Photo: Gestapo agents escorting American internees at Bad Nauheim, Germany, 1942. AP Photo.
"When Inspector Martin Halweg was a young cadet, his class met a Holocaust survivor who had spent almost four years in a Berlin attic hiding from the Nazis -- and from police officers like him. "He described what it felt like running from the police, his fear, his absolute terror," said Halweg, who was only 16 when he started training in 1992. Hearing this firsthand, he said, "changes you as a person and changes you as a police officer." Policing was fundamentally overhauled in Germany after World War II. Today in Berlin, every future police officer must visit a former concentration camp. Cadets are taught in unsparing detail about the shameful legacy of policing under the Nazis -- and how it informs the mission and institution of policing today. While we can't directly compare the history of U.S. policing to that of Germany under the Nazis, as Americans re-evaluate structures of policing, Germany's experience offers insight into redesigning systems to prevent repeating painful pasts.
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