The Fairfax County Police Department converted 630 shotguns to a “less-lethal” option, following cities like Tucson and Toronto.
At the Fairfax County Police Department, patrol officers have swapped shotgun ammunition for a new projectile: beanbags.and converted 630 of them to a “less-lethal” option, which will deploy only rounds filled with beanbag material. Brooke Wright, a Fairfax County deputy police chief, said the department’s SWAT team will still carry regular ammunition, but all shotgun shells had been taken from patrol units.Wright said the shotguns now have a bright-orange grip with type that says “less lethal.
“We have to evolve, right?” Wright said. “Not only do we evolve, our training evolves, but our tools should also evolve.”An instructor at Fairfax County’s criminal justice academy raised the idea about a year ago of changing all the shotgun rounds to beanbags, Wright said. Recruits would use them often at the academy, she said, adding that those in training preferred the less deadly option in many scenarios.
Wright said the department had already had beanbag rounds but only deployed them 14 times in the past decade. They were cumbersome to use: Police, she said, would have to clear their shotguns of all regular ammunition and double-check to make sure the two different projectiles did not get mixed together. In practice, police found the time it would take to use a beanbag round during an incident ineffective, Wright said.
Wright said she hopes police will use the option more if the department makes the process more efficient. Fairfax officials sent questions to other large agencies through the Major Cities Chiefs Association last year, and the responses showed that about 62 percent of major cities moved away from shotguns, either by not issuing them or using less-lethal options, she said. Police departments in
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