Cornyn, Mayor Turner & Houston Police Chief to Highlight New Law for Public Safety Officers

Let’s see if we can make it happen. Law Enforcement De-escalation training (aka Public Law No. 117-325) is now a law. This is to help train how to de-escalate any situation that LEOs get into such as a person in distress mentally or emotionally and/or any uncooperative person. 

The Chavez family wants this law named after Nicolas Chavez, the 27 year old Denver Harbor resident who was gunned down by law enforcement during a mental breakdown back in 2020. Chavez was hit 21 times by gunfire from HPD. You can view the footage on our YouTube page which is blurred out of respect but you can hear the gun fire. To view the unedited footage, you can head to the HPD Critical Incidents page on YouTube.

With this proper training, HPD could have prevented the death of Nicolas Chavez and the terminations of the 4+ Law Enforcement Officers involved. This could have also prevented other deaths related to improper de-escalation.