Pentagon gave $64 million in equipment to SC police through federal program

The U.S. military has supplied South Carolina law enforcement agencies with a total of $64 million worth of equipment since two controversial programs began in 1990, data show.

That equipment, obtained through the federal “1033” program and its more restrictive precursor, the 1208 program, includes tactical gear such as mine-resistant, ambush-protected vehicles, AR-15-style rifles, night vision sniper scopes, thermal sights, mine detection sets, and more.

The 1033 program, passed in 1997, was designed to fight the drug war by sending military surplus equipment to local police departments throughout the country. But critics say the program greatly increases the buildup of military and tactical equipment at police departments.

Though the 1033 program is often used to obtain non-tactical supplies from the military, such as office supplies, workout equipment, pickup trucks, first-aid kits, etc. more than half of the $64 million in gear obtained was for weapons, tactical equipment or other military hardware.

• $22.6 million was for mine-resistant, ambush-protected vehicles (commonly abbreviated MRAPs), which are designed to protect against rocket-propelled grenades, land mines, armor-piercing machine guns and anti-tank mines.
• $9.5 million for tactical equipment such as gun parts, night vision goggles, night vision sniper rifle scopes, suppressors, thermal cameras, explosive ordinance disposal equipment and more.
• $1.2 million for rifles, shotguns and pistols.

This count understates the amount of tactical and military-style equipment law enforcement have because it does not include equipment purchased through federal grants or a police department’s budget, said Kanya Bennett, a senior attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union.

Police say this sort of military equipment is not used for day-to-day operations, but rather to respond to active shooters, find missing persons, respond to natural disasters and more. The program allows smaller departments unable to afford such equipment to have it immediately available in crises without having to wait for larger police departments to bring theirs.

An example of when police say an MRAP helped save lives was 2018 when a man with a “high-powered rifle” barricaded inside his home and ambushed officers in Florence who were serving a search warrant, killing one officer and wounding six others, according to a previous article from The State.

As officers were pinned down by rifle fire, police drove an MRAP in between the shooter and the police officers, using it as a shield to rescue the wounded officers.

“For active shooter situations, this is the best vehicle to have,” Batesburg-Leesille Police Chief W. Wallace Oswald told The State.

Critics, however, see a disturbing trend.

What critics say

While law enforcement officials say MRAPs, tactical equipment and other gear obtained through the 1033 program are essential for worst-case scenarios, some activists say the way police use the program sends an intimidating and oppressive message to the Black community.

“The federal government has an important role in signaling to local police what is acceptable and what is not,” Bennett said.

When the federal government gives military equipment to local police departments, “It sends the message that communities are war zones,” Bennett said when asked about the message the program sends to Black communities. “It sends the message that people are enemies.”

Given the historic mistreatment of people of color by the criminal justice system and the yawning, racial gap in trust for law enforcement, the use of military-style equipment in local policing instills fear and escalates tension between police and the Black community, Columbia organizer Lawrence Nathaniel said.

“It’s telling you you’re looking at us as if we’re dangerous people and we’re not dangerous people,” Nathaniel said of the 1033 program.

The 1033 program gained national attention after the 2014 killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and the militarized police response to protests in Ferguson. Though changes have been made to the program, the ACLU still believes it should be abolished, Bennett said.

“None of the lessons have been learned between the deaths of Michael Brown and George Floyd,” Bennett said.

Police militarization has also been associated with erosion of trust in police and a “statistically significant relationship between 1033 transfers and fatalities from officer-involved shootings,” according to a 2017 study co-authored by Casey Delehanty, an assistant professor at Gardner-Webb University who studies police violence and the 1033 program.

“There is some evidence that the equipment provokes more violent behavior,” Delehanty told The State.

The way the 1033 program is written, it requires officers to use certain equipment within a given time frame or lose access to it, Delehanty said. As a result, police have an incentive to use tactical equipment when it is not needed, Delehanty said. What’s more, SWAT raids and civil asset forfeiture are often used to help defray the costs of having militarized equipment, Delehanty said.

“It not only gives you the ability to engage in more aggressive enforcement strategies, but it almost incentivizes it,” Delehanty said.

Not only does using military equipment send a counterproductive message, it is also a drain on resources, said Don Polite, the policy director for Columbia civil rights group EmpowerSC.

“Most police departments don’t need it,” Polite said of the military-style equipment obtained through the 1033 program.

For example, Richland County Sheriff’s Department, Columbia Police Department and S.C. Law Enforcement Division all have MRAPs, yet Richland County is home to the McEntire Joint National Guard Base and the 1st battalion of the S.C. State Guard, which responds to natural disasters, domestic crises and works alongside law enforcement during emergencies, according to the state guard’s website.

“We don’t need to duplicate, triplicate efforts,” Polite said. “Every state, not just South Carolina, has a National Guard.”

However, the military and national guard’s ability to get involved in domestic affairs is limited.

Because of an 1878 law called the Posse Comitatus Act, the U.S. military is not allowed to enforce laws, but there are a few exceptions such as an insurrection, invasion or an act of Congress, according to the Congressional Research Service.

Even if troops are activated, many military bases, such as Columbia’s Fort Jackson, do not even have MRAPs or similar equipment, Fort Jackson spokeswoman Leslie Ann Sully told The State.

That’s because Fort Jackson is focused on training young Army recruits; whereas massive bases like North Carolina’s Fort Bragg have heavier equipment because they equip and deploy soldiers including special forces, according to Fort Bragg’s website.

“We’re not Fort Bragg,” Sully said. “We’re a training base.”

It is still possible for the national or state guard to respond to crisis situations, but doing so takes an act from the Governor.

While the Posse Comitatus Act prevents the military from acting like police under normal circumstances, it doesn’t prevent the police from training like soldiers and stocking up on wartime equipment.

Training officers to use military-style equipment and tactics also takes up valuable time and resources that could better be spent on training officers on mental health awareness, Richland County Library’s social work program, the COMET bus system and more, Polite said.

“It should be changed,” Polite said of the 1033 program.

There has been some movement in Congress among Democrats to reform the program.

House Democrats, joined by three Republicans, passed a police reform bill last month. Included in the legislation are several changes to the program that provides surplus military equipment to local law enforcement agencies. For example, the Democrats’ bill would require local law enforcement agencies to list how they plan to use the equipment while applying to the program, return surplus equipment to the Department of Defense and require local law enforcement agencies to receive the approval of their local governments in order to obtain the equipment.

However, it is unlikely the legislation will be taken up by the Senate, making changes a longshot for now, according to The New York Times.

For some activists, abolishing the 1033 program is necessary, but doesn’t go nearly far enough.

“This entire program needs (to be) abolished,” said Kym Smith, a member of Columbia’s Party for Socialism and Liberation. “There’s no changing it.”

Smith cites the history of Southern American law enforcement rooted in slave patrols, the War on Drugs’ disproportionate effect on minority communities, the disproportionate killing of Black Americans by police, etc. as evidence that the entire institution of policing as it exists now should be abolished.

“They’re only doing this to protect the interests of upper-class people,” Smith said of police. “They’re here to protect money.”

Why do police say they need mine-resistant vehicles?

The MRAPs given to S.C. law enforcement agencies vary in cost from $412,000 to $733,000 and belong to both some of the largest law enforcement agencies in the state, but also small agencies.

For example, there aren’t enough people in the city of Allendale to fill Keenan High School’s football stadium, yet the military provided the city’s police department with an MRAP.

In the S.C. Midlands, the Batesburg-Leesville Police Department, which serves a town of 5,415, also has an MRAP. The police department has the MRAP in case of an active shooter situation, Oswald said.

Batesburg-Leesville is fortunate to have never needed to use the the MRAP during an active shooter situation, Oswald said, so primarily the MRAP is just used in parades.

“I equate it to a fire truck,” Oswald said, noting that fire trucks can cost well over $400,000 and spend most of their functional lives in parades and in fire station garages. “But when your house is on fire, it’s the most important piece of equipment.”

Asked why Batesburg-Leesville needs an MRAP when multiple other law enforcement agencies in the Midlands have MRAPs, Oswald said it was all about timing. Oswald said SLED told him it would take between 55 to 90 minutes for SLED to load up and take the 30-plus mile trip to Batesburg-Leesville; whereas it would take his department roughly 10 minutes to do the same, he said.

Like all equipment received through the 1033 program, the department did not have to pay for the MRAP, worth $658,000, according to federal data. But Batesburg-Leesville police are required to pay for maintenance, training, repairs, etc. For Batesburg-Leesville, those maintenance and other costs have been minimal because the MRAP has only 1,700 miles on it, Oswald said.

Oswald credits the 1033 program for his being able to afford an MRAP. Without the program, the department “couldn’t and wouldn’t“ buy an MRAP on its own, Oswald said.

The Lexington Police Department obtained an MRAP after its SWAT vehicle went out of commission. But police Chief Terrence Green said that his department primarily uses the MRAP for public relations, Toys for Tots fundraisers and other events.

However, the MRAP is useful to the department because it can be used for rescuing people during natural disasters, SWAT raids and responding to mass shootings, Green said.

Even for large agencies, MRAPs may be rarely used, if at all. For example, SLED has never deployed either of its two MRAPs since receiving them, the first in 2014 and the other in 2016, said agency spokesman Tommy Crosby.

Columbia Police Captain E.M. Marsh said his department has deployed its MRAP three times since it acquired the vehicle in 2013.

Officers have used it to climb on top of a roof in response to an armed gunman; during the protests following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis; and in response to an armed and barricaded suspect.

“If we never have to deploy it again, I’ll be as happy as can be,” Marsh said.

As far as using MRAPs in response to disasters, its effectiveness depends on the situation, Marsh said. The MRAP is not a go-to during a major flood because the sheer weight of the vehicle can become a problem on flood-damaged roads and can seat a handful of passengers, Marsh said. However, Columbia police did receive a “high water vehicle” through the 1033 program that the agency used during the 2015 floods to rescue nearly 20 people trapped by floodwaters, Marsh said.

While Marsh said he has heard concerns around police departments having MRAPs, he says their purpose is for “protection, not intimidation.”

Tactical equipment

While MRAPs are perhaps the most visible result of the 1033 program, the federal government has provided millions of dollars worth of military-style rifles and tactical equipment to local police departments throughout S.C., data show.

Between 1993 and 2001, the government provided all S.C. law enforcement agencies with a total of $15,000 worth of firearms. In that pre-9/11 time period, the majority of those weapons obtained were M-14 rifles, which the Army stopped procuring in the mid-’60s, according to federal data and the Army Historical Foundation.

In 2002, that changed. In that year alone, S.C. police departments received $110,828 worth of weapons from the 1033 program, data show. The type of weapons they received changed too. Between 1993 and 2001, only one department, Summerville Police Department, received a single shipment of eight of the lighter, more modern M16 rifles — a rifle similar to an AR-15 — data show.

Since then, S.C. law enforcement agencies have received a total of 2,485 M16 rifles. That’s 16 times as many as the number of M14s since 1993, data show.

Though M16 rifles are fully-automatic — meaning if someone holds the trigger down the gun fires multiple rounds — many departments, such as the Columbia Police Department, have permanently converted their M16s into semi-automatic (one pull of the trigger equals one round fired), Marsh said.

The 9/11 terrorist attacks didn’t cause Columbia police to buy AR-15-style rifles, Marsh said. Rather, it was the 1997 North Hollywood shooting in which bank robbers armed with body armor and fully-automatic assault rifles sprayed hundreds of bullets, striking both police and civilians.

The police were so outgunned they had to borrow AR-15 style rifles from a local gun shop to fight back, according to media reports at the time.

Smaller police departments have also stocked up on military-style rifles. Clemson City Police has several AR-15 style “patrol rifles” that it keeps on hand in case of an active shooter at Clemson University, Chief Jeff Stone told The State. Clemson’s patrol rifles were obtained outside the 1033 program, data show.

“It’s not for every day use,” Stone said.

Asked about his thoughts on the 1033 program — his department used it to acquire gun parts, a thermal sight and more — Stone said, “I think it’s essential for agencies that are smaller and may not be able to afford equipment.”

The buildup in military equipment is not limited to armored vehicles and firearms. The Hartsville Police Department, a town of just over 7,500 people, received four, $10,000 thermal sights in late 2015, data show.

Thermal sights function like night-vision goggles, except instead of amplifying light, they detect body heat, fires and other heat sources even in pitch dark. The sights are used by police to find missing persons or suspects hiding from police, Hartsville Police Lt. Mark Blair told The State.

Unlike the night-vision sniper scopes obtained by other police departments, Hartsville Police’s thermal sight functions more like a set of binoculars, Blair said.

It’s something that can be useful throughout the rural, wooded town Blair said.

“We’re a small organization, but we’re surrounded by a lot of woods,” Blair said.

Since 1993, the 1033 program has provided millions of dollars worth of tactical equipment to local police departments. Here are a few highlights:

• 698 night-vision tools such as goggles, sniper scopes, image intensifiers, etc.
• 84 thermal sights
• 76 explosive ordinance disposal robots/unmanned ground vehicles
• 19 observation helicopters
• 16 gun suppressors

Who pays?

One of the most attractive parts about the 1033 program to local police departments is they don’t have to pay for the initial equipment cost, placing within reach surplus military gear for police departments of all sizes.

For example, the Richland County Sheriff’s Department received 115 rifles through the 1033 program. The federal data values them at $500 each but department spokeswoman Maria Yturria said those rifles would cost $800 each — a total of $92,000.

The department has three unmanned ground vehicles used to dispose of bombs and respond to suspicious packages. The vehicles cost between $173,218 and $187,312, data show.

“They have been used for unattended bags, calls for service where family members have found WWII ordnance to suspicious/abandoned packages,” Yturria said in an email. “These robots are used to ensure the safety of citizens and the deputies who are trained to respond to explosive ordnance calls for service in the Midlands.”

The department has also received 300 tourniquets, which the department uses to minimize blood loss during a traffic accident or a shooting, Yturria said.

While the police department does not have to pay for the equipment, taxpayers still foot the bill for the buildup of military equipment in police agencies through federal taxes and by paying for local agencies’ costs for maintenance of and training. What’s more, even though the 1033 program was designed to deliver surplus equipment to local police agencies, more than one-third of the equipment transferred to local police departments was brand new, according to a 2014 report from the American Civil Liberties Union.

Giving new, or nearly new, equipment to police departments also raises concerns about how much of that equipment the military needs in the first place, said Bennett, the ACLU lawyer.

“What is the federal government doing that it has so much excess?” Bennett asked.

— Jack Kelly contributed to this report.

This story was originally published July 12, 2020 at 5:00 AM.