‘When we make a mistake someone can die’: Inside the world of police crisis negotiators

Most cops love the thrill of the chase that ends with a suspect in the back of a divvy van. Sergeant Victor Yanes is a bit different as he admits he has little interest in arresting crooks and even less in prosecuting them.

If he or his team makes an arrest he says it is a “byproduct” of the main game.

The job of a police crisis negotiator can be a very lonely one.

Don’t think for a moment he does his best work behind a desk, for he deals with the sharp end of life and death policing, where one mistake, one ill-chosen word, can be fatal.

For Yanes, 35, if you have to use force to get a result you may already have failed.

He is talking publicly for the first time about his role as the head of the Australian Federal Police Negotiation Operations Team. It is tightrope policing without a net. Get it wrong and someone can die.

Because the group deals with national and international incidents, diplomacy is vital. “It’s one of the few areas of policing where we could cause a major political incident,” he says.

Go too soft and kidnappers escape. Go too hard and the prime minister may get a call.

Yanes’ policing philosophy, or more broadly, his views on life, were formed, not in the Australian Federal Police Academy, where he graduated in 2013, but in the country of his birth – Brazil.

As an eight-year-old after school he would treat himself to a pastel (fried pastry – chicken with cream cheese was his favourite) from a vendor 100 metres from home. Then one day at the pastel cart a robber demanded a mobile phone from another man.

“When he refused he was shot in the head. I thought what’s all this about? Life was so cheap,” recalls Yanes.

His family immigrated to Canberra when he was 11. In his application to join the AFP he wrote that he wanted to be a police officer, “To make sure this place doesn’t end up like the place where I was born.”

The Negotiation Operations Team is called in to help resolve anything from a mentally disturbed person threatening self-harm, armed offenders with hostages, international cyber extortion demands to Pacific Island riots.

One day, he may be dealing with a person who has temporarily lost the capacity for rational thought and the next with a successful international crime gang that makes millions through online attacks on giant companies.

In some jobs, the group takes the lead, negotiating directly with the offenders or those needing help.

Other times they are in the background, schooling other cops, or in some cases the families of kidnap victims, giving them a crash course on how to conduct negotiations when a false move can be catastrophic.

Yanes lacks a cop’s protective coating of cynicism. “People are not bad, they can just be going through bad times.

“We see people on their worst day when they are in crisis and are not thinking clearly. Our job is to build a window of tolerance.”

He and his team are basically human locksmiths. Many of their jobs involve those who have placed themselves in a position where they think they will either win big or fail heroically. Yanes opens a third alternative – compromise.

“A major driver in decision-making can be embarrassment,” he says. In other words, someone has painted themselves into a corner and without seeing a dignified escape, doubles down.

His first case in 2015 was a mentally disturbed man barricaded in a locked room in a hospital. It took four hours to find the key – he just wanted to eat a meal in peace. Satisfied and with a full tummy, he came out without incident.

“You need to listen and have empathy. We have to work out what is under your iceberg.

“Everyone is different, and we have to work out what is the right tool to bring about a successful outcome.”

In the ACT the Negotiation Operations Team resolves 98 per cent of cases without the use of force.

When they are deployed to a potentially suicidal incident it is usually resolved successfully within 30 minutes. “We know when we wake up every day that we could potentially save someone’s life,” he says.

Police usually see a crisis and try to take control. The negotiator does not force an outcome but tries to guide the target to a peaceful outcome.

Sometimes, Yanes says, time is your friend, as it gives the person stressed the space to see the terrible outcome if they don’t work with the negotiators. “When they are not thinking clearly we want to help them bring their brains back online.”

Yanes says there are three steps.

1. Collect the dots. Gather the intelligence to work out who is involved. The more you know the better you are equipped.
2. Join the dots. Develop a picture of the event.
3. Move the dots. Control the pieces and provide a consistent message to reach a peaceful outcome.

The difference for the Federal case is many of their cases are international, such as kidnappings in Afghanistan, Somalia, Nigeria and Papua New Guinea. They have to step carefully because while Australian citizens are involved it is a crime committed in another country.

They can assist the investigation without running it, although they have been called to the frontline during violent attacks in the Pacific Islands.

In January, an Australian citizen was driving in the remote Imo state in Nigeria when he was abducted by a local crime gang. To put it in perspective there are about 3000 kidnappings in Nigeria every year.

There was no way Federal Police would be able to get boots on the ground. Instead, they were able to help his family in Australia, but with more than compassion and kind words.

The demands from the kidnappers were being passed on from relatives in Nigeria to his family in Australia.

“We were sitting with them, teaching them how to respond. The flow of information had to be consistent and safe,” he says.

In this case, after five days of talks the 42-year-old was released unharmed.

He points out that if people try to deal with these demands on their own it usually ends badly. The quicker the police negotiators become involved the greater the chance of a success.

The kidnappers thrive in an environment of uncertainty and search for weaknesses and inconsistencies.

“If it was a member of your family you would say, ‘I will pay anything’,” he says. Then you have lost any power to negotiate. In Nigeria, a family of six children were abducted and even after a ransom was paid the kidnappers killed one of the hostages and demanded more.

In February last year University of Southern Queensland archaeology professor Bryce Barker, three local researchers and two others were abducted by a gang of 20 armed men from a remote village in the Papua New Guinea southern highlands.

The gang demanded $1.4 million for their release. Yanes’ team was mobilised, not to head to the jungle but to Barker’s family home. There they stayed, coaching the family through the ransom demands.

They were released unharmed a week later after a token payment was made. Enough to allow the kidnappers to retreat with dignity.

In Australia, there are virtual kidnappings where Chinese students are targeted, and told that unless their parents pay a ransom their visas will be cancelled, and they will be jailed in China.

This can involve the victim being told to take pictures of them tied up to be sent to their parents or ordered not to engage with social media and stop contact with parents, allowing the crime gang to pretend they have them captive.

In one year there were 76 victims with the gangs collecting $6 million in Victoria alone.

Often the negotiators are called in too late. Experts are not emotionally involved and know how to reach the endgame. “Our job is to keep people safe.

“The only way to get people to act in a certain way is for them to want to do it,” he says.

There are no deadlines, no shouting, no threats and no intimidation. They would rather show people the exit door than kick it in.

The Negotiation Operations Team is also called in when major companies and government departments fall victim to extortion cyberattacks.

There are the cases that don’t make the headlines. Such as gangs that stand over the elderly. Yanes says a woman was told her bank had been compromised and a courier would arrive to collect $10,000 for safekeeping.

Having made the payment she contacted police. “We were there when the courier came back a second time.”

The negotiation unit is gender equal and multicultural and that is not window dressing. Yanes says it is vital in this work to have police from varied backgrounds.

“We can’t work in an echo chamber. I need to be told if I am getting it wrong because when we make a mistake someone can die,” he says.

“It can be a lonely place to be.”

Yanes says the negotiators may come from different backgrounds, but they all must have calm natures and be prepared to park their egos. “Sometimes you need to take a step back. We can’t be part of the crisis.”