Air Force Veteran and Apex Police Officers Change Futures

Apex Police Department launches training program for military veteran officers 
News Observer
BY WILL DORAN
October 10, 2015

“It was one of those things like, ‘Duh. Why haven’t we been doing this all along?’ ” said Myhand, a retired Army first sergeant with two decades of military and law enforcement experience.

Highlights

Innovative program aims to help police officers who are veterans connect with fellow veterans in need.
Program inspired by a real incident involving an Air Force veteran and Apex police officers
Organizers want to train Wake County officers first but hope to expand it regionally and nationally.
Nick Blalock was ransacking his father’s house, and when police officers responded to defuse the situation, he thought about running away, or even fighting them.

But he changed his mind when the Apex police officers told Blalock they were military veterans, just like him.

Blalock, a 2006 Apex High School graduate, had recently returned home after seven years with the Air Force’s Special Operations. He struggled to readjust to civilian life. One day in late 2013, tensions with his father boiled over, and he began destroying the home they shared.

There was potential for violence when officers Jonathan Guider and Harry Pennington responded to the call. There was a shotgun in the house, though Blalock never picked it up.

But Guider and Pennington coaxed Blalock out of hiding by offering to talk, instead of shouting orders. They bonded over stories about deployments to the Middle East, and they learned Blalock’s loss of his beloved pit bull was just one of the factors that set off his anger. Guider offered to buy him a new one.

When Guider and Pennington returned from the call, they explained their unorthodox tactics to their supervisor, Capt. Blair Myhand, prompting him to seek a program to train the department’s 15 officers who are veterans. He wanted to help those officers respond to crises involving fellow veterans – and attempt to reduce violence.

“If one veteran can not be killed, or one police officer can not die, as a result of these trainings, I’ll feel it’s a success,” Myhand said. “When I meet my maker, I want to be able to say I did that.”
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“It was one of those things like, ‘Duh. Why haven’t we been doing this all along?’" and it is a great question. Even great is the fact that this has been done all over the country for over 30 years! Point Man International Ministries started when a Seattle police officer, Marine, Vietnam veteran wanted to do something to help the veterans he was arresting. He started Point Man and since then it has proven to be a Godsend! Just a reminder that I am Florida State Coordinator.