MIAMI, Sept. 02, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — WRAP Technologies, Inc. (“WRAP” or the “Company”), a global provider of public safety and defense technologies and training solutions, today announced the completion of a new law enforcement doctrine and training methodology designed to operationalize de-escalation using the BolaWrap® 150, an instrument of restraint and rescue that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) has classified as neither a firearm nor an “any other weapon.”
The new curriculum has been submitted for independent validation in preparation for applying for California Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) certification, an important step toward establishing a standardized methodology through which officers can be trained to apply de-escalation principles operationally, not simply verbally.
Why This Matters for Adoption and Scale
For WRAP, the significance of potentially obtaining the California POST certification extends beyond training. The company believes standardized, recognized training can reduce barriers to agency adoption by bringing technology, doctrine and training together within a repeatable operational framework.
- Reduce adoption friction. Agencies can evaluate BolaWrap 150 together with a defined doctrine and training methodology, rather than as a standalone piece of equipment requiring the agency to build an operational framework around it.
- Create a recurring training layer. Anticipated digital delivery through Wrap Tactics™ creates the potential for continuing education, refresher training and recurring digital training economics alongside device and cassette revenue.
- Expand the procurement conversation. WRAP can engage agencies around how they operationalize de-escalation when verbal techniques are insufficient, supported by technology, doctrine, training and measurement.
- Build toward institutional adoption. A standardized training framework can support broader deployment across patrol, Crisis Intervention Teams, behavioral and mental health response, supervisors and other operational users.
- Create a repeatable national model. California is intended to be an important first step toward a framework WRAP can seek to replicate across additional states, agencies and other law enforcement training environments.
If successful, WRAP believes this model could expand the number of officers trained on BolaWrap 150, support recurring digital training through Wrap Tactics™, increase adoption of devices and recurring cassettes, and provide a framework the company can seek to replicate across additional states and agencies. WRAP believes California represents an important first step toward moving BolaWrap from a standalone technology to an institutionalized law enforcement capability.
Traditional de-escalation has an inherent limitation: an officer cannot make another person de-escalate.
Officers can communicate, persuade, create time and distance, issue lawful commands and attempt to reduce the intensity of an encounter. Those techniques remain essential. But ultimately, their success depends substantially on the actions of the person the officer is confronting.
WRAP’s new doctrine is designed around a different question:
What can an officer lawfully and tactically do when verbal de-escalation is not working, but the circumstances do not yet require a traditional weapons-based response?
WRAP believes the BolaWrap 150 creates an opportunity to answer that question.
Following ATF Ruling 2026-2, BolaWrap 150 is classified under federal law as an instrument of restraint, not a firearm and not an “any other weapon.” That classification creates the foundation for WRAP’s newly developed doctrine: a methodology intended to give officers a physical means of operationalizing de-escalation through restraint at distance before an encounter progresses to conventional weapons-based force.
From Verbal De-Escalation to Operational De-Escalation
For decades, law enforcement agencies have invested heavily in crisis intervention and de-escalation training. Yet an officer’s operational choices can narrow quickly when communication fails.
We believe there remains a critical space between verbal communication and traditional weapons-based force.
WRAP’s doctrine is designed specifically for that space.
The methodology integrates communication, recognition of resistance, time, distance, positioning and remote restraint into a unified tactical framework. Instead of treating de-escalation solely as something an officer attempts to persuade another person to do, the doctrine seeks to give officers a lawful physical capability that can help create the conditions for de-escalation.
De-escalation becomes something an officer can operationalize.
The methodology does not eliminate or restrict higher-force options. If circumstances deteriorate and legally justified force becomes necessary, officers retain those capabilities. Rather, the doctrine is intended to provide an additional tactical option earlier in the encounter, before circumstances take those options away.
That principle is central to WRAP’s doctrine: earlier intervention does not necessarily mean earlier escalation, and officers must remain capable of transitioning to higher uses of force when circumstances require them.
WRAP describes this approach as the Lowest Reasonable Response™: identifying and applying an effective response appropriate to the resistance and circumstances presented, while continuously reassessing the encounter. Depending on the circumstances, that may include a non-lethal response or a transition to other lawful tools and higher-force options as the situation requires.
California POST: Turning Doctrine Into Standardized Training
WRAP has submitted the newly developed curriculum for independent validation in preparation for applying for California POST certification.
If certified, the curriculum is intended to provide California law enforcement agencies with a standardized training methodology for incorporating the BolaWrap 150 and operational de-escalation into patrol operations, crisis response and agency training.
WRAP also plans to make the curriculum digitally available through Wrap Tactics™, its learning management system, creating a pathway to distribute standardized instruction at scale.
WRAP intends to use the California POST process as an initial model for pursuing additional state training certifications and agency adoption nationally, creating a repeatable framework combining doctrine, certification, technology and digital delivery.
The objective is to move operational de-escalation from a concept into a standardized methodology that can be trained, practiced and incorporated into everyday law enforcement operations.
Crisis Intervention and Mental Health Emergencies: When Verbal Is Not Enough
WRAP believes the potential implications are particularly significant for Crisis Intervention Teams (CIT), patrol officers responding to behavioral and mental health emergencies, and other encounters where a person in crisis is unable or unwilling to respond to verbal de-escalation alone.
Mental health emergencies can expose one of the fundamental limitations of traditional de-escalation. Officers can communicate, persuade, slow an encounter down and attempt to create time and distance, but verbal techniques may not be sufficient when an individual’s mental or behavioral state prevents effective communication or voluntary compliance.
WRAP’s doctrine recognizes this limitation: traditional de-escalation relies heavily on communication, but ultimately the subject controls whether verbal de-escalation succeeds. Officers therefore need an operational capability capable of creating time, distance, restraint and tactical advantage without immediately moving to a conventional higher-force tool.
Until now, officers confronting that moment have had limited physical options that do not move the encounter toward hands-on control or traditional weapons-based force.
WRAP believes the ATF classification of BolaWrap 150 creates the potential for a new approach.
The newly developed doctrine is intended to bring together training, tactics and an instrument of restraint and rescue to address the space between verbal communication and conventional weapons-based force. The methodology is designed to provide officers with a structured framework for recognizing resistance or crisis behavior, creating time and distance, applying remote restraint when appropriate, reassessing the encounter, and transitioning to other lawful options when necessary.
This is particularly relevant to crisis intervention because a mental health emergency does not necessarily end when verbal de-escalation has been exhausted. Officers still have a responsibility to safely resolve the encounter.
WRAP believes the doctrine creates the potential for a new operational pathway in those situations: communication when communication works; an instrument of restraint and rescue when verbal communication alone is insufficient; and preservation of higher-force options when circumstances require them.
Bringing Crisis Intervention Principles to the Patrol Officer
Specialized Crisis Intervention Teams have helped advance law enforcement’s response to individuals experiencing behavioral and mental health crises. But specialized personnel cannot be present at every encounter.
The patrol officer is often the crisis intervention team until the crisis intervention team arrives.
WRAP’s doctrine is designed to bring those principles and capabilities closer to the point of first contact by giving patrol officers not only communication methodologies, but an operational capability intended to create time, distance and restraint without immediately transitioning to a traditional weapon.
If certified by California POST, the curriculum would establish a training methodology for integrating operational de-escalation into patrol and crisis-response scenarios, with WRAP intending to subsequently deliver that training digitally through Wrap Tactics.
The result is more than a new training course or technology.
It is the potential for a new doctrine, set of technologies and training methodology for resolving crisis encounters when verbal de-escalation alone is no longer enough.
A New Category of Law Enforcement Response
The distinction became possible following ATF’s classification of BolaWrap 150.
ATF Ruling 2026-2 determined that BolaWrap 150, as currently designed, is neither a firearm nor an “any other weapon,” but an instrument of restraint under federal law.
That distinction allows WRAP to build doctrine around a category that historically has been largely absent from the officer’s available equipment: a physical restraint capability between verbal communication and weapons-based force.
WRAP’s doctrine identifies this gap directly. Conventional options following verbal commands typically move toward hands-on control or tools operating through chemical, electrical or kinetic effects.
The BolaWrap 150 provides a different mechanism: remote restraint without relying on pain compliance, electrical incapacitation, chemical irritants or impact.
The company’s objective is therefore not simply to certify another law enforcement product.
It is to certify a methodology for operationalizing de-escalation.
Operationalizing De-Escalation
“For decades, law enforcement has been trained to de-escalate, but there is a fundamental limitation: an officer cannot make another person de-escalate,” said Jared Novick, President of WRAP Technologies. “Officers can communicate, persuade, create time and distance, and issue lawful commands, but ultimately the person they are confronting determines whether verbal de-escalation succeeds.”
“We believe the ATF classification of BolaWrap 150 as an instrument of restraint and rescue, not a firearm and nor a weapon, creates an opportunity to change that equation. Our new doctrine is designed to give officers a lawful, physical methodology to operationalize de-escalation before an encounter requires traditional weapons-based force. This may be particularly important in mental health and crisis intervention encounters, where an officer can do everything correctly from a communication standpoint and the person in crisis may still be unable to comply.”
“Those situations do not disappear when verbal de-escalation reaches its limit. We now have the potential to build doctrine, technology and training around what an officer can lawfully and tactically do next, while preserving the officer’s ability to transition to higher-force options if circumstances require them. We are now advancing the curriculum through independent validation in preparation for applying for California POST certification, an important step toward institutionalizing that methodology and ultimately delivering it digitally to officers at scale through Wrap Tactics.”
“The economic opportunity is not simply selling another piece of equipment,” said Jared Novick, President of WRAP Technologies. “We believe the larger opportunity is establishing an operational standard around what happens between verbal communication and traditional weapons-based force. If we can combine recognized doctrine, certified training, digital delivery and an instrument of restraint and rescue into a repeatable model, we believe we can change both how agencies adopt BolaWrap and how officers are trained to respond. California is intended to be the first step in proving that model.”
It is the right response, at the right time, for the right reason, giving officers additional tactical and legal options before circumstances remove them.
The doctrine is intended to connect policy, training and tactics so that constitutional policing becomes something officers can apply operationally, including earlier recognition of escalating behavior, proportional response, reassessment and preservation of higher-force options when they become necessary.
Through the potential California POST certification and subsequent digital delivery through Wrap Tactics, WRAP intends to move that principle from concept to standardized operational practice.
Building a National Training Framework
WRAP is developing the doctrine and curriculum with the support of the Task Force 70 Foundation, a 501(c)(3) law enforcement training organization, along with experienced law enforcement instructors and curriculum developers.
Task Force 70 has worked with WRAP to strengthen the doctrine, curriculum architecture and instructor credentialing necessary to integrate the capability into established law enforcement training rather than treating BolaWrap as a standalone device.
The longer-term objective is a repeatable model: establish the doctrine, pursue recognized training certification, digitally distribute the curriculum, and provide agencies with a standardized framework for operationalizing non-lethal response.
Doctrine. Certification. Technology. Digital delivery. Operational adoption.
Together, WRAP believes these components can move de-escalation from an aspiration officers are asked to achieve into a capability they are trained and equipped to operationalize.
About Wrap Technologies, Inc.
Wrap Technologies, Inc. (Nasdaq: WRAP) is a global public safety technology company delivering intelligent detection, orchestration and response solutions designed for the next generation of intelligent, human-centered public safety. The Company’s WrapShield™ platform unifies detection, orchestration and response into an integrated, human-supervised architecture spanning law enforcement, homeland security, defense, enterprise and critical infrastructure customers. Powered by the BolaWrap® 150, Wraptor MX™, WRAP Reality™, the WrapTactics™ learning management system and Frenel TPiCore® polarimetric sensing, WRAP builds on the principle that technology and trained human judgment must advance together. For Humans, By Humans. WRAP is headquartered in Miami, Florida. For more information visit www.wrap.com.
Forward Looking Statements
This press release contains forward looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including, but not limited to, statements regarding the Company’s adoption of a new law enforcement doctrine and training methodology, the Company’s California POST certification, the ability to digitize the Company’s training, the Company’s expectations regarding the impact and success of the Bola Wrap 150’s ATF classification, the creation new operational pathways in mental health crises, the Company’s potential to resolve crisis encounters. Statements are based on current expectations and assumptions subject to risks and uncertainties, including the pace of customer and agency adoption, the timing and outcome of federal procurement and export control processes, the availability and terms of technology partnerships, regulatory developments, competitive conditions, and the Company’s ability to attract and retain personnel. Actual results could differ materially from those expressed or implied. WRAP undertakes no obligation to update or revise any forward looking statement, and investors are cautioned not to place undue reliance on them.
Investor Relations Contact:
(800) 583-2652
ir@wrap.com
