Hogan's Alley (FBI)
Hogan's Alley is a Federal Bureau of Investigation training facility operated by the FBI Academy in Marine Corps Base Quantico near Quantico, Prince William County, Virginia. Opened in 1987, Hogan's Alley is a full-scale replica of a nondescript town in the United States, spread over approximately 10 acres (4 ha). The facility is used to train federal law enforcement agents in realistic urban environments that cannot be fully emulated by, or would not be fitting in, traditional training facilities such as kill houses. It is also occasionally used to train lieutenants at the United States Marine Corps' nearby Basic School in urban warfare.
Description
[edit]Hogan's Alley is located on the grounds of the FBI Academy, roughly behind the FBI Laboratory. The facility is an open-air complex consisting of several buildings constructed to resemble establishments typically seen in an archetypical American small town, including a post office, a pharmacy, a motel, a fully-operational Subway,[1] a pawn shop, a pool hall, a laundromat, a barber, a jewelry store, a bar, and a suburban cul-de-sac, among other businesses and structures, several of which are named after events and figures from the FBI's history.[2][3] Although it strongly resembles a town, Hogan's Alley is not actually inhabited nor incorporated, and most of the buildings are either staged prop-filled sets or are in fact disguised academy facilities such as classrooms and offices. Still, some genuine confusions have happened: early into its existence, the prop mailboxes in Hogan's Alley reportedly had mail delivered to them by confused postal workers, to the point that the FBI ordered them welded shut.[4]
Hogan's Alley is used to teach agents investigative techniques, firearms skills, and defensive tactics. During training exercises, the town is populated by actors who role play parts appropriate to the training that is in progress; most play innocent bystanders, but some play terrorists, bank robbers, drug dealers, or other criminal roles. One of the buildings really houses a classroom for training agents on site and another building houses a working FBI office used in some simulated scenarios.[4]
Scenarios involve investigations of terrorist activities, planning and making arrests, processing evidence at crime scenes, conducting interviews and searches, using ballistic shields as protection, and clearing areas and buildings so they're safe to enter. Realistic paintball bullets, known as Simunition, which are fired from realistic paintball guns, are used in simulated gun fights with the criminal role players.[4]
Since civilian law enforcement's rules of engagement are far more restrictive than those generally in effect in the military, the FBI's Hogan's Alley relies on simulated munitions and role-playing to make the shoot/no-shoot decisions far more realistic than was possible in the past. Modern simulations used by military and police also now include a wide range of simulated weapons and scenarios, from force-on-force scenarios using paintball gun technology to life-sized, computer-animated simulations projected in special 360-degree theaters, using advanced light guns with force feedback to simulate recoil.[citation needed]
History
[edit]The FBI's Hogan's Alley has evolved out of established police and military training facilities dating back to the period between World War I and World War II. The first reference to a facility called "Hogan's Alley" was at the Special Police School, established by the National Rifle Association of America and the Army's National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice at Camp Perry in Ohio.[5][6] The facility was established after a 1920 survey of police departments for cities with a population over 25,000 revealed that only 13 had established marksmanship training programs. In 1924, the police departments of all cities with populations of over 10,000 were invited to participate in national matches at Camp Perry.
The coming of World War II closed the Special Police School down, but the principle of Hogan's Alley lived on in other forms, such as the "House of Horrors" kill house described by Office of Strategic Services (OSS) military officer Rex Applegate in his 1943 book Kill or Get Killed.[7] The setup used for training OSS agents differed from the modern Hogan's Alley, since lack of simulated munitions meant that training with live targets was not possible. The OSS agents used pop-up targets and reduced-caliber .22 Long Rifle pistols to minimize the danger and the damage to the facility, but it was still live ammunition and potentially lethal. Instructors followed students through the house by holding onto their belts, so that contact was always maintained in the darkened corridors.[citation needed]
The FBI's Hogan's Alley was established after a catastrophic 1986 shootout...
on a Miami street [in which] a group of FBI agents [tried] to stop suspected bank robbers; two were killed and another five were wounded. Special agent in charge of the Miami FBI during the incident Joseph Corless described it 'a devastating day for the FBI.' From this tragedy came change, in this case, the decision to invest in the mock town of Hogan’s Alley to allow agents to gain experience they needed to avoid future tragedies, without getting hurt.[4]
Origin of name
[edit]According to the FBI, they "...borrowed it from the Hogan's Alley comic strip of the 1890s. The alley was located in a rough neighborhood, so we thought the name fit our crime-ridden town."[8] While the comic strip was almost certainly the original source of the name,[4] the Camp Perry facility was probably the more immediate source of the name. The Camp Perry facility re-opened in 1956, and was probably used by the FBI, and that was probably the inspiration for the 1984 arcade game Hogan's Alley.[9]
See also
[edit]- Hogan's Alley – 1984 video game simulating a live fire shooting range with pop-up targets
- Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center Twentynine Palms – USMC facility that similarly includes a large replica of a Middle Eastern town
References
[edit]Citations
[edit]- ^ Tau, Byron (February 10, 2020). "The Weirdest Subway Restaurant in America". The Wall Street Journal.
- ^ Fratus, Matt (November 6, 2020). "Inside the FBI's Hogan's Alley: The Crime Capital of the World". Retrieved September 5, 2024.
- ^ Grundhauser, Eric (August 16, 2016). "Hogan's Alley, the FBI's Fake Training Town". Slate. ISSN 1091-2339. Retrieved September 6, 2024.
- ^ a b c d e Hendley, Shona (June 9, 2019). "Crime capital of the US you won't find on a map". News.com.au.
- ^ McClellan, Angus (April 13, 2010). "The NRA Law Enforcement Division celebrates its 50th Anniversary". American Rifleman.
- ^ "Hogan's Alley Turns 30". FBI News. FBI. May 12, 2017. Archived from the original on May 16, 2017.
- ^ Applegate, Rex (2007). Kill or Get Killed: A Manual of Hand-to-Hand Fighting. Paladin Press. ISBN 978-1581606218.
- ^ "Tactical/Hogan's Alley". FBI.gov. Archived from the original on May 27, 2023. Retrieved October 13, 2023.
- ^ Cronin, Brian (March 8, 2017). "The Surprising Comic Origins of a Classic Nintendo Video Game". Comic Book Resources. Archived from the original on March 10, 2017.
Sources
[edit]- BALDWIN, HANSON W. (August 30, 1931). "PERRY'S 26TH YEAR SALUTED ON RANGES; Colonel Critchfield, Founder of Camp, Celebrates by Bossing Fire at His "Running Deer." POLICE VICTORS EMERGE St. Louisan Wins "Hogan's Alley" Shoot--Robert Hughes Takes First Honors Among Juniors". The New York Times. p. 16.
Colonel Critchfield on Job at 67. Veteran's Gossip of Old Days. Varied Costumes of Motley Throng. Winner of "Hogan's Alley" Battle. Turtles Assist in Alibis. Juniors Receive Their Awards. High Honors for Robert Hughes. Police Prizes Bestowed
- Sandler, C. D.; Keysor, R. (August 1995). "NRA & Law Enforcement: Ties that Bind". American Rifleman. Vol. 143, no. 7. p. 40.
- Wack, Larry (2013). "From Sunday's Comics To Pop-Up Targets: Origin Of The FBI's Original 'Hogan's Alley'" (PDF). FADED GLORY: DUSTY ROADS OF AN FBI ERA.
External links
[edit]- "Tactical/Hogan's Alley". FBI.gov. Retrieved January 4, 2024.
