Glendale Hts. police host kids academy
He looked liked a giant lobster, in a padded red suit, but George Pappas's commands were serious.
"There is a man who has been drinking a lot," he shouts through his head protection.
Immediately, Pappas assumes that role, slurring his words and adopting a wobbling stance. Two four-foot tall "police officers" circle him issuing commands to comply with their requests.
When he refuses, they lash out with their legs, kicking him in the knees, taking him down, pinning his arms behind his back and pushing him to the ground.
When the middle school students let him go, Pappas pops back up like a punching bag issuing praise.
"When he took me to the ground, he said put your hand behind your back," Pappas said. "Good verbal command!"
Kicking and bashing police officers generally isn't encouraged - especially not by adolescents. And Pappas is one of two Glendale Heights Police Department's school liaison officers.
This summer, though, he and Officer Michelle Cahill spent a week working with middle school students at a Junior Police Academy organized through Gang Resistance Education and Training, also known as GREAT.
Through the course of a week, they work on arrest and apprehension techniques, crime scene processing, visit the courtroom, shooting range and work on defensive tactics.
Surprisingly, lifting fingerprints off pop cans, taking plaster casts of footprints and taking fingerprints of their peers is low on the popularity charts. It's actually the parents who are more enthused about that portion, probably from watching shows like "CSI", Pappas mused.
The kids just don't have enough patience to wait through the process of testing.
They prefer things that have an immediacy to them, such as the exercise where they stop motorists driving around safety town in a golf cart and issue them speeding tickets.
Or get to kick and flip Pappas through the air while he's wearing a padded red suit.