Officer teaches colleagues how to share tragic news
It’s likely the most devastating news a person will ever hear.
And the way a police officer goes about telling someone their loved one isn’t coming home matters, said Sgt. Andy Woodward.
“They’ll always remember that death notification. They’ll say they can remember the day that officer turned up on their doorstep,” he said.
For the past couple of years, the Calgary police officer has been taking his colleagues through a two-day course on how to deliver that news, and this month he brings that training to Caribbean police officers.
As part of the Improved Access to Justice in the Caribbean (IMPACT Justice) project, which is funded by the Canadian federal government, officers from the Caribbean will be brought up to speed on how to do what Woodward said is a difficult but very important part of the job.
“It is really to treat people how you would want to be treated,” he said.
“The better approach is to knock on the door, go in, sit down with them and explain to them what’s happened, then ask them if there’s anything you can do for them, because there will be a million and one questions that they want answered.
“We can’t answer them all, but there will be questions that we can answer.”
Woodward, as well as a civilian he works with who has been on the receiving end of that heartbreaking door knock, will be gone for this project from Nov. 14 through Nov. 20. About 40 Caribbean police officers will take part in the training.
The Calgary Police Service training was recommended for the program by the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police when the University of the Caribbean reached out to them.
Before joining the CPS in 2010, Woodward was a police officer in the U.K. for 20 years.