Specialized training provides law enforcement tools to interact with people with disabilities

by Jodi Hausen

When 73-year-old Karen Garner was arrested for shoplifting last year in Loveland, police officers threw her to the ground and handcuffed her, dislocating her shoulder and breaking a bone in her arm. Garner, who in a bodycam video repeatedly told police she had planned to pay for the items she’d taken, has dementia and an impaired ability to communicate and comprehend language. The city of Loveland settled a federal lawsuit on September 8, agreeing to pay Garner $3 million.

This sort of scenario happens all too often to people like Garner with invisible or non-apparent disabilities such as deafness or autism. But with better law enforcement training, it could happen less often.

Ali Thompson, a former detective with the Boulder County Sheriff’s Office and current state investigator, created a curriculum that uses actual bodycam video to better prepare officers to respond to situations involving people like Garner with disabilities. Thompson has two children with special needs—one is essentially nonverbal—so she has firsthand experience with both law enforcement and disability. She recently founded Pulse Line Collaborative Training to share the lessons she’s learned over the years.

“The cops don’t understand the disability world and people with disabilities don’t understand cops,” she says. If there is no imminent threat to safety, officers should remain hands-off. If the person they are trying to interact with doesn’t comply, [the police] need to figure out why.

“We have to teach [officers] to communicate better with people who communicate differently than they do or whose brains work differently than theirs,” she adds. “As cops, we need to understand that if they run, it’s because they think we’re going to kill them. I respect that they are scared of us but it breaks my heart because all the cops I know went into [law enforcement] because they want to help people.”

And though this sort of training isn’t new—several Colorado law enforcement agencies, including the Boulder County Sheriff’s Department, have been addressing the issue for years—it will be mandatory for all law enforcement officers starting in July 2022. Introduced by State Representative Meg Froelich (D-Greenwood Village), the new law passed in the last legislative session with moderate bipartisan support with all Democratic and half of all Republican senators voting for it. It creates a 12-person commission composed of representatives from the disability community, law enforcement, and the state attorney general’s office who will be tasked with examining current training protocols and recommending standards for future curricula.

Froelich says law enforcement supported the bill though it was generated by advocates for people with autism, Alzheimer’s, and those who are deaf or hard of hearing. The bill intentionally omitted legislators from the commission, she adds.

“We really wanted to give the disability community a seat at the table,” she says. “To give them a voice.”

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