Montana Law Enforcement Academy opens new training facility with aim of enhancing scenario training

HELENA — Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen cut the ribbon on a new law enforcement training facility Thursday. He and other officials told MTN News how the new space could help benefit officers throughout the state in the line of duty.

From the driver’s seat of a police interceptor sedan, the inside of Montana Law Enforcement Academy’s new Scenario Training Facility is reminiscent of a Montana Main Street.

Joel Wendland, Executive director of the Montana Law Enforcement Academy, says the new facility allows for realistic training like situations officers might face in the field.

“This environment will allow us to introduce students to the typical environments they will see out in their normal day-to-day jobs,” said Wendland.

Attorney General Knudsen emphasized the enhancement of training capabilities made possible by the facility.

“When you’re trying to teach the new generation of law enforcement professionals how to do their jobs, we’re often doing it out in the snow or in the ice where it’s not safe. This gives us a climate-controlled facility to provide training year-round,” said Knudsen,

Knudsen surprised retiring Division of Criminal Investigation Administrator Brian Lockerby by naming the new facility after him. Reflecting on his time in law enforcement training during a speech at the ribbon cutting, Lockerby shared an emotional story.

“I’ve been in law enforcement a long time. When I went to the police academy, and some of you were there when the academy was six weeks long in Bozeman; we had two weeks, one week of firearms and one week of legal they gave us four weeks of training to have the authority to take someone else’s life and one of mine was Jana Rodgers from Big Horn County. She was killed about six years later in a bank robbery,” recalled Lockerby.

He hopes training administered in the new facility might save other law enforcement officers’ lives.

“I can’t help but wonder if extra training or the right training would have saved her life,” said Lockerby.