Nassau cops visit schools on Halloween to offer safety tips

Superheroes by day and cops by night, costumed Nassau County police officers visited two elementary schools Wednesday to give kids Halloween-centric safety tips as part of the department’s latest community outreach effort. 

Nassau’s inaugural “Coffee and Treats with Cops” is a spinoff of the national “Coffee with a Cop Day,” held earlier this month. 

Rather than participate in the national event, the department instead opted to bring their officers — several in superhero costumes such as Captain America and Wonder Woman and others in uniform on motorcycles and horses — to Drexel Avenue Elementary School in Westbury and Old Country Road Elementary School in Hicksville. County Executive Laura Curran attended the Westbury event. 

An enthusiastic Police Commissioner Patrick Ryder introduced the officers in Hicksville to the shrieking students and handed out Nassau County Police Foundation coloring books. 

But Ryder reminded the kids that Halloween is more than just candy and costumes. The department also increases patrols on Halloween, he said. 

“There are certain safety ideas that you have to remember,” he said. 

He told the students that they should never go into a stranger’s house or car. He added that they must trick-or-treat in groups and let their parents inspect candy before they eat it. 

Even though the kids were delighted by the costumed cops, Ryder said the police uniform was the most important outfit of the day. 

“Now they’re seeing us as good guys,” he said as he watched his officers high-five the students as they went back into the school. “We’re not Hollywood, we’re not Disney. But we’re trying to explain to them that there’s a fun side.” 

Hicksville Schools Superintendent Marianne Litzman said the event was an important part of building relationships between the students and the police department. 

“When they see police officers, they should know that they’re their friends,” she said. 

Fourth-grader Michael Gunn, 9, of Hicksville, was one of several kids who dressed up as a police officer for Halloween. 

“I see a lot of police officers on the news,” he said. “I think being a police officer is actually a good job.”

Ryder said the event was a lighthearted community policing moment after a tragic few days, including the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting and the bomb packages sent to prominent Democrats and critics of President Donald Trump.

“It’s about building relationships; it’s about community policing,” he said. “We’re out there trying to calm the world.”