By Chief Joel F. Shults, Ed.D Experienced police officers may be rather puzzled by the sudden popularity of the belief that police officers lack skills when dealing with mental health emergencies. In a very real sense, that’s what police do the most. Whether a person is in a full-blown meltdown or merely a victim of Read more »
By Chief Joel F. Shults, Ed.D After the arrest of Rodney King by the LAPD in 1991, many states enacted laws requiring police officers to report their colleagues if they feel that unnecessary force was used. Some states have gone beyond that requirement and are now requiring physical intervention. I understand, but let’s think about Read more »
By Chief Joel F. Shults, Ed.D The animal in man is something that appears in his most desperate hours. It is intense, visceral, and primitive. What happens in the mind and body when death is in the air is hard to research, since the body’s functions are rarely measured during those moments. Capturing the full Read more »
By Steve Pomper While officer safety must be uppermost in mind, cops spend a lot of time reading people to pick up on clues as to what they might be thinking—or planning. Assessing a person’s danger level involves considering the totality of the circumstances. An officer is consistently receiving and processing data and stimuli at any Read more »
Watch the NPA Report Sunday at 10am ET with with Daniel Jewiss, CT State Police Detective & Instructor (Ret) and Founder of The RAK Academy, online at https://pluto.tv/en/live-tv/the-first or on the https://www.thefirsttv.com app or at https://www.youtube.com/c/NationalPoliceAssociation
By Chief Joel F. Shults, Ed.D The blood was still on the ground at Virginia Tech in 2007 when I traveled to interview as a campus police chief in Colorado. My time in charge of public safety was punctuated by the threat of campus violence. It was the same year that my daughter married a Read more »
By Chief Joel F. Shults, Ed.D We’ve seen it in dozens, if not hundreds, of news reports and bystander videos. People rushing, faces full of fear, dragging children and loved ones along with them, running for safety as flames rise or the sound of gunshots or explosions echo. Mostly they are doing the sane thing Read more »
By Lt. Randy Sutton The American Law Enforcement Officer is under siege. Did you know? More than 58,000 officers are assaulted in the line of duty each year. There are officers attacked, stabbed, shot, and beaten nearly every day on the job. Thousands suffer injuries ranging from minor to catastrophic and disabling. Add to that Read more »
By Chief Joel F. Shults, Ed.D Nearly 8,000 people die in the U.S. every day. Sometimes that last breath happens while a person is in police custody, an average of fewer than 2 per day, not counting the average of 3 persons per day fatally shot by police on average. Given the total jail and Read more »
By Steve Pomper With the intensified efforts toward gun control, it’s a good time to revisit Extreme Risk Protection Orders (ERPO), also called “red flag” laws. Protecting people from a person using a gun to commit violence is important. Some people should not have guns. However, shouldn’t we be suspicious of people who support gun control Read more »