The nation’s largest police department is training its 35,000 uniformed officers on responding to protests to prepare for the possibility of widespread unrest after the U.S. presidential election and the vote on the nomination of a new Supreme Court justice. New York Police Department officials said they began training officers in July, following weeks of mostly peaceful demonstrations around the country, including New York City. The NYPD hasn’t undertaken protest-policing training on this scale since at least the 1990s, said NYPD Deputy Chief Samuel Wright, who is leading the department’s current efforts. “We haven’t been engaged, in a number of years, in demonstrations like this,” Deputy Chief Wright said in an interview. The demonstrations have led to some violent clashes between police, protesters and counterprotesters, including injuries and deaths in Kenosha, Wis., and Portland, Ore.

Source: Wall Street Journal October 05, 2020 12:52 UTC