Local Police Stop Mock Protest at Westchester Community College

There were plenty of signs comradery when representatives from all of the police department’s in the county showed up at Westchester Community College’s Valhalla campus for Wednesday’s emergency drill .

But the jovial nature of the more than 200 officers involved did not lessen the seriousness of the day’s training. No one knows when the next mass protest or casual incident will occur and it’s training sessions like these that will help prepare local police when the next big emergency happens.

During the drill, county park rangers played the role of student protesters who were getting rowdy. Officers were charged with maintaining order without the use of weapons or excessive force.

“This is an opportunity for everyone to get around the same table and discuss best practices and issues that were learned from Occupy Wall Street, for instance,” said Westchester County Executive Robert Astorino. “You have the balance the rights of people to peacefully protest versus what happens if they get out of control.”

Kieran O’Leary, a spokesman for the Westchester County Police Department, said one of the lessons learned during the Occupy Protests is the need for police to properly catalogue who they arrest during large gatherings.

“What happens is that people often don’t carry identification during protest situations, so you don’t really know who they are,” O’Leary said. “So now we have numbered handcuffs. So if you’re arresting me, you put the number on a form and the cop will take my picture and attach it to the form.”

Officers were also given refreshers on the constitutional rights of protesters and the effective use of tourniquets in situations where there are multiple injuries.

O’Leary local police agencies conduct training like this at least once a year for a variety of situations.

“There is a requirement to have an annual mutual aid drill and test the county’s mutual aid plan,” O’Leary said.