Best Of: Inside Victoria Police's Special Ops Team

Every week we are joined by the Victorian Police a different area or a different department, and this week we.

Are And you know what, I am never short of amazement of how many different departments there are of the Victorian Police. Well, this one is serious, though, Ja.

They are recruiting as well. Remember whether it's Dogs, Squad, General Judies, Highway Patrol or from the Special Operations Group. These are the boys that are not here to muck around.

Oh my gosh, look at the outfits. They're not here.

Good morning.

They're not costumes, I said, uniforms. Uniforms. We have team lead morning guys.

Ben from the Special Operations Group joining us this morning. Morning. Betty's just taken off the helmet. Morning Ben, I'll get you to boost that. Mike. How a mate.

Good, Thanks for having us morning, Ben.

Now, I'll be honest, I've been trying.

To you're scary looking.

I know I was going. I've been trying some gags on the boys and it's a tough crowd.

You guys are some of the most serious within the Victorian Police. But when we were talking about having you in, I said to Jason, I'm sure they're all just big teddy bears inside and Jace got to meet you before I did, and Jas was like, you know what was I don't know if you're right about being teddy bears. These guys are tough.

How long you be doing big soft?

Is it hurt?

Well?

Jace did try and walk in while I was getting dressed, so we got off on the wrong.

Yeah, that was my bad. How long you've been in the force? Bed?

I've been in for fifteen years in the past force, and I've been at the Special Operations Group for eight years?

Right? How many years would someone normally be in the police before they can move to special operations?

Look, it really varies. Historically we probably wanted more experienced police officers, but we do recruiting of really junior members now, right, Okay, you can be as little as two years in the police force, really, and if you pass the selection program, then you'll come to the unit.

Yeah, right.

And Ben, for those of us who aren't really familiar, which is probably a good thing with a special Operations Group, what exactly do you guys.

Do you'll I heard you guys use the example before about the SWAT, so that's probably one that everyone can understand.

Yep.

The SOG is classified as a police tactical group. Every state has one, every state in territory has one, and our main role is as a counter terrorism response. Right. So look, we thankfully that stuff doesn't happen every day in Victoria. So we spend our time chasing some of the worst defenders around Victoria, mainly because they're using and carrying forearms, right, And that's what we do.

So let's say, if I try, is there a lot.

More of that happening than we actually hear about, like behind the scenes, because we obviously get some stuff reported in the media, but I imagine there's a lot more going on that we don't know about.

Yeah, I think so. Look, we arrest over two hundred people a year. Really, that's a job every few days, and right, you probably only see a handful of those high profile ones actually making news. Yeah.

So if I hypothetical I try and pull off a bank job in the city, right, and I hold it up with hostages, would I see you boys?

Hopefully you in the CS but we'd be there, how fright that is Jesus?

So? Can I imagine there's there's different positions in the team, Like is there a sniper for example?

Yeah, we've got specialists, so once you're at the unit, you can specialize. We've got snipers, which everyone's probably heard of.

Yep.

We've got a tactical canine, handlers, breeches and meetings on the team. We've got specialists roping and repelling capability, airborne and water operations capability. Yeah, so there is specialties within the team.

Yeah, right, Ben, You've got something like this very calm presence about you you're Is that part of the training or is that part of the profile of what they're looking for when they're when they're trying to find you guys, because I imagine you have to keep your cool under extraordinary amounts of pressure.

Yeah, it is a high pressure job. And yeah, I suppose on the surface may do seem calm, but we react the same as every other person when a stressful situation happens. But it certainly doesn't help us in a stressful situation to lose our call, so we try and keep a level head.

But so for example, you know, when like your order Uber eats and you find out the drivers on a pushbike not a car, do you.

Know I've become more enraged than an Uber driver than than I do find account terrors an operation.

Sorry, I was just going to ask massive story, obviously global story, the assassination attempt on Trump. You guys would have looked at that and pulled it apart. Surely.

I was glued to the news like I was watching Clint as he broke it down. And I don't know why he just couldn't commit to calling it an actual assassination attempt instead of a possible because it was pretty obvious at the start.

But yeah, I would.

Love to be a fly on the wall in that debrief because I even saw some AI generated stuff about Trump turning his head and how close it actually was he was.

It would have been Have you not seen that? Jason? It's fascinating, But do you look at things like that and think, how the hell did that guy get on the roof and they didn't notice because looking at you, Ban New would have spotted him.

Yeah. Well, America is a different beast. We train for every worst possible situation, obviously, but I've got a huge amount of faith in our snippers, so we would like to think, however, I wasn't there. We would like to think we'd have that covered a huge amount of faith.

Some of the crazy crazy training and pressure tests you guys have to go through to get into your position.

So probably the most well known within police is the selection phase of the course. So it's a ten day selection phase and really that's where we want to break down the individual to see what their true character is. If they're successful during that selection phase and they're deem suitable, then they'll most likely come on board in a training capacity, so we'll teach them over thirteen weeks. We'll then teach them.

Yeah, I commend you guys for the job you do. But also having to go home to a family after some of the bad stuff that you guys would have to do must be incredibly tough. Is it hard to leave work at work?

It is. I've got a young family, yeah, and I suppose I prioritize trying to detach from work as much as I can so get home, really invest in the kids. MU sure I'm present for them. It is hard, though, I just use that drive home usually after a job, the adrenaline is high. To decompress, put on a bit of music. Yeah, and hopefully when I walk in the door, I'm good for my most important job, which is out of three young kids.

Because are you allowed to talk about what happens in your day? Because I know that, like you hear about whatever our equivalent of the Secret Services. I don't know if that's what it's called here, but you're not allowed to talk about it. And so you guys must hold because there's so much confidential information that you're dealing with. You must have to hold so much in deal with it on your own. Is that is that tricky?

Yeah?

It is. Yeah, Look, we do we're not allowed to share a lot of information about the jobs that we do. I suppose a lot. We were fortunate that a lot of them go well, So we don't celebrate the success of those jobs. Really, it's just onto the next one. So you just internalize that feeling have success, and that's what brings you back to work the next day for the next job.

I'm just looking at all the gear you're carrying on you. It's very different to the walky talkies I got from Tandy for the kids. Can we just quickly go through the gig because you've got scissors on there as well.

Oh yeah, there my trauma she is. So if you're injured, I'm going to cut your clothes off.

Oh this is a new shirt, if you could take it off. Yeah.

So obviously we carry firearms. Now, there's no secret. You can see that.

Two guns on it, that rifle. Yeah, a song just started. You can pause to it. I'm not I'm not wrapping. You can stay on the air for as long as you want. Ben, absolutely all right. So what else you got on there?

So? Yeah, we carry e SpeI ammunition, a taser, stun grenades, some caps can spray, yeah right, and can communicate to it.

So I've seen and bear with me. I was watching Bad Boys with Martin Lawrence and Will Smith and they threw in the is it stung grenades? Right, So they go in, they lot off a huge loud bang and then is it a flash? Is it?

Yeah? Yeah?

Yeah right, they're louder.

They're louder than you can ever imagine. Yeah right, they're so loud.

I'm going to take your word for it. Hey, hey, we're going to go to a song when we come back. I know you were involved in a very famous case in twenty twenty one here in Victoria, which included two young children being kidnapped. It's a full on story. We're going to come back and chat about that. But just to go into the song, I've got something if you want it to take back to the training facility. I'm not sure what. I'm not sure what you guys use

Now do you wreckon yours?

That's work?

It has isn't it?

It hasn't it? Dreking your snipers could shoot those abs off in one.

That's as dream. Right there, we are.

On the air or with the Victorian Police this morning. The SOG boys are in the house. More with them right after do a leap bar on Novar Jason Lawrence.

Tell me what's you know?

My favorite segment. Every couple of weeks we get a different area of the Victorian Police in this morning, we've got Ben who is the team leader of the Special Operations Group. These are the SOG boys that get dispatched hostage negotiations terror, a stramas.

All the really serious stuff.

Ben is ready girls in the any females in the squad.

No, not in our units. So we work closely with other specialist units and we do work with females in those units. But yeah, no female has been able to pass sle phase yet. Yeah, right, interesting.

Sorry, it's just gonna say I've seen Lauren in full flight up against her partner and she would be a very good weapon for the Victorian police.

Yeah, no one, No one gets away from me.

There's definitely some untapped skills out there.

Ben, just quickly. Do you ever get scared? Has anything ever frightened you? Because you guys are so tough.

Yeah, you probably get a little bit caught up in the pressure of actually doing the job. But we react the same as any other person. So there's certain times that I've been in situations and I've thought, yeah, this might be it for me, especially when you're driving at really high speed or you know, you're jumping out of a helicopter like it is quite dangerous. But we just

But if the moment comes and you get the green light to take someone out, you'll do it, no hesitation. I can't say no.

Hesitating. I know.

It's what I said before. Mate. They will take you out and go and get some nuggets. That's what they do. Hey. There was a famous story in the news in twenty twenty one here in Victoria. Take a listen.

He went to the family home in Melbourne's eastern suburbs and waited for his expose to leave before breaking in. Armed with a knife. He bound and gagged his wife and two kids, A three and five, before kidnapping the children for eleven hours.

Then you were part of the crew that was responsible for rescuing the kids. Do you remember the job.

Yeah, I'll always remember that job. It will stick with me for a long time. Great result, obviously the result we wanted. But yeah, certainly pretty tense, tense day in Melbourne.

That was so he'd stormed in and taken the kids hostage. And did he have a weapon, Yeah he did.

Yeah. So I think the actual kidnapping I won't go into too much, but it was pretty traumatic for the kids and for the mother. I bet and pretty violent. So we knew from the outset that it was a serious job at ky Napping and that's that's one of our main jobs that we deployed to is those live hostage jobs. So we were deployed almost straight away.

So just on that, like say, if it's a hostage situation, because a lot of the time we'll be watching on the news and the standoff can go I don't know, ten hours and being naive as a person at home, sometimes we're just like just bloody, go in and get them. Is there a time period?

Not necessarily. Look, there's certain times where the hostage take will do something that forces us to act, but we'll always approach something from a negotiation, you know, safety first point of view. We at the end of the day, we want everyone just to come out peacefully in a life. But make no mistake, we're ready to go if it goes south and we need to act.

I mean, you guys do such an amazing job in protecting people and keeping us all safe.

Is there like.

An expiry date for you guys on how long you can do it? Because it must be so stressful. Do people only last in this job for a certain amount of time or are there people that have been doing it for tens of years.

It really varies, like I've been doing it eight years, and I think the key to lasting in the job, especially this role, is just having that balance, so making sure, as I said before, that you can go away from work and really detach and you've got something worthwhile to invest in away from work, because, like you're saying, laws, if you just commit to work one hundred percent of the time, you'll definitely burn out.

But let's be honest, from a fitness level, there's no senior Sergeant Tom Croydon part of the SG squad is there.

He may have been in a previous lot.

Now he's got a desk job. Because there's some chubby cops out there. I've seen him, and I can say, because I am, they're not doing this job. They are not doing this job. Well, can we just say thank you for the work you do? Honestly? Yeah?

And it's so brave.

Will you guys be traveling into state when the Olympics are on the games?

Sorry?

Yeah, we do.

We help our inter state counterparts with major events like that. So they've come down and traveled and helped us before. With recent events and hopefully we'll be able to support them the same.

Right and just just finally, this is just for the police. Nerd in me. What vehicles do you guys get around here? Can you say?

I'll say full drives.

I feel like you should be in a tank in that outfit.

We've got armored vehicles. We've got we've got some armored vehicles.

What's the name of the big armored cat that you look like?

A bear cat? Guy?

Ben?

In that outfit a manual job.

It's an auto, it is, and it's it's left hand steer as well, because a big American company Lenko.

Heated seats.

No, no heated seats.

Oh my god, Chase, can it? Does it fit through the drive through? That'll be his next question, does it fit through.

The drive.

Well?

Look, Ben and the crew from the Special Operations grow thank you so much for coming in. Boys. We really appreciate it.

And thank you for everything that you do to keep us safe. You guys do an amazing job. We love the Victorian Police.

Hopefully you don't see this through a scope anytime soon.

Thanks having USC on your.

Matelauren wake up feeling good on Nomber one hundred. Jason Lauren on socials,