What is Cincinnati's civil disturbance response team?

In the past, the Cincinnati Police Department might have sent "riot police" to an incident, but times have changed.

After a shooting that wounded nine people early Sunday morning, Cincinnati's civil disturbance response team was sent to the scene. The team deployed "bang balls," percussive devices used to disperse a crowd.

According to the department's procedure manual, the team is made up of supervisors and "grenadiers" to respond to civil unrest. In terms of police, grenadiers are officers who have been trained to use less lethal munitions.

The department says team members are trained in enhanced crowd control techniques and "mobile field force" concepts. The team is usually deployed in advance of possible issues, but can also be called to situations rapidly.

The police manual doesn't detail mobile field force concepts, but this term is loaded with history. Sometimes called the "Miami field force," many of the tactics were first developed in by the Miami-Dade police force in Florida in the 1980s during a period of civil unrest there, according to an article published by Police1, a law enforcement trade publication.

Old crowd control tactics were based on military and infantry movements that dated back to Roman times, the article states. The new approach focused on quickly reacting to small problems before they got out of hand by removing violent agitators, breaking up big crowds into smaller ones and keeping groups moving.

Community dialog, professionalism and restraint were also key principles set out from the beginning, the article states, along with the rapid deployment of tear gas and other munitions if needed.

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Cincinnati mass shooting: What is the civil disturbance response team?