Minimum Recruit Training
The following mandatory curriculum for police basic training, reflects 584 hours of training as approved by POST (COPT). This basic mandatory curriculum is required for all police officer appointments, except seasonal appointments.
Basic Mandatory Curriculum
Accident Investigation (24hrs)
This course develops the officer’s skills in methods and techniques to be applied to this type of investigation, including measurements, photography, sketches, reporting, and interviewing of witnesses and drivers, hit-and-run accidents and manslaughter by motor vehicle cases.
Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training (ALERRT) (16hrs)
This course will cover shooting and moving, threshold evaluation, concepts and principles of team movement, setting up for and room entry techniques, approach and breaching the crisis site, secondary responder tactics, improvised explosive devices, and post engagement priorities of work. The course will culminate with dynamic force on force scenarios.
Civil Disobedience/Labor Disputes (4hrs)
This course involves lecture on and discussion of Delaware Labor Laws and the law enforcement role of protection of life and property with explanation of injunctive relief procedures. Actual situations involving labor strikes and picketing of companies, abortion clinics, animal rights groups, etc., will be discussed.
Constitution and Bill of Rights (2hrs)
This class provides an introduction to the history and development of the Federal and State Constitutions, particularly the Federal Bill of Rights, as interpreted by the courts down through the years, with emphasis on decisions of the United States Supreme Courts.
Courtroom Procedure and Demeanor (8hrs)
This class covers the fundamentals of how to be most effective as a witness in court. Includes preparation of the case prior to courtroom presentation. Also, appearance, manner, and attitude in court and while waiting to testify will also be discussed.
Criminal Investigation (44hrs)
This course presents a study of the basic fundamentals and procedures of investigation involving the more serious crimes and includes establishment of the elements of burglary, robbery, auto theft, theft felony, homicide, and other major offenses such as gambling and organized crime. Students will also be trained in the detection, prosecution and prevention of child sexual and physical abuse, exploitation and domestic violence.
Cultural Diversity and Community Relations (12hrs)
This course is intended to bring about increased understanding and respect on the part of the police officer in their interactions and communications with all minority groups.
Delaware Criminal Code (20hrs)
The course should make the officer sufficiently familiar with the Code in order to know all aspects of the most important and common violations and to know how to make ready reference to the Code for all other violations. This segment will also acquaint the officer with the more commonly encountered civil law violations.
Delaware Motor Vehicle Code (20hrs)
The purpose of this course is to acquaint the officer with the provisions of the Motor Vehicle Code Annotated. With this background, he/she may readily recognize a violation thereof and be able to (1) define the elements of such violation and (2) know the nature of the evidence necessary to prove such violation in court.
Domestic Violence (8hrs)
This class will acquaint the officer with the potential dangers that exist when answering calls of domestic disputes. Generally, such training is designed to prepare police officers to react effectively, efficiently, and sensitively to the crisis situations which they encounter.
Drug Enforcement and Controlled Substances (8hrs)
This course acquaints the officer with the types of narcotics commonly used. It includes the terms of jargon, the general effects of various drugs and barbiturates, plus their relationship to crime. Field-testing of various substances will
Emergency Vehicle Operations Course (EVOC) (24hrs)
This course is divided into approximately 2 hours of classroom instruction and 22 hours of driving on a skid pad. The classroom instruction stresses the importance of vehicle safety in teaching defensive and pursuit tactics. The student is taught to realize that the driving environment, which includes the vehicle, the road, and the driver all have limits. Some of the topics covered are the effects of weight transfer, effects of centrifugal force and friction, and skids and cornering.
The skid pad portion reinforces the student's understanding of the driving environment and other classroom material. The student is exposed to steering control, judging distances, the vehicle’s evasive capability, maximum braking ability without losing steering ability, and the effects of skidding and controlling skids.
Firearms (40hrs)
Instruction includes classroom lectures on safety, nomenclature, care of weapons, and the viewing of training films. Range instruction emphasizes the practical application of police weapons related to actual combat conditions.
First Responders (40hrs)
Because accidents and other emergencies bring police officers to the scene first, this training is to develop first aid techniques that enable them to efficiently fulfill their responsibilities. The course also offers sufficient instruction to enable the police officer to make an emergency child delivery.
Fitness and Wellness (6hrs)
The purpose of Physical Fitness/Wellness testing and training is to encourage and teach law enforcement officers to maintain a healthy fitness level throughout their career. Law enforcement officers who remain physically fit prove more readily able to cope with the day-to-day stress of job demands, and are better prepared to handle critical incidents. For this purpose, within each academy a segment of instruction will be devoted to nutritional education, exercise physiology, lifestyle adjustment, and stress and stress relief methods. Other areas specific to fitness and wellness can and will be added as needed.
Interactions with Persons With Disabilities (8hrs)
The purpose of this course is to identify behavioral factors which the officer may encounter, to discuss the influence of group behavior or individual behavior, and to emphasize the importance of understanding unusual behaviors in order to handle that behavior most effectively. It also includes a review of the 24-hour commitment procedures.
Homeland Security (16hrs)
National Incident Management System (NIMS) (4hrs)
National Incident Management System integrates effective practices in emergency preparedness and response into a comprehensive national framework for incident management. The NIMS will enable responders at all levels to work together more effectively and efficiently to manage domestic incidents no matter what the cause, size or complexity, including catastrophic acts of terrorism and disasters.
Incident Command System (ICS) (8hrs)
ICS is a standardized on-scene incident management concept designed specifically to allow responders to adopt an integrated organizational structure equal to the complexity and demands of any single incident or multiple incidents without being hindered by jurisdictional boundaries.
Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) / All Hazards (Awareness) (4hrs)
WMD/All Hazards awareness provides emergency responders with awareness-level instruction on recognition, avoidance, isolation and notification techniques in weapons of mass destruction and all hazards environment. The course covers prevention and deterrence, chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive (CBRNE) hazards and other disasters.
Information Systems (44hrs)
Communications
This course acquaints the officer with the features and use of all communications equipment used in police operations, including telephone, computers, radio, and NCIC. Instruction also includes rules and regulations of the Federal Communications Commission with regard to radio transmissions.
Report Writing
This class instructs the officers in the essential mechanics of recording their investigations in report form suitable to serve both as an aid to further investigation and to the preparation and development of prosecution.
Law Enforcement Investigative Support System (LEISS)
- Automated Crime Reports training takes the officer through some of the more complex police reports and steps the user through the many features of this program. Various crime reports will be completed during this training along with all new system features covered. This allows the police crime report to be sent electronically to the State Bureau of Identification. This program also has links to the automated warrant system if a warrant is required; no dual keying of data is needed.
- Automated Warrants is a law enforcement application designed to provide court acceptable documents Exhibit A (charge sheet), and Exhibit B (probable cause statement). This warrant is electronically sent to the court and can be modified and changed at any time before the approval by a judge. From this original warrant document, information is loaded directly into the CJIS (Criminal Justice Information Services) Wanted person files whenever a warrant is created without arrest information. Also included in the application is the Attorney General Intake for felony cases and an automated arrest report to be attached to the fingerprint cards. This is the instrument used statewide for arrests by all criminal justice agencies.
Delaware Criminal Justice Information System (DELJIS)
This course covers all the features of the CJIS system along with all new applications being developed. Users are given a security briefing along with an example of all the basic inquiries used for criminal justice. This course covers motor vehicles inquiries along with criminal history inquiries, Protection from Abuse orders, no contact orders along with case inquiry and much more.
National Crime Institute Center (NCIC)
This block of instruction shall directly relate to the use of the National Crime Institute Center computer software and includes FBI mandates, lecture, testing and certification.
Interview and Interrogation (8hrs)
The purpose of this course is to teach the officer the approved techniques of interrogation so that they may fully develop information or evidence by conversation with witnesses and subjects. Instruction will include an emphasis on legal limitations.
Introduction to Law Enforcement (2hrs)
This course introduces law enforcement officers to the historical background and development of the police service with emphasis on its relationship to modern society. Also included is an analysis of the organizational structure.
Juvenile Procedures (8hrs)
This course is designed to acquaint the new officer with the family, social and economic conditions, and factors, which foster and encourage juvenile delinquency. It stresses the role law enforcement can play in the overall effort to combat such conditions with emphasis on the planned programs existent within the State of Delaware.
Latent Fingerprints/Crime Scene Processing (12hrs)
During this course the officer will learn the methods and importance of identification including the methods of dusting, photographing and lifting latent fingerprints and palm prints from all manner of surfaces and areas, and obtaining both inked and rolled fingerprints; not only of live and willing subjects, but also from unconscious, deceased, and decomposed bodies.
Laws of Arrest, Laws of Evidence, and Search and Seizure (40hrs)
This training covers the legal foundation of laws governing and limiting the police officer’s authority in the areas of arrest. This treatment shall be afforded with respect to: (1) the laws of arrest with or without warrants, arrest for misdemeanors and arrest for felonies, the elements of probable cause, and the disposition of persons after lawfully arrested; (2) the law applicable to criminal interrogation and resultant confessions under the 5th, 6th, and 14th Amendments of the Federal Constitution and; (3) the application of constitutional safeguards to electronic surveillance, chemical, and serological evidence.
The purpose of this course is to acquaint the recruit with the rules and law of evidence exercised in a court of law so that he/she may recognize what is legally admissible. He/she must be able to differentiate between the various types of evidence and be familiar with the rules concerning maintaining the chain of evidence. This course covers the laws of search and seizure under the provisions of the 4th and 14th Amendments including the exclusionary rule and the elements of a “reasonable” search and seizure of persons (a) incidental to arrest; (b) under a search warrant; (c) with consent.
Manual Traffic Control (2hrs)
This class is designed to teach the officer the fundamentals and mechanics of traffic control and control devices; and to familiarize the officer with the proper signals and gestures used in point traffic control.
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and Driving Under the Influence (24hrs)
This course presents the elements of the offense of driving under the influence as defined by Delaware law. It provides knowledge on securing the necessary evidence, including scientific tests and reporting in order to successfully prosecute.
Other Police Agencies Jurisdiction (2hrs)
This training is designed to acquaint officers with the jurisdiction, function, and availabilities of other enforcement agencies including federal departments such as the Secret Service and Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Police Communication & Crisis Intervention (20hrs)
The purpose of this course is to provide police officers with the knowledge, skills and ability to interact with people on a daily basis. Within this course the communications process will be described along with the barriers to communication. Students will be taught how to communicate with persons in crisis. Types of instruction include, but are not limited to verbal judo, active listening skills, suicide intervention and de-escalation techniques. Role-play scenarios are a valuable part of this training.
Patrol Procedures/ Officer Survival (60hrs)
This course is designed to acquaint the new officer with the basic street survival techniques as accrued from actual encounters on the street. Practical application of avoidance, deterrence, and de-escalation techniques through the handling of actual scenarios will familiarize officers with what to do when confronted with an unarmed/armed combatant.
Police Discipline and Ethics (8hrs)
This course covers the basic why, when, and where of discipline and courtesy of police officers. Ethics from a law enforcement perspective will be explored and discussed.
Police Fire Survival (14hrs)
In this class the Delaware State Fire School explains the hazards of electrical fires, the proper use of various types of fire extinguishers, knowledge of structural fires, how to handle flammable liquids and gas and rescue techniques for removing trapped persons from vehicles.
Sex Crimes (4hrs)
This course is designed to teach the officer the elements, peculiar techniques of investigation, motives, and most productive sources of evidence, psychology of violators, modus operandi, etc. The detection, prevention and prosecution of sexual assault will be included in this training.
Use of Deadly Force (6hrs)
This course will acquaint the officer with the laws governing the use of deadly force by police officers.
Defensive Tactics (30hrs)
Through the use of lecture, demonstration and individual participation, this training will provide each new officer with sufficient skills to defend himself/herself from attack. Instruction on the use of the police issued impact weapon, basic handcuffing techniques and de-escalation techniques will be paramount to this course of instruction.
