THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, April 28, 1996 TAG: 9604260220
SECTION: CHESAPEAKE CLIPPER PAGE: 14 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY SUSAN W. SMITH, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 89 lines
Capt. J.E. Saunders has looked down the barrel of a loaded shotgun. He has searched a house for a bomb. He has raided crack houses guarded by drug dealers with weapons better than his.
Over the years, he has rappeled from helicopters, crawled through woods looking for bodies and been attacked by a vicious dog.
``But all good things must come to an end,'' Saunders said.
Saunders is a commanding officer with the Chesapeake Police Department's Special Weapons and Tactics unit - the SWAT team. In June, Saunders is stepping down after 22 years of service and almost 800 missions.
``In all the years and all the situations, there has never been any killings on any mission. I do not think that can be said about too many other SWAT teams in the nation,'' said Capt. Donald S. Zeagler, the SWAT team's critical incidence commanding officer. ``Saunders has a 100 percent success rate. He is also the most senior tactical SWAT commander in the United States.''
The highly trained team's purpose is to surround and diffuse dangerous or potentially violent incidents, such as hostage situations or armed stand-offs. The team is often deployed to enforce high-risk drug search warrants and when gunfire is reported.
Zeagler's responsibility is to negotiate a safe or peaceful solution to the problem. If that does not work, he handles the details and logistics of calling in the team and turns to Saunders.
Saunders' speciality is the actual operation of moving men into the danger zone. He is responsible when the team needs to use snipers, forced entry, barricades, weapons or explosives. Saunders is responsible for his men as well as those that have started the problem.
In 1974, plans were made to add a tactical unit to the police department soon after two Chesapeake officers were ambushed in the Fentress section of the city.
Saunders quickly became involved with the early plans. He contacted the Los Angeles Police Department, which had one of the first organized and trained assault teams, and gathered information from U.S. Army Rangers, various state police departments, bomb squads, psychologists and fire departments.
About 40 police applicants signed up for the first team. But after a few months of training and drills, 18 men remained with the unit. Saunders, as training officer, led them in tactics development, scenario practices, land navigation, helicopter sweeps, marksmanship, patrolling, rappeling, sniper fire exercises and search and rescue. Practices and drills are held after regular work shifts.
The unit also spent weekends training with a U.S. Navy underwater demolition team and with a U.S. Army Special Forces unit.
Because there was no department funding, Saunders said equipment was whatever each man could bring. Uniforms were blue, flight suits and baseball caps. Army surplus flak jackets served as body armor. Saunders' station wagon was the SWAT mobile.
After only three months of training, a domestic dispute on Centerville Turnpike was the first call. Just after the police set up a barricade, the man walked out his front door into the team's waiting arms for a successful first mission.
Saunders, Zeagler and others attended the FBI Tactics School and later took a U.S. Army marksmanship course at Ft. Meade, Md. They also worked out with the Navy Special Warfare team at Little Creek Naval Amphibious Base. Saunders trained with the Philadelphia police and the Metro Dade County, Fla., SWAT team to bring skills back to Chesapeake.
``We were always looking for classes and special training sessions,'' Saunders said. ``and any equipment that we could scavenge, borrow or beg we added to our stockpile. By the 1980s, we even had radios and pagers, but not for the whole team.''
Since then the team has successfully handled calls where children were hostages and even rounded up a motorcycle gang that had tried to set up a drug operation in the area.
Saunders was awarded a Silver Star for Bravery medal when his team released six hostages held by a gunman at the Home Headquarters Warehouse in Chesapeake.
Now the team is equipped with uniforms, helmets, night vision gear, a first-rate weapons arsenal, a communications system, a van, a manual of operational procedures and a medical director.
``The relationship that the men have developed with each other is tighter than some family relationships,'' Saunders said. ``You have to completely trust and depend on your teammates and put your life in their hands.''
``Capt. Saunders might be retiring,'' said Sgt. John R. LeFebvre, a SWAT team member. ``But his presence will be felt at every drill and with every mission.'' ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by MORT FRYMAN
Capt. J.E. Saunders helped form Chesapeake's SWAT unit.
by CNB