Trick-or-Treat with TPD

10/28/2015 – Ladybugs, pirates, princesses and skeletons descended in droves upon the Tulsa Police Department’s Riverside Division on Tuesday for an evening of candy, games and scares.

Around 2,000 people attended the sixth Haunted Halloween Precinct event. Children younger than 12 trick-or-treated at various booths, played games such as ring toss and toured police vehicles, Capt. Thom Bell said.

The event began as a community outreach project so officers could interact with residents in a nonenforcement environment, Bell said.

The annual event now includes tours of police helicopters, armored vehicles and a haunted house built inside the precinct, Bell said.

Officer Nilo McCray was handing out candy and showing off the helicopter to children at the event. McCray said he’d seen hundreds of children come through dressed as anything from police officers to firefighters to princesses.

McCray said children could stand on the helicopter’s railing and look inside at the buttons and switches, but they couldn’t touch them.

Jay Quiroz, 11, was standing near the helicopter dressed as a ghost. He said his favorite part of the event was petting the police dogs.

His sister, 7-year-old Kayli Quiroz, was dressed as a princess and said her favorite part of night was the helicopter — though she liked the dogs, too.

“That brown dog, I think, is bigger than me,” she said.

Sophia Quiroz, the pair’s mother, said she brought her children because she knows the candy they are getting at the precinct is safe. She also wanted them to meet the police officers and teach her children to ask officers for help when necessary.

“It’s super important that they know if they ever need help or are in trouble that they can seek help from an officer,” Quiroz said.

The original article can be found here.