CAMPBELL CO., Va. – Law enforcement at the Campbell County and Bedford County sheriff’s offices recently received a real-life scenario training on-site.
10 News was able to watch them go through the de-escalation simulator and talk with law enforcement about why it’s an important addition.
“It is state of the art. It is as close to reality as we can get. That’s why both sheriffs are so progressive, and we want to make sure our men and women have the best training that’s possible,” Bedford County Sheriff Mike Miller said.
In law enforcement, what role you have to play that day is a roll of the dice.
“We have so many different hats that we have to wear that people actually judge us on. So, when we can get scenarios like this and continue to train on them, it makes us better at it, is what it does. It also helps the patient, or it helps the person we are dealing with because the outcome we hope is a successful outcome,” Miller said.
The training will help officers better respond to domestic violence, mental health crises, and much more.
“It keeps them safe; it keeps our community safe, and it gets the scenarios that we deal with mostly day to day, and that’s what we need to continue to train our officers on,” Miller said.
With the recent mass shooting, we asked the sheriff, how the de-escalation simulator gives officers another element of needed training.
“Your adrenaline is getting pumping and different things like that, and knowing how to talk to people but like I said this training is one way and our active shooter training is totally different scenarios. Different ways we approach scenes, different ways we approach talking to people, different ways we have to deal with it,” Miller said.
The simulator gives officers the tools to stay well-equipped throughout the day-to-day challenges they face.