NYPD Probes Claims Of Inadequate CPR Training For Officers

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- The NYPD has launched an investigation into charges that police receive inadequate training in life-saving techniques.

But as CBS2 Political Reporter Marcia Kramer reported, the investigation is cold comfort to a Brooklyn couple whose asthmatic daughter died after a police officer told them, "I don't do CPR."

Police Commissioner Bill Bratton ordered a full-scale Internal Affairs investigation only after Officer Peter Liang was found guilty this month in the death of Akai Gurley from an unintentional shooting. Liang had testified that he had not been properly trained in CPR.

The irony is that Carmen and Michael Ojeda have been calling attention to the NYPD's lack of CPR training for six years, ever since their 11-year-old daughter, Briana, died.

"We're constantly knocking on the doors. No one hears us," Carmen Ojeda said tearfully. "So I feel lost in translation."

Ojeda and her husband have suffered through a heart-rending battle for six years to get the NYPD to train its officers adequately in CPR and other live-saving techniques.

"This is something we need. We need this," she said. "Our daughter passed. We just need this."

Michael Ojeda described what happened when Briana suffered an asthma attack.

"The police officer that my wife and my daughter encountered said that he didn't know CPR; he didn't do CPR," he said.

They said Briana would have survived if she had received CPR in time. Now, when they pray at the shrine to Briana outside their home, they also pray for the NYPD to train every officer in CPR.

That is why they closely followed Liang's murder trial in the shooting death of Gurley, in the stairwell of the Pink Houses development in East New York, Brooklyn.

Both Liang and his partner said they did not give Gurley CPR after he was hit by a ricocheting bullet, because they were not properly trained in the Police Academy.

"Immediately upon that statement being made, we initiated an internal affairs investigation," Bratton said.

Liang testified that he had little training, and said the instructors gave students the answers to a multiple-choice first aid test.

CBS2 asked the NYPD for details of the CPR training, including the number of students in a class, the number of instructors, the length of classes, and how many test dummies were available to practice on. One source told CBS2 there are only three, making practice limited.

"Under no circumstances will we tolerate any instructor in the New York City Police Department short-circuiting the process; the testing to validate the officer has the skills necessary to safely patrol the city," Bratton said.

The Ojedas said they would like to meet with Bratton. They said CPR training in the Police Academy is not enough, and officers should get refresher courses every two years.