A crisis actor is a trained actor, role player, volunteer, or other person engaged to portray a disaster victim during emergency drills to train first responders such as police, firefighters or EMS personnel. Crisis actors are used to create high-fidelity simulations of disasters in order to allow first responders to practice their skills and help emergency services organizations to prepare and train in realistic scenarios as part of full-scale disaster exercises.
Disaster training simulations
Actors take on the role of mock victims and simulate specific injuries from a disaster to add life-like realism to an emergency exercise. Theatrical makeup and cosmetics, plus rubber and latex appliances, are often used to simulate a variety of wounds or medical conditions that realistically portray victim's injuries, a practice known as medical moulage. Actors who portray news reporters, relatives of victims, and concerned citizens are also used during drills to train emergency operations center personnel to cope with a variety of emotionally-charged demands and requests.
In the United States, the term has been used by conspiracy theorists who claim that some mass shootings and other disasters are staged, and victims and their families are being played by crisis actors. Conspiracy theorists' use of the term is thought to have originated in 2012, when a blog post by former professor and professional conspiracy theoristJames Tracy suggested that the government could have hired an acting agency named Visionbox, which supplied crisis actors who were "trained in criminal and victim behavior, and bring intense realism to simulated mass casualty incidents in public places" to help stage the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting. Tracy also promoted a crisis actor conspiracy theory of the Boston Marathon bombing. Conspiracy theorists have claimed such attacks are "false flag operations" staged by conspirators, usually government or corporate forces, in order to achieve some goal such as justifying increased government surveillance, disarmament of the population, or military action against blamed nations or groups. Crisis actors are claimed in this context to play the part of bystanders or witnesses, emergency response personnel, and wounded victims of the attack. Advocates of the conspiracy theory include Alex Jones and outlets such as True Pundit. In April 2018, the parents of two children killed in the Sandy Hook shooting launched a lawsuit against Alex Jones for defamation "accusing him and his website InfoWars of engaging in a campaign of 'false, cruel, and dangerous assertions'".
