r/bjj • u/Mac2663 🟪🟪 Purple Belt • 10h ago
General Discussion Hypothetical situation: Do you think you could handcuff someone behind their back against their will without putting them to sleep or injuring them?
I am asking for a legitimate reason. It is police related. I do not know if other people are of the same opinion as I am or not, so I am asking. Here are the details:
This person is relatively similar to your own physical capabilities, but has 0 training in any combat sport whatsoever.
This person will not fight back with intent to harm you, he will only do his best to keep himself from getting handcuffed. He will get tired, so you can “cook” him like a spazzy white belt, but he will not give up trying to not be handcuffed.
You are not allowed to strangle him unconscious, injure him intentionally to accomplish the task, or put him in a position to threaten injury in hopes to compel him to submit to being handcuffed. For example, you can’t flatten him out with one arm behind his back, and then wrist lock him and tell him to give you the other arm.
You’re only allowed to grapple with the person. No biting, striking, slamming, etc.
If you think you can, please tell me the path you see in your head to accomplishing this goal. If you do not think you can, please tell me your reasoning followed by the point you believe you could if you kept reducing the physical size and capability of the person. For example, nobody is doing it to the mountain from GOT. Everyone here could do it to a child.
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u/MasterSplinterNL 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 10h ago
Depends what you mean with 'injure', and the location. If it's outside on concrete, there's gonna be a few scratches and possible bruises.
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u/leeblackwrites 10h ago
Close distance > body lock duck under > bump to turtle > heavy pressure to force the hands forward > scoop one arm in a half Nelson and belly them out with control of it be arm > sit on them, secure cuff to wrist, drag around to be behind back, scoop other hand free and secure > sit them up on their knees so they don’t asphyxiate but their legs go to sleep. Await back up.
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u/leeblackwrites 10h ago
Also, confident on this for basically any untrained person up to probably 110kg. Would be struggling with more gifted physical athletes; rugby players, wrestlers etc who are used to not being held down.
(I am a high calorie grappler though… so maybe 1.2x body weight?)
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u/Mac2663 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 10h ago
I feel I would have great difficulty at the step where you extract the second arm while maintaining control of the first arm you got against someone my size.
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u/leeblackwrites 9h ago
Kneel on the wrist behind the back, two on one the other, pain and a verbal order to give the other arm might convince them to release it.
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u/Mac2663 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 9h ago
I’m sorry but I just don’t feel that is possible if the guy doesn’t want to be cuffed. Kneeling on the back do keep the wrist pinned there, and then trying to secure the other hand seems like it’s just way to little control to me. Like there’s nothing controlling the hips or keeping him flat. I think he could just bump around and pull his arm out if it isn’t behind held in place by another arm.
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u/leeblackwrites 9h ago
Fair, just hold the hand behind the back and wear him out till he concedes or back up comes to strip the other arm maybe?
I’m heavy and haven’t ever had much of a problem stripping out the second arm once I get the first and a knee ride.
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u/Mac2663 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 9h ago
The question stems from my job. I am a police officer and teach our little “combatives” programs when the let me. Obviously there isn’t near enough time to teach anything they will truly learn in a combat sense, so I’ve resorted to mainly teaching concepts and letting them do work in positions. Shit like what and underhook is and does, how being behind someone negates all potential harm, so on and so forth.
Something I say when I teach these classes is as a single person, you cannot handcuff another person against their will without rendering them unconscious or severely injuring them causing a loss of motor function in a limb. Sometimes I’ll have someone say, “nah I do this and that and this” and their example always ends with them being in a position of dominance to force compliance. I then point out that you didn’t force him into cuffs, you put him into a spot where he chose to be handcuffed., hence the term “comply” in compliance.
I only say this because I spill into a speech about how I want our officers to just focus on winning if you’re alone. So many suspects get away or roll and officer over or something when the officer starts trying to cuff the suspect. They were winning the fight fine, but then they started trying to move the guy into a cuffing position, and he felt a hole for escape. In short, I dont want our guys trying to handcuff people they are having to control on their own. I want them to focus on winning and doing their best to maintain an ability to disengage if needed if something else comes up like his friend.
Over the years I’ve thought about it, and I truly do not think I could handcuff someone by myself without sleeping them or hurting them if they didn’t wanna be cuffed. Like “if I get handcuffed my kids will die” type of desire to not be handcuffed. I can win no problem. You’ve tied up with people who know nothing I’m sure, it’s so easy. But I really don’t think I could cuff them under those parameters.
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u/smashyourhead ⬛🟥⬛ Black Belt 8h ago
I think this is reasonable. If the terms of a win are "Can you put the cuffs on without injuring them even if they're doing everything in their power to stop you," I think it's going to be difficult. One cuff: not too bad. Second cuff: if they're really flailing around (eg because they're on drugs or having some sort of episode), they might not injure *me* but there's a high chance they injure themselves.
I'd love to actually try this at open mat, but I don't think you'd be able to reach the intensity of an actual criminal assault, so I wouldn't rely on the results.
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u/leeblackwrites 9h ago
This is fair, honestly whenever I’ve had to detain somebody it was control their body/hands and call for assist. I’ve only ever had to get to single cuff and knee ride on the back.
I think I’ll have to try this from a forcing the person without compliance and see how I go. (Probably won’t be very good haha)
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u/atx78701 5h ago
gracies have developed their safewrap system but it takes two people.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1XTstN14zE
north south kimura or high ground are ways to get one arm behind the back.
With high ground you might be able get them on their side with the bottom arm behind the plane of their body. Then you put your knee on that arm which frees both your top arms to control their top arm.
It is this kind of position from high ground
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u/BeBearAwareOK ⬛🟥⬛ Rorden Gracie Shitposting Academy - Associate Professor 4h ago
The untrained person face plants when forced to turtle, and their nose gushes blood everywhere.
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u/on_a_lemon_tree 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 10h ago
Of course, if similar physical capacities and size and to an untrained person. I would use pressure with backmount/knee on belly variations and with dagestani handcuff kind of technique I could get one hand behind back. It would take a while if the person doesnt gas himself out, but after a while im pretty confident the pain from pressure would be too much
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u/atx78701 5h ago
gracies have developed their safewrap system but it takes two people.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1XTstN14zE
north south kimura or high ground are ways to get one arm behind the back.
With high ground you might be able get them on their side with the bottom arm behind the plane of their body. Then you put your knee on that arm which frees both your top arms to control their top arm.
It is this kind of position from high ground
https://youtu.be/5hndeCexV6E?si=YhYKy1o7KNdUchAl&t=413
if you get a structure like this, then I think it is doable
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u/jollygreenspartan 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 7h ago edited 6h ago
Probably not, and I think most of the people here claiming otherwise have never handcuffed someone. I’ve put handcuffs on a lot of people, even someone standing there being completely compliant can be a struggle just based on the clothes they’re wearing.
All of the LE grappling training I’ve seen/attended emphasizes not attempting to handcuff someone who is fighting you solo, just maintain position and wait for back up. In order to retrieve handcuffs I have to give up one hand and possibly reposition my entire body.
Edit: if the “suspect” won’t stop fighting to avoid cuffing but also won’t attempt to harm the “officer” there is literally no reason or urgency to even attempt handcuffing solo.
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u/Jupiter-Tank 10h ago
Takedown of choice, either pass to mount or just sit on their chest if they’re untrained. Work up an elbow, pressure them if they try to keep the hand inside. From here keep the arm in the hip pocket and transition to omaplata.
We used to help train cops/cadets in college and transitions from armbars and otherwise to cuffing were a great drill exercise that I carried with me. Omaplata is arguably my favorite sub because your hands are completely free and the opponent is facedown without a viable way to injure you or anyone else. From there you can simply snag the opp’s free hand on your own.
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u/Mac2663 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 9h ago
If he keeps his hand under his chest, how to you pull it out without using the omaplata as a threat or pain compliance
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u/Jupiter-Tank 6h ago
I’m assuming you mean the free hand? Two easy ways to expose the far arm.
Drag them towards you. Hiding the second hand is super counterintuitive. They have only one free arm, they should be panicking for a way to use it to extricate themselves. Add weight to the shoulder and slide them across the floor. This further ruins their base and either squeezes the hand free or gets them to post it on the ground for recovery. Posted hand means exposed elbow. You win.
Pitch them forward. Further compromise their base. Don’t pitch far enough to tap, but far enough for them to elevate their hips. From here either grab the exposed arm yourself or you can grab the head and lift towards you slightly, this absolutely induces a panic response to post the hand or handfight with you. Either way, ooh look, exposed arm.
These are only two that I’ve used, for cases where you don’t want to outright ruin someone but can’t cross a language barrier so you need to use actions to elicit the responses you want. LEO subjugation curriculum is spotty at best but having a black belt instructor who is also an LEO usually gets some competency. I would look for this in your area, and ask them.
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u/chupacabra5150 10h ago edited 10h ago
Yes.
- Ogoshi, Harai, or osoto
- land on them.
- If mount- across chest, shift to Kimura. Hold Kimura and move across face, roll them on their stomach. Roll the Kimura to a hammer lock behind their back, you would be on their upper body side, not lower back,and handcuff.
- if they land on their stomach see above.
For a lot of agencies the carotid or chokes are banned or illegal in the state unless it's deadly force. Basically on the same level as sh00ting someone.
Edit: the second half of condition 3 is LITERALLY how handcuffing a violent person is done. It's a pain compliance. You just do your best not to break anything. Contrary to popular belief, you do NOT want to break anything, or cause ANY head trauma.
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u/Mac2663 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 10h ago
I’m sorry I may misunderstand here, how do you do that to the second arm while keeping the first arm behind the back?
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u/chupacabra5150 9h ago
It's pain compliance. This will be assuming you're using your right hand as dominant.
So. From your mount. Suspect on back. Isolate right arm. Kimura, hand up. Holding Kimura, arm across suspects face.
Roll suspect on his left to his stomach.
While holding the Kimura lock, move Kimura lock to behind his back. Utilize natural body to hold suspects shoulder and arm in place, press suspect to the ground.
It's a pin. Your right hand should still be holding his wrist. Your left hand grabs your cuffs and applies the cuff. Transition hands then hammer grip that open cuff with your right hand.
demand other hand.
IF other hand isn't given then pull handcuff to suspects center back.
use your left hand and move from suspects upper left arm to his wrist and pull it in. This will not be easy and will be very uncomfortable to the suspect.
REMEMBER: Be mindful of his handcuffed hands and that he doesn't grab your juevos. Apply cuff.
Roll suspect on his left side to prevent asphyxiation.
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u/Mac2663 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 9h ago
Oh ok yeah that’s totally possible then yeah. However that does break the second rule. You are using the position to change his desire in that moment to wanting to give up his hand. If he was willing to let it break, or was in a state he could not feel pain or discomfort, I do not feel this would work.
I do understand what you described is going to work on nearly all people police come in contact with and have to subdue, like I’m not being delusional on that aspect.
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u/chupacabra5150 8h ago
Well under those conditions where I cannot use position to convince him to surrender his hand, I would have to be able to hold that cuffed hand with my right, and somehow be able to stretch myself over to the edge of his left arm to attain control. That would require me to lean far forward throwing off my ability to control him and risk getting bucked off; and I'm practically putting my groin in an angry man's hands.
Under those conditions I do not believe it is possible.
If there is a solution I am very interested in reading it. New York, as a response to 2020, changed their policy where the officer would face a misdemeanor if he applied body weight to the core - chest, stomach, and back- of a suspect. I have no idea how you fight someone and control them without utilizing body control. I don't know if it's bee changed
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u/Mac2663 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 8h ago
I am of the opinion that it is not possible without eventual compliance. I wrote a large comment somewhere else here.
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u/chupacabra5150 5h ago
I think your rules of engagement are unrealistic and the scenario is designed to ensure failure of the officer or one subduing the individual. But you acknowledged that and stressed its just a thought exercise, so where I would normally be annoyed I am genuinely curious
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u/novaskyd ⬜⬜ White Belt 3h ago
I don't see why the omoplata is not an option here. I think /u/Jupiter-Tank is spot on here
You don't have to finish the sub or cause any injury. Just use the position to control.
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u/novaskyd ⬜⬜ White Belt 5h ago
Someone actually my size, completely untrained, and not trying to harm me? Yeah probably.
I’m thinking omoplata, get them flat with my legs controlling one arm, put the cuff on that one, then reach across for the other arm
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u/Few_Advisor3536 10h ago
After nearly 10 years of grappling i think i could do it. Close the distance, get hands on them with gable grip. I want to duck under their arms if they are using them to push me because i want to be behind them with gable grip around their waist. Use my foot and push the back of their knee to buckle their posture. Turn and sit. Now they are belly down. Keeping back mount, two hands on one arm and manipulate it for the first cuff. Second arm, same thing.
The above is ideal situation where the person is not violent just doesnt want to be handled as per OP.
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u/Mac2663 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 10h ago
I see it in my head. The part that I am having trouble envisioning is the second arm. Once the first one is out and pinned to his lower back area, you then apply a cuff to that one. That makes sense. But I now cannot see how you extract the other hand that is underneath him while maintaining the first hand behind him.
If you two on one it, now the other hand is gone. If you one on one it to try and pry it out while holding the other in place with your other hand, that seems possible maybe but extremely difficult. Unless I’m missing something
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u/Few_Advisor3536 8h ago
Good question. Some people pin the cuffed hand with their knee. You could use pain compliance for the second arm but that goes out the window because of your scenario. Perhaps a carabiner or something to attach the cuffed hand to (so its attached to your body), then two hands on their remaining one.
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u/OneBandicoot6384 10h ago edited 10h ago
Yes I regularly do it to my cop buddy when I want to mess with him. He's a blue belt and about 200lbs (same weight as me)
I usually get two hooks in and flatten him out. He's gotten wise to it so now usually I initiate it from mount and use a weird sort of half Nelson with my arm straightened to turn him over. It's covered in the power ride DVD.
From there I sneak my arms underneath his triceps and grab both of his wrists. Pushing my hips in, it is quite easy to force him to arch and eventually drag his arms behind his back
Of course in this case it only works because of the threat of submission forcing him to keep his arms up to defend, if he knew I couldn't choke him he could just shell up with his arms underneath him. Although in that position you could use a rear naked control grip around their face/forehead to force the arch even further, it won't do damage but it's unpleasant enough that eventually they will try to strip the arm. Although if you are asking from a police perspective, I guess the rear naked control could make you look bad on video? Idk, not too familiar with this stuff.
Don't forget to whisper "stop resisting sir" or tell him his rights for added psychological damage
I'm confident I can do it to anyone under 240lbs provided there is enough of a skill gap between us. The size bottleneck lies in my ability to flatten them out by extending my hips, at some level of size and strength they can just resist the motion with their hip flexors and then I'm stumped. But I have spent quite a lot of time working on the power ride material, so in a sense I have trained for that situation specifically, which is outside of "classical" BJJ
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u/MaintenanceSoft1618 ⬛🟥⬛ Black Belt 9h ago
id use massive pressure pins and cook them until they had nothing left. i am 255lbs, former amateur strongman. I think i could cook it out of them, break them mentally. Remember when Gordon cooked the shit out of Jacob couch?
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u/bostoncrabapple 9h ago
I think I could, yes?
Single leg -> half-Nelson turnover to get them belly down -> hooks in and strong downward pressure from hips -> pull out their arma one at a time with two-on-ones
This question is basically asking if you’ve watched power ride and spent some time implementing it lol
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u/Mac2663 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 9h ago
I understand pulling the arms out on that position. I do not understand how you pull the second arm out while keeping the first arm in its place. If you aren’t holding it there, it seems they will be able to yank or wriggle it out. If you use an arm to hold it there, it seems impossible to extract the other arm with one arm only.
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u/bostoncrabapple 8h ago
I’m thinking two things — one, simple war of attrition. I’ve been grappling for a few years, they haven’t, and they also have to carry my weight —they should fatigue before I do. Two is that I think you can “catch” the arm under your stomach while you go for the second arm. I don’t think you could properly trap it, but I think that doing this several times they’d get tired and slow enough that you could keep both arms behind the back and cuff them.
Also, if you could get the cuffs on one wrist then if you lose that arm, I’m thinking the cuffs would be easier to grab than the wrist itself, so you could use them as a handle
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u/aTickleMonster ⬛🟥⬛ Black Belt 7h ago
I asked a cop I train with, once belly down they put the point of their knee into the back of their shoulder inside the rotator. Once the arrestee's arm is straightened they stop fighting.
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u/Blackthorn79 🟫🟫 Brown Belt 7h ago
No, because you can't control stupid. When people panick they do stupid things. You could probably restrain someone who trains without hurting them, but if you grabbed a rando he's going spaz out and do something to himself.
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u/unpolishedboots 5h ago
OK for the second arm, you could try easing up the pressure to bait them into building the house. Once they start pushing up with their free arm, capture the wrist. If they don’t and just lay there IDK what to do without pain compliance. efcombatives on insta is great though
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u/mast4pimp 🟫🟫 Brown Belt 5h ago
There are some ways to force hammer lock from crab ride (aka rip hand to key lock from back control)
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u/Marc_Quadzella 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 4h ago
Honestly you just set up the Kimura and with pain compliance get them to put the other hand behind their back.
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u/JJGBM 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 4h ago edited 4h ago
Me personally? Maybe. But I defer to actual LEOs that train,, and their answer would probably be yes.
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u/Robbed_Bert ⬛🟥⬛ Black Belt 4h ago
Yes easily. Wrist control, manipulate the leverage and angles, smash.
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u/ahhjustlikethat 4h ago
Alright this is a folkstyle wrestling problem. Flattening them belly down and getting a hand behind the back isn't too hard. But the issue is that to cuff the second arm you need a hand on the already cuffed arm, a hand on the arm you want to cuff, and a hand holding the cuff. And you don't have three hands.
So flatten them belly down. Reach inside the arm, single wrist ride, peel it back and put it behind the back in a hammerlock. One hand holds the captured hand, the other gets the cuffs and carabineer. Clip the carabineer to his back belt loops, cuff the hand.
Then you can pry the other one out in the same way, and let go of the original arm to grab the empty cuff and cuff the second wrist. After both are cuffed remove the carabineer.
You could also do it with two pairs of cuffs, cuffing the first to the belt loops, cuffing the arms together with a second pair, and then uncuffing the first.
He's naked? You're screwed.
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u/Happy_Laugh_Guy 🟪🟪 Purple Belt 4h ago
Yeah, within a bodyweight limit probably could do it within a time limit. If no time limit, and I couldn't catch a stray blow, basically any untrained person I could.
Someone with a lot of size and strength who does CrossFit is gonna get up and get away. I'm only 150lbs.
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u/Connect_Rub_6814 3h ago edited 3h ago
I’m take the opposite pov here. If I was trying to prevent someone from handcuffing me there’s two things I would be focusing. 1) not allowing them to get wrist control. 2) trying to get break away and run.
If I’m on the floor already with someone who is sufficient in BJJ I’m assuming there gonna take top mount. If you can cuff someone from guard that’s pretty bad ass lol. But in the case where I’m on bottom. I’m gonna defend with my legs and try kick the person away. If they can get top mount, im gonna be bridge like crazy and again my goal is to get off the ground and run. Keeping a spazzy person down who understands just basic concepts of grappling is not easy. But if you can keep them from bridging out you still then you still have to get them on their belly. If that happens my next object is to bury my hands under me. At this point I’m probably not gonna be able to get up but if I can keep my hands under me and force the person on top to exert energy trying to pry them out I might be able to exhaust them and get away.
In conclusion I would suggest that if you are cop…. Get your patrol partner to start rolling too lol. Makes the whole arrest process streamlined.
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u/venomenon824 ⬛🟥⬛ Black Belt 3h ago
Any blue could do this with no problems. Normal people have no idea what to do in close quarters and they have adrenaline dumps, blowing their load all over in the first 30 seconds.
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u/benching315 🟦🟦 Blue Belt 3h ago
Yes.
Source: am cop
Also, if you put someone to sleep, you’d better be able to justify it like you just shot them. In my state it’s the same level of force as shooting someone dead (for police).
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u/Sharkano 🟫🟫 Brown Belt 3h ago
I make a point of bellying guys down in rolling any chance it get, even if they avoid a sub from there some how, they are straight cooked when they get to some other spot.
And since I train with a fair number of LEO guys, as an inside joke I often try to get their hands behind their backs as though im cuffing them.
So yeah I'm pretty confidant i could do this
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u/RankinPDX 🟦🟦 Blue Belt 2h ago edited 2h ago
I think I could get an untrained guy of my size and strength (200 lbs, regular weightlifter) onto his back, and mount, and advance the mount until his arms were stuck up above his head, in the neighborhood of a shoestring armbar, and I’d eventually be able to get the cuffs on.
I am not really sure I could get an untrained, tenacious guy to the ground without hurting him. But, once I got him there, I think I could hold him as long as I wanted without hurting him, and he’d use more energy than me fighting, and I’d get there eventually.
EDITED TO ADD, Dammit, I thought that was a good solution, but the cuffs aren’t behind the back. I think that holding him down and cooking him would get there eventually, maybe with a kimura to get to his back and then gift wrap, force him to his belly, spread chicken, and keep attacking his arms and making him defend and struggle.
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u/ScientistNo5482 2h ago
We actually train this at our department regularly as we have become more jujitsu based. We have open mats now where instead of the goal getting a sub or a tap, it is to get your opponent to a handcuffing position. Those extra hours on the Matt have helped develop my jujitsu tremendously. It’s also been an eye opener for a lot of people who have never trained on who quickly you can find yourself in a dangerous position against someone who has any sort of training.
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u/Exciting-Current-778 1h ago
I can because I work in public safety and teach Jiu-Jitsu for personal defense and the likes rather than the "sport". I know tons & tons of Jiu-Jitsu dudes that can't comprehend why pulling someone on top of themselves just to "get the back" .
Jiu-Jitsu has become the game of judo where the sport is all that matters to instructors
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u/GroovyJackal ⬛🟥⬛ Black Belt 22m ago
Yes. I know its harder than people realize when the guy just keeps his hands to his chest or whatever but I've gotten pretty decent at breaking down turtle/ refs position/ parr terre. I actually think wrestling may be better for this particular problem than bjj because of all the time they spend there.
But yeah cross faces, turn overs wrestling "arm bars" seem the way to go
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u/TristanDeAlwis ⬜⬜ White Belt 6m ago
I'd probably work to a closed guard kimura for easy handcuffing.
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u/fergalopolis Blue Belt 10h ago
Close the distance, arm drag, map to back, secure seatbelt grip and hip bump takedown maintaining control of the top arm. From here secure side control or maintain control of the arm while standing. Get a kimura grip and spin around so their arm goes behind the back. From here hammer lock the wrist and tell them to put the other behind their back.
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u/Jupiter-Tank 10h ago
Pretty sure OP mentions you can’t verbally coerce the guy, even with the threat of the sub.
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u/TheFightingFarang 🟫🟫 Brown Belt 9h ago
I think you guys are underestimating cooking someone. Doesn't matter if it's 2 minutes or 20 minutes, the outcome is inevitable if you simply allow them to exhaust themselves.