Two police officers watched Christopher Araujo pace back and forth, a gun in his waistband. Araujo was in Texas, but his mind was in Iraq.
“I’m here to help, bro,” one of the officers said.
“You need to stay outside the wire,” Araujo snapped back, his perimeter secured.
The pistols stayed in the holsters.
“I can get you in touch with some care,” one of the officers calmly said. “Why don’t you come on out?”
Araujo snapped out of his daze: “Yeah, I can do that.”
The Roy Butler Training Academy last week transformed conference rooms into tense exercises. Scenes like the one involving Araujo were the culmination of a three-day course for 25 police officers from across Texas to learn how to diffuse responses involving “trauma-affected veterans” — ones who might be dealing with post-traumatic stress disorder or traumatic brain injury.
Texas Veterans Commission, a state-run program connecting veterans with resources and benefits, is among several federal, state and local partners across Texas that designed the training after advocates here expressed a need for localized hands-on programs. A state bill later mandated the program.
[For more of this story, written by Alex Horton, go to http://www.stripes.com/texas-p...th-veterans-1.431806]
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