'DRUG BUST' A LEARNING TOOL

Students Simulate High-Risk Situations They Might Find Themselves In During
Their Careers

Local News - So, I was hanging out with my sister Annik, her boyfriend
Michel and my boyfriend Hissein the other day, when we heard an unexpected
knock at the door.

Hissein gets up to answer it, and half a dozen cops push their way into the
house. In seconds, I am flipped around, pushed face down onto the couch and
my hands are held behind my back.

I am terrified, my heart is pounding in my ears, and all I can think is
"What's going on?"

"Don't move," the officer tells me, as he wraps handcuffs around my wrists.
"You'll only make them tighter."

He hauls me up from the couch and sits me beside Annik, cross-legged on the
floor, with my hands cuffed behind me. The cuffs are tight and I can't move.

I look to Hissein, who is being frisked and held against the wall by two
other cops. He's yelling for his lawyer and they're trying to keep him quiet.

"Don't hurt him!" I yell. "We didn't do anything wrong!"

But now I'm being hauled to my feet again, and a female officer begins to
frisk me.

"What's your name? Are you armed? Do you have any drugs on you?" She
attacks me with a barrage of questions as she pads down my arms and legs,
checking for drugs.

Meanwhile, Michel is out cold on the floor, blood pouring down his face,
and the paramedics are called in to make sure he's still breathing. He
tried to run, so they zapped him with a tazer gun, and when he fell he hit
his head.

"What did you do to my boyfriend!" Annik yells. "What's going on?"

Finally, we are shown a warrant and I am informed what I am being charged
with: possession of an illegal substance.

Why then, readers might ask, am I sitting in a downtown office, writing
about the experience and not doing time in jail? Was it a dream? A
recollection of my shady past as a drug lord's girlfriend?

In fact, Friday afternoon, I took part in the annual Police Foundations
simulated drug bust in the new Police Foundations lab at College Boreal.
Annik Gravel, Hissein Hamit and Michel Carre are all second-year Police
Foundations students at the college.

The lab hosts a fully simulated house, including a bedroom, bathroom,
living room and kitchen area, complete with a kitchen table strewn with
(empty) beer bottles, and bags of cocaine (flour) stashed in the house.

There is also an observation area above the crime scene where students can
watch as the scene unfolds.

The lab was opened a few weeks ago, to enable second-year Police
Foundations students to simulate high-risk situations they might find
themselves in during their careers in law enforcement.

Gerry Hogan, professor and co-ordinator of the event, believes the lab is
important, because it is the closest students will get to real-life
high-risk crime takedowns before they become police officers.

"The purpose of the exercise is is to help the students realize, number
one, it's not a TV show, but a real-life situation," he said. "Number two
is that they'll know how difficult it is to be a police officer, to truly
understand what a police officer goes through."

Students experience a few simulations a week, and one large simulation is
organized at the end of the year, in which second-year students
participate. Police officers from the City of Greater Sudbury Police
Services, the Ontario Provincial Police, and paramedics from EMS were on
hand to offer their experience and expertise.

The simulations are videotaped from start to finish, and the students will
watch the tapes in class to analyze what they did well and what
improvements they can make. "The procedures are enormous and they have to
be done right," Hogan said. "I want to see how they react in the situation.
I want to see the control of the officer."

Hogan emphasizes the knowledge and experience of the police officers are
instrumental in helping students see what they are doing right and what
they are doing wrong in a situation.

"If not for them we wouldn't be able to do this successfully," he said.

*Lindsay Kelly is a journalism student from Cambrian College and the winner
of The Sudbury Star's journalism scholarship for 2002-2003. She is
currently on placement at The Star.