The Frederick Police Department is excited to announce its participation in the ABLE program. A project out of Georgetown Law's Center for Innovations in Community Safety, ABLE stands for Active Bystandership for Law Enforcement, a training program designed to foster a culture in which police officers intervene as needed to prevent misconduct, avoid police mistakes and promote officer health and wellness. The training also empowers law enforcement officers to intervene in another officer's actions regardless of their rank.
FPD prides itself on empowering officers across all ranks to communicate effectively and consistently to hold each other accountable and ensure every officer in an FPD uniform consistently does the right thing.
The ABLE training program allows the department to continue to build on that priority.
"Day after day our police officers are placed in tense situations that take a toll on their emotional wellbeing. It's important to remember that cops are human just like everybody else,” Chief of Police Jason Lando said. “ABLE training is designed to help officers recognize and de-escalate tenuous situations and keep everyone safe, themselves and the community. We have an outstanding police department in Frederick and peer-intervention programs like this are just one way our command staff can ensure that we continue to do the right thing for our residents and our officers."
FPD selected two members of its command staff to first take the program and become instructors. Lt. Tracey Wiles, Patrol Division Commander, and Lt. Kevin Meyer, Training Division Commander, will serve as FPD’s instructors and are participating in the ABLE “Train the Trainer” program.
After that training, FPD will begin the process of departmental-wide implementation of ABLE training.
“I’m excited by the launch of the department’s participation in the ABLE training program,” said Lt. Wiles, who secured FPD’s acceptance into the program. “This is an excellent opportunity to continue to build on our strong organizational culture to keep our residents and our officers safe. We want the community to have the utmost confidence that our officers do the right thing and in the event one of them might make a mistake, another officer will step in to correct it.”