WHITTIER — The director of the Rio Hondo College Police Academy said more frank discussions between law enforcement and community members will be needed to move forward and to train “guardians, not warriors” to enforce the law.

“It’s critical, now more than ever, that we stand up for the tenets of a training system that values the personal relationships police officers should forge with members of diverse communities, guards the sanctity of life and upholds the constitutional rights of all,” Academy Director Walter Allen III said.

Allen, who has led the Rio Hondo College Police Academy since 2014, said he was “disgusted, I was upset, and being a black man, I was just in shock” after seeing the video of George Floyd pinned at the neck by the knee of a Minneapolis police officer now charged with his murder.

The current class of Rio Hondo cadets consists of recruits sponsored by more than 20 local law enforcement agencies in Los Angeles, Orange and Ventura counties, as well as cadets who opt to go through the program on their own in hopes of later obtaining a job.

Many of the Rio Hondo Academy instructors are also people of color who have “experienced the good, the bad, and the ugly in the law enforcement arena,” Allen said.