BUFFALO, N.Y. — 2 On Your Side heard from a retired Buffalo police lieutenant and former member of the department's Emergency Response Team. We got his opinion on last week's incident that resulted in a 75-year-old man being pushed and injured outside City Hall.
This is the closest we'll get to hearing from an officer with knowledge of what it's like to put on a badge for ERT.
The retired lieutenant, who just wants to go by his first name of Mark, left the department last year after 20 years on the force. His career encompassed time on ERT.
This was his conversation with 2 On Your Side reporter Jeff Preval:
Preval: When you look at the incident that happened outside City Hall last week what's your first reaction what was seen on video?
"From my opinion and the training that I went through the officers did exactly as they were instructed," Mark said.
He added that training is through the Federal Emergency Management Agency, also known as FEMA.
"Whatever supervisor it was gave orders for the ERT team members to form a line and clear that area and through the training that we got with ERT one of the things you do is you move people back. If they don't move willingly, you move them back with force," Mark said.
Preval: The response to that we've gotten from the district attorney has said that; why not just arrest him?
"Because that wasn't the order. The order was to move people back," Mark said.
Preval: How are they maybe trained to respond to someone who was injured right there on the scene?
"Once again if you break down the video you can see immediately the officer went to reach for him to assist him the supervisor grabbed the officer by the back of his uniform and pushed him ahead and that supervisor stayed there and immediately called for assistance," the former officer said.
Preval: According to Buffalo police protocol that's what you're supposed to do?
"As a patrol officer, if your supervisor is indicating for you to keep going and keep the line straight you keep it going," he said.
We also talked about police reform and specifically calls to defund BPD.
"Defunding the police is definitely not something that you can do or should do it's simple, you need the police," Mark said.
That retired lieutenant says more training is needed, and there needs to be better communication between police and youth.
Meantime, the two officers involved in the incident outside City Hall, Aaron Torgalski and Robert McCabe have been charged with assault and remain suspended, without pay.