SWANSEA - After years of teaching the DARE program to local middle-schoolers, Joseph Case Jr. High School recently changed programs from the Drug Abuse Resistance Education curriculum to a Project Alert program, which the school says provides students with updated research methods and more interaction. Case Jr. Principal Robert Monteiro said the switch stemmed from the school's difficulty securing a DARE-certified officer to teach the program and the need to improve on the traditional DARE program in order to hit more crucial areas. When former long-time DARE officer Lt. Robert Cabral was killed in November 2005, the DARE program was at a standstill until Officer Shane Mello took up the lead a few months later.

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SWANSEA -- After the death of Swansea's volunteer Drug Abuse Resistance Education Officer Lt. Robert M. Cabral on Nov. 5, it would have been understandable to see the DARE program be discontinued for the rest of the school year.

But Cabral's fellow officers knew that the lieutenant would have wanted to continue the program for the good of the students, and officers from Somerset and Swansea have made that a reality.

"After the tragic loss of Lt. Cabral, Somerset Police Chief Joseph Ferreira called us asking what his department could do to help keep our DARE program going," said Swansea Police Chief George Arruda. "Because our own School Resource Officer Shane Mello was not yet DARE-certified, Chief Ferreira said he had two officers that were willing to help keep our (DARE) program going."

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