Local Cadets Share De-Escalation Techniques
by ANN Staff
Recent events in some of America’s largest cities have police forces across the country considering their response to belligerent and angry citizens. These organization are finding that they don’t have the training to handle these situations without them descending into violence. These local forces also don’t have the budget to support this training.
One local police force has solved this problem in partnership with a local CAP squadron. Their innovative solution: Peace officers receiving de-escalation training from CAP Members.
“Let’s face it: Nobody is better at handling the angry public than a Cadet who’s done airshow parking duty,” squadron commander Capt Lance Smith says. “Sunburned drunks staggering back in the general direction of any car. Families with crying kids asking for help finding their vehicles. People wanting special treatment because their cooler is heavy and doesn’t have wheels, or their kid has three legs or whatever. It’s a jungle out there.”
“We tried to encourage good practices by monitoring their behavior with body cams,” Smith says. “We had a bunch donated by the local sheriff’s department after they won a police brutality lawsuit. But it turned out that scolding someone after they punch a bratty seven year-old isn’t that effective. And because of the contours of a Senior Member’s torso, the cams usually point at the sky. Plus the audio just records heavy breathing and, sometimes, chewing. One of the cams clouded over with what we thought was snow, or ash. But it turned out to be donut sugar collecting on the lens.”
“So, the solution was to provide De-Escalation training, coupled with hot yoga and Zen Bhuddism meditation,” Smith says. “Overall, it’s been amazingly effective. The hot yoga has really made everyone very resilient during those long afternoons in the sun, and the Bhuddist perspective has been a game-changer. The only snag has been the one Senior who set himself on fire during an especially rough day at the County Fair.”
In a classroom at the police building, a few Cadets and a Senior member discuss their experiences and strategies with a group of officers.
“I got screamed at from six-inches away by five-foot tall old lady because I parked her one space over from the one she wanted,” says Cadet Azalea Lopez. “I wanted to knock her on her ass, but instead I let her vent. Eventually she took a heart attack or something and collapsed. She was the medic’s problem at that point.”
“That’s nothing. I had someone bump me on purpose with their car because I wouldn’t move aside and let them into the VIP lot,” explains Cadet Sam McMichaels. “I’ve gotten every angry cliche in the book: A guy with a bum knee from Vietnam who spit on me; how’s that for irony? A four pack-a-day smoker who said his lungs won’t hold out long enough to walk, but who had enough air to chase me down to yell at me.”
Officer Ray Sandy, one of the half-dozen local officers attending the class, speaks up. “I’d have a choke hold on that guy in a heartbeat. Yell through that, Marlboro Man!” he says, to general laughter.
“See, that’s just what you don’t want to do,” says McMichaels. “Just focus on something that’s distracting and doesn’t matter or affect you, and go to your happy place. I usually focus on what they’re saying. It’s so unimportant to me that my mind drifts away.”
After a few hours in the classroom and a hot yoga session in the kitchen of the local Chinese buffet, the lessons move to a practical demonstration at a local event where the squadron is providing a parking detail. A local officer shadows each of the squadron members as they perform their duties.
Cadet Lopez is paired with Officer Sandy, and is earnestly passing along her hard-won experience at the entrance to one of the enormous grassy fields she’s in charge of.
“Hang on one second,” Cadet Lopez says to Officer Sandy as a car with five members of an extended family pulls up and rolls down a window.
“Yes sir?” Lopez says to the driver, a florid, heavy-set, middle-aged man who is already scowling.
“Can we park up close?” he asks. “My mom is late for her shift at the carnival.”
Lopez smiles apologetically. “The up close spots are reserved for people with hang tags, sir. But you’re welcome to drop your mother off before you park,” she says firmly.
“Thanks for nothing, kid,” the driver barks, stomping the gas and heading toward the line of Cadets gesturing him into his designated parking spot.
Cadet Lopez turns to the police officer shadowing her and says, “Did you see how I just answered his question, and he drove away?”
“Yeah. That was nicely done,” replies Officer Sandy. “Hell, I’d have pepper sprayed the entire inside of the car as soon as his window came down.”
Cadet Lopez laughs and claps Officer Sandy on the shoulder companionably. “Sometimes I’d like to do that too,” she says. “But all they give me is a reflective vest and a flashlight. And it’s not even a nice Maglight; it’s an angle head. You can’t make a point with that thing, so you learn to just let it go.”
Capt Smith says he’s been contacted by law enforment agencies across the country.
“The press is all over these guys about escalating violence, so they’re looking for anything they can do to bring it down a notch or five. I just got a call from a department out west. They asked if we could help them with downtown ‘parking duties’,” he says, making air quotes. “I can’t name the city, but it rhymes with ‘cortland boregon’.”
