Course gives detention officers training

Lt. Curtis Cherry stood by chanting “Press, press, press,” as a fellow detention officer pushed his finger into the neck of a man laying on his stomach.

As the man on the ground slowly pulled his hands out and extended them to the sides, Cherry said, “release. He’s complying, release.”

Cherry is an instructor in an 80-hour training and certification academy for detention officers at Clovis Community College.

Topics range from defensive tactics to legal issues, report writing, ethics in corrections, inmate con games and understanding gangs.

Officials said the training improves safety for officers and inmates and reduces liabilities for the county.

“Ninety percent of the time the guys are pretty calm,” said Cherry, a training instructor and detention officer at the Curry County Adult Detention Center. “But everybody has a bad day.”

On occasion, inmates act out, he said. Maybe they had a bad experience at court, or a family member didn’t come to visit, he said. It falls on the detention officer to de-escalate those situations.

Prior to the course’s inception this year, Curry County Manager Lance Pyle said officers mostly learned from on-the-job training and experience.

He believes the course is invaluable because officers end up more effective, feel less stressed and have increased morale.

“We’ve had people quit because they were scared of being attacked by an inmate,” he said. “(And) we have had workman’s compensation injuries with employees getting hit.”

It was the second time the course has been held. The class consisted of five Curry and three Roosevelt County officers, Pyle said.

Patrina Rodriguez, a detention officer at the CCADC for more than five years, was taking the course for the first time.

The 54-year-old said the class has given her better perspective on the implications of the actions officers take.

“It wasn’t that I was deficient before, but I was ready to learn more and I had officers around me that knew less,” Rodriguez said. “I don’t know about (it making my job) easier, but it will make me a better officer.”

Officers such as Rodriguez are often forgotten with a rush to recruit and train new detention officers, Cherry said, “but the laws are changing everyday” and senior officers need training too.

Rodriguez previously worked for the school system and plans to stay in corrections until she retires. She said the role of a detention officer is changing with a push to educate and rehabilitate inmates rather than just warehouse them.

“Back in the day when I started it was not what it is today,” she said.

“They’re not nobodies. They’re from our community. They’re our neighbors and people we see on the streets and they’re going to be living back on the streets with us. We have to show them they don’t have to be that drug dealer, they don’t have to be that thief.”

By the numbers:

$160 — Cost of the course per student

$11.07 — Entry level detention officers starting pay

181 — Inmates at CCADC as of May 2.