MEADVILLE — If criminals don’t intimidate the Guardian Angels, a little rainfall wasn’t going to keep the newly formed Meadville chapter from holding its first training session on Sunday.

Well, work is a conflict. And vacation time. It was those two factors that reportedly kept attendance low in Diamond Park.

Jose Conception, leader of the Meadville group, says he has eight members in the area chapter. But only three, including Conception, were on hand Sunday.

Still, Conception says he’s psyched that things have gotten off the ground, and that Meadville could soon have its very own civilian crime prevention unit.

“I’m actually very excited,” he said. “I’m very happy. We’re going to be the extra eyes and ears to deter crime that is going on in Crawford County and the Meadville area.”

Sunday’s group of local volunteers were joined by Pennsylvania Regional Directors Jason Weston and Scott Koppenhofer, who traveled all the way from Wilkes-Barre to lead the training exercises.

“Today,” said Koppenhofer, a 21-year veteran with the Angels, “was just the first training to get them a little acclimated to patrol procedures; how we all form up, what we all do, why we have the formations we have, and the protocols for when we’re out on patrol.”

One of the main ways the Guardian Angels prevent crime is through visual deterrence. Its members wear bright red jackets, red berets — easy-to-spot stuff. And their presence alone often has criminals thinking twice.

“You can’t miss us when we’re on the street,” said Koppenhofer. “You can spot us from a block, two blocks away. And when they see us and they’re getting ready to break into a car, or a building, that will deter it without us even knowing it.”

The Guardian Angels patrol in groups. The formations that Weston and Koppenhofer introduced to the Meadville group on Sunday has practical aspects, and it gives the unit an orderly appearance.

“Basically, the core of what we do as a chapter is patrolling,” Koppenhofer said. “It’s nothing really difficult. It’s something we’ll do in every training. It becomes repetition. Later on it gets more advanced. We’ll train where we run scenarios and we’ll apply patrolling techniques that we learn to those different scenarios.”

Future training exercises also include first aid, cardio-pulmonary resuscitation, teamwork development, studying local law, and self-defense techniques.

“As the training progresses they learn respect, integrity, how to work with the community better,” said Koppenhofer.

One of the key lessons that Guardian Angels must learn is conflict resolution. As a civilian group its job is to observe and report crimes to the police. The Angels do not get physically involved, unless they find themselves in physical danger, or if they have to protect someone else who is in imminent physical danger.

To avoid those physical confrontations, the Angels learn to calm situations down.

“(We learn) how to control things verbally,” Koppenhofer said. “You don’t want to get physical. We want to de-escalate the situation. So we teach them restraint, which is difficult when you’ve got someone yelling and scream at you inches from your face. How do you deal with that? You need to de-escalate it and do it calmly.”

Guardian Angels undergo three months of training. Part of the Meadville chapter’s training will take place in Cleveland, Ohio, with an established chapter there.

Should things go as planned, the Meadville Guardian Angels should graduate some time in November. Chapter graduations are usually attended by Curtis Silwa, who founded the Guardian Angels in 1979 in New York City.

After that, the red-clad Angels could be seen somewhere on the streets of Meadville.

“We like to keep the criminals on their toes,” said Conception. “They’re not going to know where we’re going to be, what day we’re going to be out. We don’t want them to know. We want to keep them guessing and then we want them to leave town.”



Pete Chiodo can be reached at 724-6370 or by e-mail at pchiodo@meadvilletribune.com.