by Roy Taylor, Daily Vidette Reporter

ISU Police Chief Ronald Swan invited the first Russian police officials to the United States and addressed the graduating class of a Russian police academy in August.

Swan said he was invited to address the class after visiting with Russian leaders who were on a trip to the United States, and making his own visit to Russia in 1991.

The Russia-U.S. police exchange was first envisioned over two years ago, Swan said.

“Since the Bolshevik revolution of 1917, the Soviets have never sent members of the prestigious academy outside the eastern bloc,” he explained.

“I then started corresponding with the then-Soviet government, hoping that they would perhaps send their police to the west,” Swan added.

“They agreed, and in March 1991, a Russian militia major and a colonel were sent to the ISU Police Department,” he said.

This visit was the first of its type anywhere in the United States, and the delegates toured various police installations in Illinois and Missouri, Swan said.

Swan was accompanied on the trip by Mike Charles, Directory of the Police Training Institute at the University of Illinois.

Charles was formerly chairman of the criminal justice sciences department at ISU, he explained.

“In July 1991, the Soviets reciprocated, and we were invited to the Soviet Union,” Swan said.

During the trip, Swan provided lectures and program development for the Russian academy, he added.

It was during the trip that Swan was invited to address this year’s graduating class of the Special Secondary School for Officer Training of Russia, he explained.

The school is located in Vladimir, a city founded in 1108, Swan said.

Just weeks after Swan’s delegation left the Soviet Union in July 1991, the Soviet coup occurred, and “something very significant happened,” he said.

“When the coup took place, this school was one of the very first groups that mobilized and traveled to Moscow to protect Boris Yeltsin,” Swan added.

Swan said he was concerned for the well-being of his many friends in Russia when the coup took place.

Swan addressed the school’s graduating class on August 27 in the Russian language, and said it was “one of the high points” of his professional career.

Similar events are planned for the future as well.

Swan expects that in May 1993, a Russian police general and colonel will once again visit Illinois.

They plan for the Russians to spend two weeks lecturing and traveling in the state, he said.

In addition to the police exchange program, Normal also participates in a sister city program with Vladimir, and ISU officials are involved in building a model American home there, Swan said.