Alabama Law Enforcement Alliance For Peer Support, also known as ALLEAPS.

Rickey Stokes

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Posted by: RStokes
[email protected]
334-790-1729
Date: Feb 26 2019 12:09 AM

ALABAMA:

This past week Harvest Church was host to about 130 law enforcement officers from all over the wiregrass to participate in Alabama Law Enforcement Alliance For Peer Support, also known as ALLEAPS.

CLICK FOR ALLEAPS WEBSITE

Even Colonel Charles Ward, Director of the Trooper Division of Alabama Law Enforcement Agency, was on hand for the day seminar and training.

This training was last week and I have been holding this story. Last evening articles were posted where a officer in Tennessee was shot and killed, in another instance a officer was shot and in the hospital.

Today in Pasco County Florida a female law enforcement officer with four years service took her own life. The reasons were not stated but she was a dedicated officer, wife and mother.

CLICK FOR ARTICLE

ALLEAPS is designed to prevent such tragedy as the Pasco County Florida Deputy.

Tonight tragedy struck locally when a bad guy who is alleged to have committed several robberies, kidnapping and kidnapping attempts, assaults, and stolen cars claimed the life of a innocent motorist when he was fleeing the police on the wrong side of the roadway. Nothing anyone could do to stop this fleeing felon and his behavior.

Law Enforcement, Fire, EMS are humans as everyone else. But what each of them see everyday, what they deal with every day, often times works on someone in ways they do not even realize.

What one see's is beyond description and the situations law enforcement, fire and EMS are thrown into are beyond describing. They see people, daily, having bad days and are charged with coping with them on that bad day.

The purpose of the training and seminar last week was in an effort to help those in attendance and make commanders aware of what is available to help those under your command.

It is OKAY for you as a law enforcement officer, fire or EMS to need to talk to someone. It is OKAY for you to be bothered by something you see and experience and need to just talk about your feelings and thoughts.

And the Alabama Legislature has made it okay and opened a confidential avenue for you to do so in this program.

With excitement we want to remind all Emergency Responders that the Peer Support Law provides all Emergency Responders with privileged and confidential communications when trained and appointed by their Chief/Sheriff as a Certified Peer Support Member.

In cooperation with the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency (ALEA), the Alabama Law Enforcement Alliance for Peer Support (ALLEAPS) is pleased to announce the activation of a toll-free peer support telephone number. The call will be answered 24/7 365 days by ALEA Central Dispatch resulting in the activation of peer support personnel.

Since October 2017, ALEA and ALLEAPS have worked hand in hand to develop a quality peer support program with the goals of assisting law enforcement officers experiencing a personal and professional event. All peer support communication is privileged and confidential per Alabama Statue 36-21-14.

Secretary Taylor and his command staff have worked diligently with ALLEAPS to develop and provide peer support training both in the Trooper and SBI agent academies. The mutual goal is to set Alabama Peer Support as a Standard of Care for law enforcement officer peer support.

The goal of Peer Support in Alabama is to make contact with an officer or an agency within thirty minutes of receiving the call. Should you or your agency need assistance, please call: 
833 219-2461

For more information visit: www.alleaps.org

The more you prepare and train in ADVANCE, the better for all!
 
We offer support and resources for LEO’s who want help with:

• family issues (we have programs for spouses and families)


• financial matters


• suicide prevention, intervention, and follow-up


• alcohol and/or substance abuse problems


• spiritual issues


• other personal concerns

We have a chaplains’ component within our program which offers great benefit to many officers.
 
For those of us that have received the training, we now have a great law in place that defines our communication as “privileged.”
 
WHY WE DO THIS
 
We do this because it’s needed and it makes sense. We do this because we have seen it help other Officers. We do this because it works!
 
It’s no secret that a law enforcement career places unique stressors on cops. We’re good at what we do because we can exist on Adrenalin and caffeine; we’re doggedly determined, fiercely loyal, and always “in control.” We remain stoic and professional in the face of the senseless tragedy we view daily.
 
Despite low pay, long hours, and no “normal” life on holidays and weekends, we report for work as scheduled because the battle of good versus evil rages on. We know that without us, anarchy would rule society. Only a cop understands that this is who we are, not just what we do. We really are 24/7.  The bottom line is that what makes us good at our jobs can take its toll on the rest of our lives.
 
We’re taught to “keep it all in” from the first day at the academy, to protect our families, because society just doesn’t understand the cop sub-culture, and because it’s just not “police” to show emotion.
 
Every day, police face high stress events – situations which hold the potential to invoke unusually strong emotions which have the potential to interfere with our ability to function, either at the scene or later. Shootings, accidents, use of physical force, injuries, seeing injured victims (especially children), deaths (especially line-of-duty-deaths), suicides (especially police suicides), sudden health problems, and the myriad of tragic events that we witness happening to others (and ourselves!) daily are all examples of critical incidents. But sometimes our “survival techniques” are self-destructive.
 
DID YOU KNOW

• the life expectancy of a cop is 59 years (78.56 years for civilians)


• there are 125-150 cop suicides each year; two to three times as many cops kill themselves each year than are killed by a bad guy!


• there is a 72% divorce rate among 10-year veterans


• alcoholism among cops is twice the national average


• domestic abuse is twice the national average

THIS DOESN’T HAVE TO BE; THAT’S WHY WE’RE HERE. We’re cops just like you. We’re here to respond and help you deal with the physical, emotional, cognitive, behavioral, and spiritual effects of job-related stresses. You are not alone!  If you have any questions, please get in touch with us.

 

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