HARRISBURG, Pa. (WHTM) — Violence has continued recently in Harrisburg but so too have efforts to stop it.

This is what’s called credible messenger training. About fifteen people took part between Wednesday and Thursday. They will go into neighborhoods after something violent happens.

Some are police and community service aides but others are people formerly on the wrong side of the law – who have turned their lives around.

“And you want to use people that actually lived the kind of life in the streets, who have some experience,” public safety chair and credible messenger trainee Lamont Jones said. “This makes it easier for them to be able to connect to the individuals that we’re trying to guide away from the violence that’s happening in the community.”

“A lot of people come after somebody who’s been shot already,” trainer and president Tio Hardman said. “My job is to train people on how to intercept whispers in the community to stop killings on the front end.”

This is part of Harrisburg’s group violence intervention initiative, inspired partly by the program in York that had helped to reduce violent crime there.

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