Blog

Dealing with the Unimaginable

January 18, 2016  |  Training
On November 5th, Colleen Chamberlain of MHRS partnered with Clermont County to conduct a training entitled "Dealing with the Unimaginable." The event included Sergeant Garcia who was part of the team responsible for the peer support offered to first responders of the Sandy Hook Tragedy.

The intention of this event was to identify the extraordinarily trauma that offices face. We don't need to simply identify these traumas, but we need to realize the impact them have and discuss and develop means of dealing with this stress and a peer support network.

We had 130 registrants from Warren, Clinton and Clermont counties alone as well as participants from other police and sheriff's departments across Ohio. Participants included law enforcement, first responders and those involved in the criminal justice systems.

We were fortunate to hear from two speakers who are all too familiar with situations that many would deem unimaginable. One of these speaks, Jim Rudnick is a 26 year veteran of the Montgomery County Police Department in Maryland. Moving through the ranks from dispatch to officer, and is now a sergeant.  In addition to nearly 10 years as a conflict negotiator, he has a master's degree from Johns Hopkins University. At this event, he covered two suicide by cop scenarios as well as the Discovery Channel hostage take over. Sergeant Rudnick shared the stage with an equally qualified peer in Sergeant Garcia of Connecticut.

In addition to his more than 20 years of police experience, Sergeant Garcia is the coordinator of the Critical Incident Stress Management Team. He and his team were responsible for the peer support offered to first responders of the Sandy Hook Tragedy.
 
Though no follow up events are currently scheduled, the Crisis Intervention team training will be held in the spring. Another advanced CIT class like this one will be held later in 2016. For more information about this event or the topics covered, please contact Colleen Chamberlain at CChamberlain@mhrswcc.org.