Police graduation slogan causes stir

BOISE – Idaho’s newest police officers are not being trained to inflict post-traumatic stress, the head of officer training for the state says, despite a slogan to that effect that was featured prominently in the program for the latest police academy graduation.

“Don’t suffer from PTSD, go out and cause it,” urged the slogan, which was printed above the list of 43 graduates of the Idaho Police Officer Standards and Training Academy’s latest basic academy.

“That’s not something we encourage or condone,” said Jeff Black, executive director of the POST Academy. “It shouldn’t have been in there – it was inappropriate.”

Black said Ada County Sheriff Gary Raney pointed out the slogan to him three minutes before the graduation ceremony was to begin Dec. 14. “We both cringed,” he said.

Each POST class is allowed to vote on a slogan, Black said, and the latest class, which included officers bound for 19 police agencies around the state, selected the quote from retired Army Lt. Col. David Grossman. Grossman writes and teaches about mental survival for officers, and his work is particularly popular in military circles.

“Our class president was ex-military,” Black said. “It slipped in.”

In the future, class slogans won’t be printed in graduation programs without first being reviewed by POST officials, Black said.

He noted that the 43 class members also voted on their graduation speaker, and they selected Nampa Deputy Police Chief Leroy Forsman, who gave a well-received speech on community involvement and treating people with dignity and respect. Black said that’s the message new officers are getting in their training – not to go cause traumatic stress.

“One of the things we really strive to do is community relations,” he said.

Black said he heard no complaints after the ceremony and even received several complimentary e-mails from new officers’ parents thanking POST for holding the ceremony. But a photo of the portion of the program bearing the slogan was e-mailed anonymously to news media outlets throughout the state.

Last week, the photo generated lively discussion on The Spokesman-Review’s Huckleberries Online blog, where comments were divided between those highly critical and those who thought the photo must have been a hoax. Black, who was back in his office Monday after traveling last week, confirmed the slogan really appeared. “We were mortified that it was in there,” he said.