Correctional emergency response team
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A Correctional Emergency Response Team (CERT or CRT) is a team of highly trained Corrections Officers or Deputy Sheriffs in the United States tasked with responding to incidents, riots, cell extractions, mass searches, or disturbances in prisons or jails possibly involving uncooperative or violent inmates. CRT team members are required to be contactable and available to respond at all times. CRT is founded upon a team concept and is made up of highly motivated and experienced officers.
Duties
Possible duties of a CRT team include transport of high risk inmates, extracting uncooperative prisoners from their cells, daily full cell searches and high profile security, barricaded persons, riots, mass arrest, high risk/high profile transport and hostages situations, as well as crowd control. In the United States CRT organization and training requirements differ from state to state. A standard cell extraction team may consists of the following:
- CRT Team Leader "Leads". Is the only person who may give verbal commands to both the inmate and his team. Spoken communication skills, anger de-escalation techniques.
- The Equipment/Video Member "EQV" To capture the entire response on video.
- CRT Officer "1" Lead member, first in to deal with the inmate. Usually a shield man.
- CRT Officer "2" Second team member in. Usually assigned to immobilize the right arm/hand
- CRT Officer "3" Third team member in. Usually assigned to immobilize the left arm/hand
- CRT Officer "4" Fourth team member in. Usually assigned to immobilize the right leg.
- CRT Officer "5" Fifth team member in. Usually assigned to immobilize the left leg. (Practiced in Capital Health Emergency Facility in Trenton, NJ)
- CRT Officer "6" Sixth team member in. Usually assigned to apply restraints (handcuffs, leg irons, flexi-cuffs, etc). (Practiced in Capital Health Emergency Facility in Trenton, NJ)
CRT Officers are outfitted with extensive gear, including body armor, helmet, tactical gloves, handcuffs, leg shackles, and riot shield. A CRT Officer may also be outfitted with a less-than-lethal shotgun, Taser, OC spray, or lethal weapons such as firearms. A CRT Officer may be outfitted with plain-clothed police uniforms and work as part of a Strong Man Team in Emergency Rooms (Capital Health Emergency Facility in Trenton, NJ).
Hong Kong CERT
With a size of around 152 part-time personnel, the special response unit of the Correctional Services Department was set under the organisation of the Escort and Support Group.
The Hong Kong CERT handles emergency and riots with Hong Kong's prison system. Members are equipped with less lethal weaponry such as pepper spray. Firearms are used as the last resort.