.
4. You are the Chairman of the County Supervisors in the county that contains the Shining Star Elementary School. The county sheriff, fire department, health department, and county support offices work for you.
For the four positions you should have: Notified all local Law Enforcement agencies for assistance; established an Incident Command System; and isolated the area.
Scenario:
1. Fires have broken out in twenty-five (25) schools of the district.
2. The City Police and County Sheriff offices are destroyed by explosions.
3. The National Press demands immediate access to the Shining Path Elementary School and whoever is in charge.
4. The group in the Shining Path Elementary School demands all prisoners held in Guantanamo be released within twelve (12) hours or more students and teachers will be killed.
For each of the four positions explain what you would do and expect to happen in the scenario. Consider the following in each of your answers:
1. WHAT ASSETS DO YOU HAVE?
2. WHAT AGENCIES NEED TO BE INVOLVED?
3. WHO DO YOU NEED TO COORDINATE WITH?
4. WHAT ACTIONS CAN YOU TAKE?
5. WHAT NATIONAL AGENCIES SHOULD BE INVOLVED? WHO NOTIFIED THEM? WHAT ARE THEY DOING?
Length: This SLP Assignment should be at least 3 pages not counting the title page and references.
References: At least two references should be included from academic sources listed below(e.g. peer-reviewed journal articles). Required readings are included. Quoted material should not exceed 10% of the total paper (since the focus of these assignments is critical thinking).
Organization: Subheadings should be used to organize your paper according to question.
Required readings:
ATF Home Page, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives website: Retrieved November 15, 2012, from: http://www.atf.gov/
Brinkerhoff, J.R. (2009). The role of Federal military forces in domestic law enforcement title. US Army Combined Arms Center, Newsletter 10(16), Ch. 11. Retrieved November 16, 2012, from: http://usacac.army.mil/cac2/call/docs/10-16/ch_11.asp
Cook, T. (2008). The Posse Comitatus Act: An act in need of a regulatory update. Retrieved November 15, 2012, from: http://www.hsdl.org/?view&doc=137185&coll=limited
Haddal, C. C. (2010). Border security: The role of the U.S. Border Patrol. Congressional Research Office. Retrieved November 15, 2012, from: http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/homesec/RL32562.pdf
Vision, mission, core values, and pledge: CDC vision for the 21st Century (2010). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Retrieved November 15, 2012, from: http://www.cdc.gov/about/organization/mission.htm
SAMPLE ANSWER
Domestic Terrorism
Scenario One: Fires have broken out in twenty-five (25) schools of the district
The Shining Star Elementary School, being part of a four-school cluster, is relatively well prepared to deal with emergencies that could arise. The same is true for all schools in the district since the standard set in the cluster is the same throughout the district. All schools are equipped with fire fighting equipments including fire extinguishers and hydrants. Additionally, each school has a fire marshal stationed in each school whose primary responsibility it to maintain fire disaster preparedness at all times, assess equipment adequacy and usability state and conduct emergency drills twice every school term. With the reports coming from the respective Fire Marshalls, the disaster preparedness plan is activated immediately. The plan indicates that in the case of a fire, all students after evacuating the premises are to meet at pre designated points for roll-call to determine who is missing.
As the Principal of one of the schools facing a fire disaster, one has to place a call to the local fire department. It will be the responsibility of the local Fire Chief to escalate the incidence after determining its dynamics. It is expected that among the agencies that will respond to this disaster will include, the National Emergency Management Authority (NEMA). Given the multiple locations of the fire disasters, the district fire marshal will take overall responsibility of coordinating all activities and thus becomes the go-to person in case of a need.
As a principal, the immediate action to engage in is to have all students evacuate the premises and assemble at the assembly points for roll call. It is at this point that medical needs will be identified and addressed, while missing students will be known and sort. Given the scale and spread of the fire, NEMA should be involved. Forensic scientists should be involved in order to determine the causes of the fire. The national agencies will be notified and invited by the person in-charge of emergencies in the district (Schmid, 2011).
Scenario Two: The City Police and County Sheriff offices are destroyed by explosions
As the emergency manager of the county, the destruction of the City Police and the County Sherriff office makes this an invasion that affects the core of emergency response in the county. As a result, county resources cannot longer be relied upon to attend to the emerging emergency. Given that the cause of the explosion is not immediately evident; the emergency manager places a call to the State Governor requesting for federal assistance. The Governor will place a call to the President of the Country for federal assistance. This calls set the ground for the deployment of the National Guard – to take care of the enforcement of Law and Order, allocation of Federal resources to assist with the local emergency, deployment of the FBI whose explosives experts should help the cause of the explosive (Haddal, 2010). This revelation will determine the next cause of action. Should it be determined to have been caused by deliberate human action, then criminal investigation will commence immediately. Should the explosion have been caused by natural causes, the reconstruction will commence immediately.
Scenario Three: The National Press demands immediate access to the Shining Star Elementary School and whoever is in charge
The Mayor of a town within the county that contains the Shining Star Elementary School and with command of both the police and fire department, has a responsibility to shield both forces from the prying eyes of the National Press, who can be uncivil in their quest to get the story. This being the case, all information will be shared from one central source – the mayor’s office. Since there are different disaster locations, instructions will be issued to seal-off all the locations and no one apart from authorized personnel should access the sites (Ciment, 2011). Additionally, no emergency worker should talk to the press and all press interactions will be left to the mayor or to whoever the responsibility is designated. As the mayor, a call will be placed to the State Governor for assistance and it is expected that the Governor will in turn place a call to the President seeking Federal aid.
Scenario One: The group in the Shining Path Elementary School demands all prisoners held in Guantanamo be released within twelve (12) hours or more students and teachers will be killed
With the demand coming from the Shining Star Elementary School, it is clear that this is no longer a local problem but has taken on an international dimension. Despite being the Chairman of the County Supervisors with the power to command all the county emergency resources, the situation at Shining Star Elementary School is much bigger and complicated that the local resources are designed to cope with. Given that the situation has clearly degenerated to a terrorism stand-off with demands that border the life or death of the hostages – who include student and teachers, immediately, both the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) will be called to the scene and left to determine between the two federal agencies, who will take the lead role (Brinkerhoff, 2009). Additionally, depending on the lead agency, Special Weapons And Tactics (SWAT) teams will be brought into the scene with the clear instruction to prepare for both soft and hard assault of the target and what each plan will entail – both in terms of personnel and possible casualties. Given the epicenter of the action will be at the Shining Elementary School and the publicity generated nationally, after sealing off the school building where the terrorists are, the National Press, will be set up in the playing field with regular briefing being held in pavilion. This should keep the national press and briefing personnel safe while keeping them within the vicinity of the epicenter. Before the federal agencies arrive to take over the situation, the local hostage negotiator will be in-charge off all communication with the captors in an effort to ensure no life is lost while the scene is still under the command of the local agencies.
References
Brinkerhoff, J.R. (2009). The role of Federal military forces in domestic law enforcement title. US Army Combined Arms Center, Newsletter 10(16), Ch. 11 Retrieved November 16, 2012, from: http://usacac.army.mil/cac2/call/docs/10-16/ch_11.asp
Ciment, J (2011). World Terrorism: An Encyclopedia of Political Violence from Ancient Times to the Post 9/11 Era, 2nd Ed, Sharpe Publishers, Armonk, NY.
Haddal, C. C. (2010). Border security: The role of the U.S. Border Patrol. Congressional Research Office. Retrieved November 15, 2012, from http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/homesec/RL32562.pdf
Schmid, A. P (2011). The Routledge Handbook of Terrorism Research, Routledge Publishing, New York, NY.
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