TRU TO THE GAME

Tru Pettigrew took his passion for ensuring that diversity is real across the country and turned it into a movement. That movement is helping the Minnesotta

Written by ANTHONY KIRBY

Anthony T. Kirby is the Lifestyle Editor for CODE M Magazine and has spent over 30 years in the menswear industry. He lives in Philadelphia, PA where he is the Creative Director for FINICKEY, an online men's haberdashery brand. (https://finickey.us)

you young son grow up, he needed to have a conversation with the police department.

“I started Tru Access out of need to build bridges across generations.” Pettigrew said.

“In 2014, when Mike Brown was shot and killed by the police, I was asked to speak to law enforcement to help them to understand how to build bridges in the communities that the serve.” Pettigrew said.

Pettigrew, himself, lived through biased policing on the streets of Baltimore where he grew up. He experienced having a police officer place a gun to the back of his head during a traffic stop. So he knew that something had to be done to change the way police saw Blacks, and ultimately how they interacted with Blacks.

Pettigrew started doing work with police departments on how to connect with the Black community in a more equitable way.

The police chief in Cary was so impacted by Pettigrew’s work, the police chief started to tell other police departments about how the Cary department was transformed. That lead to Pettigrew to doing work across the country.

So police departments around the country are starting to get the training they need to have more empathy when it comes to dealing with the Black community, but what about the citizens who are stopped on a daily basis. Anxiety is running high for Blacks when they are stopped by the police.

“There is a clinical term for that, and it’s called Vicarious Trauma,” Pettigrew said.

The majority of Blacks, especially Black men, experience some level of elevated stress when being pulled over by the police.

Pettigrew, understanding that, started Barbershop Rap Sessions to help the community deal with the stress being pulled over.

“We go into barbershops around the country to help Blacks understand that they are not alone when it comes to dealing with bad police departments.” Pettigrew said.

Pettigrew feels like Blacks need to put themselves in a position so they can have good conversations about how to deal with their feelings of police brutality and how they should respond to it,

Pettigrew’s passion for he field of work can be heard in his voice and felt by his motivation to effect change. That kind of passion can not be taught, and Tru Pettigrew is living in his passion. ●