School shootings or mass casualty events have become all too common. In order to prepare for whatever might come their way, the Wareham Police Department conducted training on how to handle active shooter situations.

The training was held Thursday, May 8 at the former Decas Elementary School where officers from Wareham, Middleboro, Carver, Bourne, Somerset and Berkley College of Music ran through different active shooter scenarios in the hallways of the old school.

“It’s tactics for room entries, approaching an active shooter and how to get into an active attack site,” said Wareham Police Officer Calib LaRue who is one of the training’s organizers.

Participating officers were given protective gear and minimal information about each scenario before entering the hallway. Live, non-deadly rounds were used to simulate a real-life active shooter situation.

The training is a part of the Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response training program which was started in 2002 in response to the 1999 Columbine High School shooting that resulted in the death of 14 people to better prepare local law enforcement agencies in active shooter situations. The program has many classes for officers to take, one of which Wareham police have already used.

According to LaRue, officers had just completed an Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response class when a New Bedford man shot at officers from the Marriott hotel in Rosebrook Place, August 2024.

“One of the officers there said that what he got from the training — which was a contact cover method where one officer provides cover and another goes hands on with the subject — helped him get through the incident,” LaRue said.

LaRue also highlighted the amount of different departments in attendance. He said local police departments rely on each other in these situations and now, everyone will be on the same page.

“Let’s say I’m responding to something in Bourne then me and a Bourne officer have been trained the exact same way and him and I can go and do these movements and formations with the exact same training,” LaRue said.

Wareham Police Chief Walter Correira Jr. echoed this, saying this training is “imperative” for all officers.

“It’s so important and I can’t believe it’s gone so long without us having some type of training like this,” he said.

Wareham Police Officer Luka Faria, who just recently joined the department said doing these trainings will help everyone be prepared.

“When you get stressed out and you’re in a stressful situation, you’re going to refer back to the only thing you know which is the training we’re learning here today,” he said.