Dallas PD Used a Robot to Terminate Armed Suspect

It’s likely a first in the history of U.S. law enforcement. Last night, following a shooting spree in which an assailant attacked law enforcement officers, killing five and wounding seven, Dallas police used a robot to detonate a bomb and kill a suspect.

The decision to end the tense standoff in this manner was made after negotiation attempts broke down and the suspect exchanged fire with police officers. “We saw no other option but to use our bomb robot and place a device on its extension for it to detonate where the subject was,” Dallas Police Chief David Brown stated at a press conference this morning. “Other options would have exposed our officers to grave danger.”

Experts are commenting on the extraordinary nature of this measure, noting that using a robot to lethal effect is unprecedented in domestic law enforcement. Peter W. Singer, a military scholar with the New America Foundation, confirmed in a tweet that this event was a first in policing, while adding that U.S. troops in Iraq had used bomb disposal robots in this manner before.

Bomb disposal robots are remotely controlled and have been deployed to do jobs in dangerous situations without placing human operators at risk. In military combat and in law enforcement, such robots have been used for surveillance, remote detonation of bombs, breaching doors, and clearing obstacles.

In his book Wired for War, Singer describes cases in which American soldiers in Iraq have jury-rigged bomb disposal robots, called MARCbots, with Claymore anti-personnel mines to kill insurgents holed up in alleyways.

While U.S. police have never before used a bomb-equipped robot to kill domestic suspects, last night’s events are part of a trend of increasing reliance on robots in military and law enforcement situations. For instance, in 2011, al-Qaeda operative Anwar al-Awlaki became the first U.S. citizen to be targeted and killed in a CIA-led drone strike, though the strike occurred overseas in Yemen.

The U.S. military currently has over 12,000 robots, according to the Washington Post, and many of these are making their way into domestic policing through a federal program that sells surplus military equipment to civilian law enforcement agencies.