Hostage-taking is not just by terrorists in highly-planned operations, or by mental health patients, but by criminals who may never have intended to take hostages in the first place. From our January 2002 print edition.
Hostage-taking does not stand still any more than security management. While the UK still has air-hijacks to deal with on the ground, notably at Stansted in February 2000, hostage-takers worldwide know that if a plane lands at a UK airport it is not going to take off again. Thus air-hostage-takers have for years sought to avoid the UK. Rather, hostage situations in the UK are likely to crop up in mental health institutions and prisons, and (to take consultant Colin Braziel’s long list): high street banks and building societies, post offices (particularly in rural areas), companies with American owners or partners, embassies and consulates, high value retailers (jewellers, for example). Outside of closed institutions such as prisons, a hostage situation may come about simply because of a criminal’s blunder: ‘Because of [police] armed response teams he suddenly finds himself cornered and doesn’t know what to do and panics.’ Every UK police force has trained officers ready to deal with a hostage situation. Colin Braziel makes the point: ‘The more armed policemen we have out there, the more the chances are that you are going to have an accidental hostage situation.’ He dates hostage negotiation from the Iranian embassy siege in London in 1980, when terrorists grabbed a police officer, who did not let on that he was armed, and remained armed throughout the siege. The world remembers the TV footage of SAS troops storming the embassy, not the several days of successful negotiation beforehand. Hostage negotiation is about compromise, he says. ‘Clearly the hostage takers want something. They might want their freedom, 1,001 things, and you compromise with them to achieve some of their aims. We know we are never going to let people go and you never say no to anything.’ It could be the hostage-takers have no aims. Whatever, after a couple of days the hostage-takers may well want food; then the negotaitor asks, what will you do in good faith in return’ The hostage-takers may let children go, for example. Colin describes hostage negotation as ‘one of the most tiring jobs you can think of’. A phone call to the hostage-holders may last ten or 15 minutes, and it could be an hour or two before the next contact. In the meantime, there is background work to do. There are some rules: don’t give hostage-takers alcohol, or firearms, and beware of giving access to a priest (it suggests the hostage-takers are thinking of something suicidal). Nor do you give access to third parties, such as the media, although, as Colin said, negotiation is a compromise; the hostage-taker may agree to give up on the promise of a media interview. You as a negotiator always start your first conversation with: ‘I am working with the police, I am here to try and help you.’ You will either get a load of abuse, or you might get someone down the phone saying: ‘I don’t know what to do, how do I get out of this”’ Colin praises the police training, that includes testimony from former hostage victims, and role-playing at an airport, with co-operation of volunteer flight staff. What does the security manager need to know’ ‘A lot of these situations rely on the first person on the scene. You are lucky if you have a trained negotiator in the early stages. In any area at risk you should be looking at briefing people in what to do in those first 10, 15, 20 minutes – how do you calm the situation. The Prison Service are very good at this, because they have trained negotiators, but invariably it will be an ordinary prison officer at the start.’ Security managers should ask themselves how someone could be held hostage on their site, and build in prevention. A bank manager holding the keys to the safe is at risk, for example, and needs to be briefed on being aware that he might be followed, and should vary his route to work, for instance. Nor should premises have items around that could be used to harm people. ‘Because as I said, an awful lot of these situations are on the spur of the moment.’ For all the discussion, there is no getting around the violent, sudden act of hostage-taking and confrontation – and it may well be a security officer or gatehouse guard who has to judge how to react to a criminal holding a member of staff under duress and threatening to shoot, unless he the criminal is let in. Colin suggests it is a situation for role-play, and for the security department to draw up a plan of action, so the control room has something to refer to in the emergency. If a criminal is seeking to force his way into your building with a hostage, a way of limiting the threat could be to have a pair of access-controlled doors before sensitive areas such as your control room, so that if the hostage-taker enters through a first door he is held at the second door without directly threatening more staff.
