HARLINGEN – Two police academies in the Valley have been suspended by Texas law enforcement officials while allegations of excess brutality during training are investigated.
The Lower Rio Grande Valley Academy in Harlingen and the Hidalgo County Sheriff’s Office Training Academy are being investigated by the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement for separate incidents.
The Lower Rio Grande academy incident involved an Instagram video which was posted showing a certified academy instructor violently slapping down several class participants. The self-defense course in which the slapping occurred was held May 17.
The second involving the Hidalgo County academy occurred in April, and involved a pellet gun reportedly being fired at jailer cadets when they made mistakes in training.
The pellet-gun wounds caused bruising and bleeding and, in one case, sent a cadet to the hospital for treatment when instructors couldn’t determine if a pellet shot at the cadet was still under the skin.
“I can tell you that we did get some information about some practices that are not quite up to what our standards are,” Gretchen Grigsby, a spokesperson for TCOLE, said late yesterday afternoon.
Both academies have been suspended from performing any training while the investigations continue, she said.
Texas has several dozen such police training academies, which offer training for current officers who must complete 40 hours of professional development every two years.
The academies also serve to provide required instructional training for candidates seeking to become law enforcement officers in Texas. It is believed both incidents under investigation were of the latter category of trainee.
The Lower Rio Grande academy is run by the Lower Rio Grande Development Council, an economic development organization, and holds classes at Texas State Technical College.
“During a defensive tactic training session, a video recording was conducted for the purposes of cadet instruction and feedback,” said Ron Garza, deputy executive director of the development council. “Video feedback had not been previously utilized by LRGVDC Police Academy and we have determined that video photography will not be used in the future.
“Although we understand the inherent risks associated with hands-on courses such as defensive tactics, our goal is to minimize those risks, making the training environment as safe as possible for cadet participants,” Garza added.
Garza said the Harlingen academy has been commended for its curriculum and training in the past, and that the council was in the process of incorporating measures to ensure “no future recurrence” of the incidents now being investigated.
But the violent self-defense incidents in the video are not the only things being investigated. Instructors allegedly told cadets to strike each other at “80 or 100 percent” full blows, and that if they didn’t, instructors would deliver the blows instead.
Also, investigators said, instructors allegedly threatened cadets that they would be Tasered if their grades in the class weren’t high enough.
In Hidalgo County, the police academy in question is run by the Hidalgo County Sheriff’s Office.
In this second incident, cadets were allegedly shot with pellet guns for making mistakes while taking shotgun orientation classes. EMT-certified cadets at the training session reportedly were unable to determine if one cadet hit by a pellet still had the pellet under his skin, so he was transported to a hospital.
Sheriff J.E. Eddie Guerra said in a statement he was informed of the “training protocol violation” on April 29.
“The training was outside the parameters of the class curriculum, and was not conducive to a safe environment,” the sheriff said.
The two instructors involved, Guerra said, were currently under an administrative review and the sheriff’s office is investigating.
“I am absolutely committed to restoring and preserving the public’s confidence and trust in the Hidalgo County Sheriff’s Office,” the sheriff said.
“We will review and evaluate all of our training protocols, to ensure high levels of proficiency and safety, while continuing law enforcement education within our training academy.”
