Starvin Larry

In September 2008, William “Dub” Lawrence watched helplessly as a Davis County, Utah, SWAT team shot and killed his son-in-law after the man had a mental breakdown. To Lawrence, the police team acted rashly. He thought they needlessly escalated the situation, were too quick to opt for force, and were too quick to move on to lethal force. It’s hard to fathom what it must be like to see a family member gunned down, but for Lawrence, the incident was particularly crushing because back in the 1970s, he was elected sheriff of Davis County. And he started the SWAT team that he later witnessed killing his son-in-law.

Today, Lawrence is part of a police reform movement in Utah that has posted some surprising legislative victories. Most notably, Utah is now the only state in the country with a SWAT transparency bill — police agencies with SWAT teams must report how often they use the units, for what purpose, what tactics were used, what was found, and other information about these raids. (Maryland passed a similar law in 2011, but the legislature allowed it to expire this year.)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2014/10/13/ex-sheriff-speaks-out-on-police-shootings-training-militarization/