Welcome To BarryOzeroff.Com, the Cyberspace Home of author Barry Ozeroff

"A Police and Robber Story With A Major Twist!"
--W. H. McDonald Jr., The American Author Assoc.

"Gresham Author's First Novel a Winner: His debut effort is a potent tale that drips with authenticity."
--The Cannon Beach (OR) Gazette

"A Good Inflight Read Sniper Shot will keep you at the edge of your seat at 30,000 feet"
--The Source Weekly (Bend, OR)

"The author's SWAT experiences leap from every page. SNIPER SHOT is a terrific debut."
--Alafair Burke, author of CLOSE CASE

"SNIPER SHOT is a bang-up, on-target story that tears ahead at a breakneck pace."
--Jack Kelly, author of PROTECTION, MOBTOWN, and LINE OF SIGHT

"SNIPER SHOT is a superb debut novel with a masterful mix of engaging characters, white hot action,
spine-chilling suspense, and absolutely perfect pacing... Barry Ozeroff is a truly awesome talent as writer!"
--Joe Buff, author of SEAS OF CRISIS and TIDAL RIP

"Ozeroff hooks readers on the first page and never lets go! SNIPER SHOT is the best police-based thriller
I've read in years."
--David Kent, author of THE MESA CONSPIRACY

"The plot and structure of this novel are nicely focused and the characters are interesting. The tone is dead
on. "Sniper Shot" is a great way to pass a few hours, and most readers will hope Ozeroff keeps writing."
--The Statesman Journal (Salem, OR)

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

ABOUT WRITING
ABOUT SERT

I hear different words for police tactical teams, like SWAT, SERT, and SED. What's the difference between them?

How do you go from being a regular cop to being on the SERT team?

Is SERT all these guys do, or do they have other police functions as well?

What is the best part about being on SERT?

What is the worst part?

You always refer to SERT "guys." Can women be on the team?

You are a sniper. Have you ever shot anyone?

Have you ever had to shoot at anyone as a regular cop?

As a sniper, why don't you shoot the gun out of the bad guy's hand, or shoot him in the leg? Why must you kill him?

How can you prevent the guy from pulling the trigger after he gets shot, but before he dies?

Do SERT officers have extra ballistic protection?

Why would you want to be a sniper in the first place, and put yourself in the position of having to take a shot like that?

What kind of equipment do you use as a police sniper?

How accurate is the rifle?

What other kind of equipment does a police sniper carry?

What other positions are there on a police tactical team?

What kind of weapons do the Entry and the IP Teams carry?

How do you get into a locked or fortified building when it's time to go in?

What are the most common SERT situations?

ABOUT SERT

I hear different words for police tactical teams, like SWAT, SERT, and SED. What's the difference between them?
There really isn't any difference other than the name. SWAT is the most common, standing for Special Weapons and Training. Many cities don't like the hard image that name implies, so they call it other things. After all, SWAT implies a bunch of highly-trained tactical police officers running around in camouflage fatigues carrying machine guns and worse, just itching to go in there and get the bad guy. When in actuality, what you really have is a bunch of highly-trained tactical police officers running around in camouflage fatigues carrying machine guns and worse, just itching to go in there and get the bad guy.
SERT stands for Special Emergency Response Team. SED stands for Special Enforcement Division. No matter what the name, the job is always the same. Go into the most frightening of situations and do what the regular cops can't do. Once, we all sat down and tried to come up with various acronyms that might fit the bill. Though nobody at a level higher than sergeant liked it, the one we voted on was very simple and descriptive, the Tactical Interdiction Team. We never could figure out why they didn't like that one...
How do you go from being a regular cop to being on the SERT team?
First of all, you have to wait until there is an opening on the team. With all the equipment and time necessary for training and actually going on callouts, it can be pretty expensive to the city to have such a team, so there are only so many positions. You have to have proven that you can be a cop first, so the basic requirements are three years as a police officer with better than average yearly evaluations. Then, you must submit a memo with your qualifications. All potential candidates must then pass a tough physical fitness test. After that comes a tough, high-pressure interview with a board comprised mostly of senior SERT members. Every candidate is scored, and the top scorers go on a list to be drawn from as openings occur during the life of the list (usually one year).
Is SERT all these guys do, or do they have other police functions as well?
We'd love to have a full-time SERT team, and most larger cities do. Our guys are all on 24-hour pagers. They go about their regular duties as patrol officers, detectives, School Resource Officers, undercover dope team guys, or whatever, until the pager goes off. Then, it's time for a fast drive to the office, where, like Superman in a phone booth, they flock to the SERT van, change clothes into tactical gear, and go handle the emergency. When it's over, they debrief and go pick up their lives.
What is the best part about being on SERT?
For me, it was being part of a team, working with guys who were the best of the best, and having a particular skill that is both uncommon and useful. The best part of a callout is when, after hours and hours of negotiations, it's finally time to do something, whether it's gas the house, make an entry, deliver a throw-phone, or anything, as long as it's action of some sort.
What is the worst part?
There are a few "worst parts." The biggest one that comes to mind is discomfort. There's nothing like sitting around a warm kitchen carving pumpkins with your kids on Halloween while a fierce rainstorm howls outside one minute, then find yourself laying in a four-inch deep puddle on top of thorny blackberry bush vines in forty five degree weather while the storm lashes at you for six hours the next minute. Or laying on a concrete balcony on the hottest recorded day in May from 11:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. under a blistering sun with no shade staring at a window through the scope with no real relief. Or trying to keep your eyes open and focused on the blackness in the scope until dawn after working a twelve-hour patrol shift, and not being able to see anything until first light. Need I go on?
You always refer to SERT "guys." Can women be on the team?
Yes, women can be SERT officers, and can even be better ones then the men. Just as women were rare in police work twenty years ago, women are rare on tactical teams now. My reference to "SERT guys" is mere force of habit, since in my five years on SERT we never had any female officers on the team.
You are a sniper. Have you ever shot anyone?
No, I've been a cop for thirteen years and a sniper for four, and thank God, I've never had to shoot anyone before. I hope that day never comes.
Have you ever had to shoot at anyone as a regular cop?
No, again, if I had to shoot at someone, I would kill them, and that hasn't happened to me yet. Most cops work 25 or more years without ever having to pull the trigger.
As a sniper, why don't you shoot the gun out of the bad guy's hand, or shoot him in the leg? Why must you kill him?
By the time the situation deteriorates to the point that the sniper must take a shot, someone is going to die. If we shoot the gun out of his hand, how do we know he doesn't have another gun? Or a knife? Or maybe he's willing to choke the hostage to death. Once we determine that unless we do something right now to stop him or he'll kill someone, we basically have no choice but to shoot to kill.
How can you prevent the guy from pulling the trigger after he gets shot, but before he dies?
The only way to do this is to target the medulla oblongata area of the brain. This is where the brainstem meets the spinal cord. If a bullet separates that connection, the possibility of even a reflexive movement is removed. A perfect brainstem shot will remove the possibility of even a twitch of any body part. The person will be dead before the bullet leaves his body, and will simply collapse where he is.
Do SERT officers have extra ballistic protection?
In a word, yes. We wear a much heavier ballistic Kevlar vest, a Kevlar helmet, ballistic eye protection, and can carry ballistic shields that will stop most anything anyone shoots at us. We are still waiting for someone to make a ballistic Kevlar cup, and sincerely hope that product will soon be available.
Why would you want to be a sniper in the first place, and put yourself in the position of having to take a shot like that?
Being a sniper is to me, the best position on the tactical team. You get to be an integral part of every operation. You're the first person to see the target building and the bad guy. The team often depends on you to guide them into good positions. You're generally 75 to 200 yards away from the action, yet you are still smack-dab in the middle of it. I like the gear, the ability to disappear in your environment, and watching the team in action. The idea of taking a shot isn't appealing to anyone, but if it has to happen, I know that I would be saving lives in the process. And, I know that I can do it, both the physical act of shooting someone, and overcoming the tremendous mental blocks involved in doing so.
What kind of equipment do you use as a police sniper?
As for the weapon, we use the new Remmington LTR, or Light Tactical Rifle. It is built on a standard Remmington .308 receiver, but has a much shorter, lighter barrel. The barrel is specially fluted, or grooved, to allow for maximum cooling and weight reduction without compromising accuracy. The rifle tends to recoil harder than standard .308 sniper rifles, which are much bigger and heavier, but it's reduced size and weight make it that much easier to hump through the bush in getting to a callout. And believe me, we do much more humping through the bush, over fences, up onto roofs, and everywhere imaginable than we do actually taking a shot in the field. But when it comes to all the training to get proficient, bruised shoulders and aching muscles pay the price for all that convenience on real callouts. The scope we use is a Leupold Vari-X ten power scope.
How accurate is the rifle?
Any police sniper rifle should be a sub-minute of angle gun. A minute of angle loosely translates to accuracy within one inch at 100 yards, two inches at 200 yards, etc. A sub-minute of angle gun is even more accurate than that. Say, the ability (based on the shooter) to consistently shoot within a half-inch at 100 yards, one inch at 200 yards, etc. Many police snipers I know carry a quarter with a perfect .308 bullet hole piercing it on their key chain as a testament to their shooting skill.
What other kind of equipment does a police sniper carry?
Arguably, the single most important piece of equipment the sniper will carry with him is his radio. A sniper is basically a reporter with the immediate ability to neutralize a threat. The entire team depends on his ability to see what's going on at the target and report on it. His radio transmissions will tell the team when it is safe for them to move, where it is safe for them to move to, and what lies in their way. His rifle will protect team members when they are exposed.
Other equipment includes foul-weather gear, all kinds of camouflage materials such as face paint, face netting, sheet netting (for draping over the sniper and the rifle), a ghillie suit (jacket and pants made with long tatters of green and brown burlap attached, which completely breaks up the human silhouette outline), a high-rise tripod to hold the rifle steady at window height, wire cutters for getting through fences you're too old to climb, liquids, freeze-dried foods, a gas mask (despite that you're usually far enough from the action not to need it, I can attest that this isn't always the case) and much more.
What other positions are there on a police tactical team?
Our team is broken mainly into three categories. Entry Team, Inner Perimeter Team, and Sniper/Observer Teams. The Entry Team might be considered the star of the show. They are the ones who, when all else has failed, actually go into the house or building where some madman with a gun is holding hostages. It is perhaps the most difficult, the most physically demanding, and the most taxing job on the team. The Inner Perimeter team is generally the starting point for new SERT team members. The IP team provides more than just containment around a SERT target location. They are called upon to introduce chemical agents to the target, to provide diversionary distractions (such as throwing flashbang, or stun grenades, into the back when the team is about ready to make entry into the front of a building) and to supplement the sniper/observer teams in acting in an "eyes and ears" capacity. The IP team may also be called upon to take into custody anyone who leaves the target location during the incident. That could mean anyone from an innocent who happened to make it out, to an escaped hostage, to the bad guy trying to crawl out of a window and escape. The IP team must be ready to handle any one of those incidents, plus a few others.
What kind of weapons do the Entry and the IP Teams carry?
Our Entry Team carries the same weapons that have been used successfully for years by special operations teams worldwide: the Heckler and Koch MP-5 9-mm submachine gun. They are equipped with a fire selector switch enabling them to fire in either semi-automatic or fully automatic mode and a very bright tactical light mounted under the barrel. Some are equipped with a three-round-burst switch as well. The tac light is activated by a squeeze pad mounted on both the forestock and the handgrip, allowing the operator to light up the area his gun is pointed in by simply squeezing the grip. The standard issue weapon for our Inner Perimeter team is the Heckler and Koch HK-53 fully automatic assault rifle. This comes in a .225 (5.56-mm) caliber, and is also equipped with a bright under-barrel tactical light and semi- or fully automatic selector switch. All team members, snipers/observers included, carry a Sig Sauer 9-mm semiautomatic pistol, also equipped with a tac light, in a drop holster attached to their thigh. On the other thigh, each team member carries at least three spare magazines for each of his primary weapons.
Other weaponry consist of 12-gauge shotguns (often with pistol grips and tac lights) used for a variety of purposes such as delivery of less-lethal rounds (sandbag rounds, wooden dowels, foam rounds or rubber stingball rounds), delivery of gas once inside the target location using shotgun fired "ferret" rounds, or door breaching, using "Avon" rounds designed to take out the locking mechanism of any door. Delivery of chemical agents (teargas) from the outside IP team through doors or windows is generally accomplished via the use of shoulder-fired 37-millimeter guns. We have both single-fire 37-mm guns and revolving magazine L-8 semi-automatic 37-mm guns.
How do you get into a locked or fortified building when it's time to go in?
The most common method is to simply take the door out with the use of a "key," which is a very heavy solid block of steel at the end of a bar with handles. The biggest guy on the team swings it at the door lock when it's time to go in, and, trust me, the door easily figures out what it's supposed to do, and does it without much protest. However, many bad guys will anticipate such a move and fortify their doors to prevent such an entry. We've been known to back a tow truck up to the house, have the Mobile Reaction Team (another faction, usually comprised of Entry Team members on temporary loan) hook it up to the fortified door, and simply drive away, taking the door, the frame, and occasionally the wall with it. In the case of a metal door that's been welded shut, or any one of a hundred other worst-case scenarios, we work very closely with the EDU (Explosives Disposal Unit) guys. They are only too happy to come out to our scene, wire the door with plastic or C-4 explosives, and open it right up for us. We train with them, both to prepare ourselves for such a blast and to prepare them to do such a job safely in a SERT-type environment.
What are the most common SERT situations?
There are several types of situations for which police departments will activate tactical teams. The most common examples are:

Domestic or other situations in which one of the combatants barricades him or herself into a room or building purports him or herself to be armed
Any shots fired type of call where the suspect refuses to surrender to the police
A situation where a person who is known to either have access to weapons or is prone to violence is in a known location and a reason exists for his arrest
High-risk drug or arrest warrants
In cooperation with other agencies in multi-agency raids
Any hostage situation

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