Action and reaction training may not sound difficult, and it seems pretty straightforward, but the success rate for Jimmy's group of agents on their first try was less than half.
"FBI, drop your weapon, drop your weapon!" Jimmy shouted, holding his gun with both hands, aiming at the agent opposite him. Both wore head protection and had eye guards, so there was no need to worry about the simulation gun hitting a vital spot.
The agent didn't speak or move, their right hand holding a gun. A senior agent behind Jimmy gave a thumbs up, and the agent facing Jimmy immediately raised his right hand. However, he was facing Jimmy, who already had numerous takedowns on his record. Before the agent's right hand was even level with his line of sight, a paint round had burst on his headgear.
Jimmy was actually observing not his hand, but his right shoulder, which would slightly lift when raising the hand. Since Jimmy had already aimed in advance, all he had to do was pull the trigger, which naturally made him faster than the agent.
After winning all the tests twice in a row, Jimmy ran out of luck. Given Jimmy's speed, the senior agent responsible for the course directly assigned Jimmy to the role of the opposite agent, facing fellow trainees aiming to become agents.
Jimmy didn't hold back since the headgear was protected, and a hit from a paintball elsewhere just stung for a moment; it wasn't a big problem.
In the subsequent tests, Jimmy didn't lose a single round. He didn't use the normal method of leveling the gun with his line of sight but rather shot from the hip, always managing to fire before the other party could shoot.
In the end, Jimmy utterly dominated the training, leaving no fellow trainee able to score against him.
Jimmy didn't know how the other groups were doing, but he was certainly happy at the moment. Beating the less skilled was simply too entertaining. Of course, the others in his group looked rather displeased.
In various agent skills training sessions, Jimmy consistently scored well, with some of his scores even ranking high among the trainees.
As for the cultural classes in the professional courses, be it law or case studies, Jimmy employed his best trick—rote memorization. He memorized all the relevant policy and legal provisions for the assessments, which posed no issue.
Relatively speaking, more troublesome was the historical case analysis, identifying suspects' characteristics and clues from subtle leads. Jimmy's foundation was too weak for this part; he had never received training in this area before. The crux of the matter was that he was completely unfamiliar with their slang and common knowledge-related content, having only appeared to be a local for the last two years.
For example, the clothing of a criminal suspect, and the supposed differences between the 70s, 80s, and 90s, Jimmy could only read the clues describing the style and type of clothing but was unable to recognize them from a group of suspects. Likewise, if a suspect drove an old car, its brand or era, or a clue mentioned a building from a certain decade, he could not distinguish it from several photographs, naturally unable to point out where to go next for the clues.
This disadvantage directly led to Jimmy not identifying key clues in many case analyses, keeping his scores in this area less than ideal. Jimmy, although trying hard to cope, had a very poor success rate when it came to specific cases.
However, Jimmy did fairly well in handling cases like violent crimes or bank robberies, having seen many movies in the past. Although he couldn't remember the plots, he remembered numerous classic heist methods.
The hard-studying Jimmy was unaware that someone had already set their sights on him.
Carrying Jimmy's learning and training materials from the past couple of months, a senior agent arrived at the FBI National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime (NCAVC), another important division of the FBI. The work of this division involves analyzing behavioral science patterns of criminals to assist in addressing a series of violent criminal cases and providing investigative or operational support based on the behavior of the suspects.
There are five Behavioral Analysis Units (BAUs) in NCAVC, each responsible for different types of cases.
Unit 1 handles counter-terrorism, arson, and bomb attacks.
Unit 2 handles cases of threatening nature, cybercrimes, and public corruption issues.
Unit 3 focuses on crimes against children.
Unit 4 focuses on crimes against adults.
Unit 5 is responsible for research, strategy provision, and instruction.
Of course, this is just a general internal classification; in reality, they have the authority to deal with various cases simultaneously.
The NCAVC is located within the FBI Academy. Although primarily focused on the behavioral analysis of criminals, the institution is staffed with many experts in psychology and behavioral sciences, who are also very proficient in individual profiling.
The senior agent's visit was specifically concerning Jimmy; he handed Jimmy's file to a BAU chief, then returned to wait for the results.
Personal profiling isn't a matter of simply going through the materials; freshly, Jimmy was also studying at the Academy, allowing them to observe him up close.
Jimmy and his fellow trainees had completed most of the courses and were now entering the case simulation stage. The practice site was in a town that looked quite ordinary. Still, it was not an actual town but a mock town called "Hogan Alley" built by the FBI near the Academy, with all the complete infrastructure buildings required for a small town. Here, the trainees would perform various exercises such as stakeouts, tracking, arrests, and bomb disposal.
Hogan Alley, aptly named as America's most dangerous town, has a "Hogan Bank," the most frequently robbed bank in the United States, averaging three robberies a day. The buildings here are real, and the residents are actors who play the roles of real townspeople.
Each trainee practices their law enforcement procedures in this town, from legal processes, arrests, escorting to tactical coordination, and firearms usage. Under such real-world scenarios, the pressure faced by the trainees is immense. It's not a classroom where answering incorrectly doesn't matter. Here, each simulation case is evaluated and critiqued post-action.
Every trainee coming to Hogan Alley naturally experiences a stress reaction, with their heart rate increasing and breathing becoming difficult. At any time, they must be ready to face the threat of lethal force.
Trainees arm themselves with weapons and enforce the law in Hogan Alley as assigned by the instructors, with the simpler tasks involving direct arrests and the more complex ones, like bank robberies.
Enforcement in Hogan Alley also encounters behavior that would happen in real situations, such as bystanders' actions. Whether the bystanders exhibit any abnormalities or other unexpected incidents occur is unknown. Jimmy noticed a situation where a fellow trainee was attacked by onlooking residents while observing.
For Jimmy's first live-case scenario, he had an arrest warrant and needed to capture a person, but since the suspect was renting a room in someone else's house, he couldn't just bash in the door to make the arrest like in the movies. He needed to first contact the landlord to get authorization before entering the house.
This is the essence of their live training; in a case scenario, they must consider all aspects including procedures, authorization, and legal risks to complete an arrest successfully.