The free training, which is valued at $55,000 a year, will be offered "for the remainder of Mayor Frey's term," according to a news release posted on the website for Law Officer, the law enforcement training organization. The president of the Minneapolis police union announced that a partnership with a law enforcement training organization will offer free "warrior-style" training for police officers. The announcement comes just a week after Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey banned the popular "warrior-style" training style, which he first said in his State of the City address. The free training, which is valued at $55,000 a year, will be offered "for the remainder of Mayor Frey's term," according to a news release posted on the website for Law Officer, the law enforcement training organization. Mayor Frey told KARE 11 Wednesday evening, "if officers who take any training that conflicts with MPD authorized and sanctioned training they will get disciplined" and "any use of force training needs approval." The president of the Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis, Lt. Bob Kroll, thanked Law Officer for defying Frey's banning of the training. "Law Officer brings our officers state of the art warrior training that we are proud to embrace and while it seems that the lives of our officers are not important to politicians, they certainly are by Law Officer and we are grateful for this partnership," Kroll said in a news release. Kent Erdahl: "What happens if one set of training teaches you principles that are in direct conflict with another set of training?" Lt. Bob Kroll: "We'd have to look at what specific parts of the curriculum is in violation. I'd be happy to sit through the first training block with the Mayor and have him tell me directly, what he perceives as wrong with this training.” MPD Public Information Officer, John Elder says the new training policy remains in place, meaning officers can be disciplined if they undergo training that conflicts with MPD standards. So far, he says no officer has taken the free “Law Officer” training, and it is now being reviewed to see whether it complies.<doc-sep>Image 1 of 2 ▼ The head of the Minneapolis Police union is defying a recent ban implemented by the Minneapolis mayor to get rid of "warrior" training used for officers. The warrior training has come under fire from critics who say it actually teaches officers to perceive everyone as a threat. Earlier this month, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey announced during his State of the City address he will no longer allow the training under his leadership. Minneapolis became the first department nationwide to eliminate this type of training. “This is not the kind of training that people in Minnesota want to fund—it’s not the kind of training that people in Minnesota want our officers to engage in," said Michelle Gross of Communities Against Police Brutality. Travis Yates is the director of Training for Law Officer, a program that implements a variety of training methods including officer survival, leadership and de-escalation tactics for law enforcement professionals across the country. Shortly after Frey’s announcement, he posted a training video directed at Minneapolis officers. “So I have a message for Minneapolis officers—stay encouraged, stay in the fight,” said Yates in the video. A few days after Frey’s address, organizers from Law Officer reached out to Minneapolis Police Federation President Bob Kroll to offer their services free of charge as long as Frey is mayor. “It’s their private phone—it’s their private time—they’re very good videos,” said Kroll. “I believe if the Mayor saw what actually occurred in these things, he would be supportive of it.” Kroll says the daily training videos can be viewed by officers through an app or on the website and must be done during off-duty hours. The mayor issued a statement to FOX 9 saying in part, "Officers found to pursue any training that conflicts with MPD’s training and has not been preapproved will be subject to discipline.” Kroll says he's not concerned about violating policy. "If he wants to pay our officers 24/7 to abide by everything we are certainly amenable to that,” said Kroll. The Minneapolis Police spokesman John Elder released the following statement: Advertisement “The new training policy was enacted to ensure that officers only receive training on use of force and deescalation that is consistent with the carefully developed training provided by the Minneapolis Police Department. The policy just requires pre-approval for external trainings on these topics to make sure there is not a conflict. The MPD encourages and supports training for its staff that encompasses officer and community safety based on procedurally just methodology.”<doc-sep>This image was removed due to legal reasons. Last week, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey made an unprecedented announcement of a ban on “fear-based” training for police officers. You’ll be shocked to hear that the local police union is now fighting back. Advertisement The Star Tribune reported on Thursday that the Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis will now offer free “warrior” trainings to employees on the force. The announcement was posted to the website Law Officer, which revealed the site’s intention to provide the online training—which is valued at $55,000 a year, per the Tribune—to any officer who wishes to defy the mayor’s ban. Frey first revealed the ban in his State of the City address last week, saying his first in the nation ban will bar officers from attending off- duty “fear-based” trainings because they “violate the values at the very heart of community policing.” The idea behind it is to shift police officers’ mindsets to a guardian mentality that focuses on de-escalation, with violence reserved as a last resort. In a statement to the Tribune, Frey held the line, reiterating his intention to institute the ban and implement a system that requires officers to report any training seminars or sessions they attend to the department. “We have adopted this new policy because proper training on use of force and de-escalation is of paramount importance,” the mayor said . “Officers found to pursue any training that conflicts with MPD’s training and has not been pre- approved will be subject to discipline.” After the address, Minneapolis P olice C hief Medaria Arradondo said the department doesn’t allow fear-based or so-called “warrior” trainings internally, but that even off-duty trainings become “muscle memory” for officers on the job. “You can’t just flip that switch on,” Arradondo told MinnPost. “A lot of that training becomes muscle memory, and to say that officers are engaging in fear-based training on the weekends, but they can just simply switch it off when they come to work on Monday and put on the uniform, that is false.” Advertisement The popularity of the training seminars and the ongoing cases of excessive use of force by Minneapolis police are what spurred the ban from the mayor in the first place. Jeronimo Yanez, the St. Anthony police officer who was acquitted after shooting and killing Philando Castile during a routine traffic stop in 2016 , infamously attended a two-day training course called “The Bulletproof Warrior.” That’s in addition to the case of Minneapolis officer Mohamed Noor, who is currently on trial for shooting and killing Justine Ruszczyk Damond in June 2017 after she called 911 to report a sexual assault in the alley outside her home. It’s also worth mentioning that for all the claims the Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis make about the dire need for officers to take protecting their lives into their hands, just two officers have been killed while on duty since 2000, one of whom was killed by a drunk driver; in that same time, Minneapolis police have shot and ki lled at least 29 people.<doc-sep>"Fear-based" seminars are now prohibited for cops both on- and off-duty. The Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) is officially banning "extracurricular" training programs reportedly aimed at bringing out a cop's inner warrior. The decision comes from the very top, with Mayor Jacob Frey announcing on Thursday that the city's officers are now prohibited from attending such "fear-based training": Frey says MPD "will become the 1st major department that we know of" to take this stance on external training programs. What's more, any officers who want to attend any external training that focuses on "use-of-force" will have to get permission from Chief Medaria Arradondo himself, Frey says. So, what exactly are these programs, and what do they teach? One example Frey gives in his tweets is "Killology" — the name of a self-described research group interested in "the scholarly study of the destructive act," according to its website. Led by retired army Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, the group gives seminars such as "Bulletproof Warrior," which had been attended by the St. Anthony cop that shot and killed Philando Castile during a traffic stop in 2016. Grossman is the subject of a great deal of criticism for his teachings and training programs; nonetheless, he's become "a luminary to many in law enforcement" and has achieved "semi-celebrity status," according to the left-leaning news magazine Mother Jones. MPR says Mayor Frey has made it clear that seminars like Grossman's are prohibited for MPD officers not just while they're on duty, "which is already the case," but also while they're off duty. This last point is generating some backlash, with Minneapolis police union leader Bob Kroll telling KARE 11 that it may be "illegal" for the city to ban officers from "any training during their off-duty hours." He also told the station that Frey "misrepresented the training" in his announcement, and defended it as "not truly 'fear-based' training." The decision follows a number of high-profile police-involved shootings not just across the country but also in Minneapolis, including those that led to the deaths of Justine Damond, Thurman Blevins and Jamar Clark.<doc-sep>
Mayor Jacob Frey announced a ban on "warrior-style" police training, but the union is vowing to fight the policy. MINNEAPOLIS — Minneapolis police officers are now banned from participating in "fear-based, warrior-style" training while off duty, Mayor Jacob Frey announced Thursday, a policy the police union plans to fight and argues may not be legal. During his State of the City address, Frey told the crowd that this type of training runs in "direct conflict with everything that our chief and I stand for." Just last year, Minneapolis Police pulled staff from the training at Mall of America, where activists protested the event. To the mayor's knowledge, Minneapolis has become the first major police department in the U.S to prohibit the training, which is not offered through any official channel by Minneapolis Police but had been available to officers during their non-working hours. Any outside use-of-force training must now be approved by Chief Medaria Arradondo. "Fear-based trainings," Frey said, "violate the values at the very heart of community policing." Frey specifically mentioned "Killology," led by Lt. Col. Dave Grossman and often used in tandem with another well-known trainer named Lt. Jim Glennon of Calibre Press. They have trained thousands of law enforcement officers and military members, providing courses they claim help officers identify threats and balance their use of force. The training has come under scrutiny, however, for teaching tactics some deem as overly-aggressive. In Minnesota, the training became intertwined with a particularly high-profile case: The shooting death of Philando Castile during a traffic stop three years ago. St. Anthony police officer Jeronimo Yanez, who killed Castile, had participated in "The Bulletproof Warrior" course in 2014. Lt. Bob Kroll, the president of the Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis, said Mayor Frey misrepresented the training when he announced the ban on Thursday. "I think the mayor needs to take a more in-depth look at what this training is. It's not truly 'fear-based' training," Kroll said in an interview with KARE 11. "I think it would be beneficial for him to sit in on one of these trainings. It's survival training." Kroll commended Lt. Col. Grossman's training and called it "excellent," disputing the outside descriptions such as "warrior-style" and "fear-based." He said the training has been around for a long time and he knows MPD officers who've attended, although he did not know exactly how many (KARE 11 asked an MPD spokesperson how many officers have taken the training and whether the department has paid them to go in the past, but he did not have that data). Specifics aside, Kroll said he does not believe the city has the right to ban officers from any training during their off-duty hours. And Kroll vowed to discuss the new policy during this year's contract negotiations. "For them to blanket limit it, I think it's illegal," Kroll said. "If not, it's a labor issue." Retired Minneapolis Police Sgt. Michael Quinn, who has taught law enforcement for four decades and once led the Minneapolis Police Academy, also questioned whether the mayor and police administration could ban accredited off-duty training. However, Quinn said he is no fan of the "Killology"-type training, which he said sends the wrong message to law enforcement officers by enhancing their perceptions of fear.