After a minute or two spent aiming and adjusting the rifle, West fired at the target, a photo of a man aiming a gun.

The shot, from 240 yards away, sounded like a firecracker.

At that, five fellow members of the West Memphis Police Department SWAT team poured out of a van and ran into a makeshift house next to the target, weapons at the ready.

Wearing vests, helmets and goggles, they moved into the building, clearing it room by room, firing live rounds at stationary targets.

Three minutes later, it was over, and Shelby County Sheriff's Department Sgt. Kenny Roberson was there to tell them what they'd done wrong.

"They were kind of confused in the hallways," he said, adding that another failed to drop his jammed gun and immediately reach for his pistol, a potentially fatal mistake. "It's a learning process."

This week, 96 officers from SWAT teams around the Mid-South converged on Memphis for the sixth annual Southeast Regional SWAT Team Competition.

The Shelby County Sheriff's Department hosted the event at its training center near Shelby Farms.

The teams are from local departments like Collierville and Olive Branch as well as farther away like Zion, Ill.

During the week, the SWAT teams will perform a number of exercises, from rappelling to shooting to hostage rescues.

The point of the exercises is to better train these police forces, many of which don't have a dedicated SWAT team but instead call together regular officers in times of emergency.

"We want to provide a realistic approach to training," said Jason Pagenkopf of the sheriff's department SWAT team.

In addition to the sniper exercise Tuesday, the teams assaulted a make-believe crystal meth lab (complete with booby traps) and practiced a "transitional assault" at the Shelby Farms public gun range.

After Tuesday's exercise, West studied the target, convinced he'd hit it dead center, just underneath the left eye.

The instructors, however, said West's bullet hit the top of the target about six inches above the "kill zone." Of the seven snipers who fired at the target Tuesday morning, none had hit that zone.

Regardless, West was appreciative of the opportunity.

"It's training," West said. "When you're not a dedicated unit, you take advantage of every opportunity for training you can get."

Still, training can be a little monotonous, so the point was also to have a little fun. And, when no one's life is on the line and you're using real bullets, it's hard not to have a little fun.

"It's enjoyable," said West Memphis officer Erik Sammis, just after taking part in the live-fire exercise. "We had a paintball competition with some other teams."

- Jody Callahan: 529-6531