Pepper ball launchers serve as key less-lethal tool for Boise police. What to know

Boise Police have gone 18 months without an officer-involved shooting. City leaders credit a mix of training, deescalation tactics and expanded use of less-lethal tools — in particular, pepper ball launchers.

FULL STORY: Boise police haven’t fired a gun at a suspect in 18 months. Here’s what changed

Here are key takeaways:

• Boise Police have not shot a suspect since November 2024, down from six shootings in 2023 and six in 2024. Other than 2025, only two years in the past three decades — 1998 and 2014 — saw no police shootings.
• Police Chief Chris Dennison, who assumed the job in September 2024, has overseen an expansion in the use of pepper ball launchers, which fire paintball-like munitions filled with PAVA, a synthetic chemical irritant similar to pepper spray.
• The launchers, which typically have bright yellow parts to distinguish them from firearms, can be fired directly at a suspect to subdue them or into an area to keep people away. Dennison said the effects fade quickly but “it really takes the fight out of someone.”
• Pepper ball use jumped from twice in 2024 to 18 times in 2025, according to Lexi Whitmore, a data analyst in Boise’s Office of Police Accountability. Overall, the use of less-lethal weapons rose 57% last year, while instances of officers pointing guns at suspects dropped 18%.
• As of late March, Boise Police had 26 launchers and 30 officers trained to use them, BPD spokesperson Haley Williams said. The department piloted the launchers in 2024 before a broader rollout last year.
• Pepper balls have drawn legal scrutiny elsewhere for their use in crowd control. A judge in Illinois temporarily barred federal agents from using them on protesters near Chicago, and the ACLU of Oregon spearheaded a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security over their use in Portland.
• Nicole McKay, director of Boise’s Office of Police Accountability, credits training, tools and leadership — including scenario-based exercises focused on deescalation — for the shift away from gun use. But, both McKay and Dennison emphasize that luck plays a role, too: “There’s a level of luck that does play into it — but we try to stack the deck the best we can in our favor,” Dennison said.

The summary points above were compiled with the help of AI tools and edited by journalists. The full story in the link at top was reported, written and edited entirely by journalists.