DECKER

Investigation Unit, they were the ones doing the talking.

There in Kent’s foyer, the detectives explained that his 21-year-old son, Brandon, had died along with two other young men in a fiery crash caused by a drunken driver going the wrong way on Interstate 71.

On the stairs behind him, Kent’s wife collapsed.

Kent recounted this story Tuesday afternoon at the State Highway Patrol Academy on East 17th Avenue to a classroom of primarily lawenforcement officers.

The students were learning how to better make death notifications, a universally dreaded task that often falls

to officers with little training about how to do it right.

For years now, a Mothers Against Drunk Driving Ohio program has worked to change that. The training isn’t required for officers but reaches about 150 people a year, said Tilde Bricker, a victim-services specialist with MADD. Most are lawenforcement officers, but the training is open to others who might benefit, including funeral-home employees, firefighters, prosecutors and coroners.

The classes, which are held across the state, are taught by Sgt. Brooke Wilson, who leads the Columbus Police Accident Investigation Unit that handles all fatal crashes in the city.

In his six years with AIU, Wilson estimates that he has

been involved in more than 400 death notifications. The emotions he’s encountered have run the gamut from rage to anguish.

“I’ve had people throw things, I’ve had people break things,” Wilson said. One relative ran away from him, out of the home. Others have collapsed or become incapacitated by shock.

He urged officers to imagine being on the receiving end of the news they deliver.

“You are undoing everything I think I know,” Wilson said. “I thought my family was safe, and you’re telling me my daughter is dead.”

Faced with such emotion, officers might try to detach or go on autopilot. That, Wilson said, is the worst thing to do.

Learning of the unexpected death of a loved one, survivors

can be overwhelmed with a sense of powerlessness.

“The antidote to powerlessness is information,” he said. He has carefully gone through crash-scene photographs with family members if they ask to see them. He does not promise what he can’t deliver, isn’t afraid to say, “I don’t know,” and tries to always deliver the news in person, ideally with another officer.

And while acknowledging that officers must remain professional, he said that doesn’t mean they must be emotionless.

“When you make somebody sad, some of that sadness is going to rub off on you,” he said. “That’s OK.”

“This is the crappiest thing we may do in our careers,” Wilson said. “But it is an opportunity to help people.”

Beginning in 2014, he worked closely with the families of two pedestrians killed by the same out-ofcontrol driver. The driver was sentenced to prison last September. That same month, Columbus had a terrible twoweek stretch in which three children were struck and killed by vehicles.

Not long afterward, Wilson’s phone rang.

It was the widow of one of the pedestrians killed in 2014. She had seen reports of the children’s deaths in the news, and she thought Wilson might need to talk.

He was struck by the grace of her offer, and he took it as a sign that he’d gotten something right.