Abdussabur is the founding executive director of CTRIBAT, a three-year-old New Haven youth development program created in the wake of the closing of the Dixwell Q House. It is dedicated to enhancing the spirit of self-preservation and mental coping skills of at risk teens in the Dixwell area.

Abdusabbur, a ten-year veteran of the New Haven force, was initiating CTRIBAT's gun violence prevention workshop, held at the Wexler-Grant School Friday. It was one of the most critical offerings in his summer-intensive, but year-long "camp" designed, in his words, "to take kids who are on what we call the bubble, who are exposed to guns and gun violence all the time, and may soon be confronted with decisions about guns that will change their lives."
"We call it a camp," explained Abdusabbur, "but it's really a program that builds strength of mind and spirit and creates opportunity for these kids. In a world unfortunately inundated with guns, these boys need the role models, the information, and most of all coping skills and moral and mental strength to resist bad choices that will doom them to become statistics."
Enrollment, which has nearly 50 boys (there's a separate program for girls) in two age groups, 9 to 12 and 14 to 16, spiked in the immediate aftermath of the shooting death of thirteen-year-old Jajauna Cole, who was known by many of the program's participants.
Many parents, such as Tiffany Franklin, who has three sons, Jammal, Deangelo, and Xavier, and a cousin Milton enrolled in CTRIBAT's programs, said, "I live in the building where Jajauna was shot, and I can't for the life of me figure out what all this battling about turf is about. It's such a shame kids have to be exposed to this stuff. We heard about this program, which has hiking and trips, and it is good for the boys."
The trips the boys will go on are not all of the traditional camping variety. On Tuesday, July 12, for example, they will be going to the correctional facility on Whalley Avenue. "You will see how big a cell is, you will see what the prisoners eat, you will see what it means to have your freedom limited. If knowledge is power," Abdusabbur said, in the you-can-do-it-despite-the odds spirit of inspiration, which he combines with a hard-hitting aversion-therapy technique unique to CRITBAT, "then you will emerge from today's workshop as supermen."
Abdusabbur's voice â€" and role model â€" was not the only one. For the workshop he assembled, among others, police Lt. Herman Badger of the and Kashif Abdul Karim, from the Office of Juvenile Parole, patrolman Carl Myers, who is Abdusabbur's NHPD partner, and officer Russell Blackwell.
"I don't want to meet these kids for the first time when something bad happens," said Blackwell, who grew up in the Hill and has been on the force for two years. He's one of several volunteers Abdusabbur has recruited from among many police colleagues, who support the program with gifts of time and money. Blackwell plans to go camping with the participants so he can get to know the kids over a campfire, and not through gunfire.
"Grown men, on parole," explained Parole Officer Abdul Karim, "will ask you to carry a gun for them and tell you it's not crime because of your age, so that even if you're caught, nothing will happen. I'm here to tell you that's dead wrong. And I emphasize the dead. You will go into the juvenile system. Even at age 14 you can be bounced up from the juvenile system if the crime is serious enough. You need to know what you are getting into. And know that the system is not kind."
"As far as a police officer is concerned," explained Badger, "whether you withdraw a b.b. gun, a butane lighter 'gun' or a real gun, it's a gun. You could get shot by the officer, and if you don't, any firearm violation will get you eighteen months as a juvenile. And after that, you may actually be ordered not to visit your home community for four years. That's called exile. Anybody in this group not want to be able to come home for four years? Anyone want to be sent to Arkansas, where your family can visit you maybe once a year?"
For a moment, only a brief moment, but perhaps that was enough, every single set of youthful eyes was riveted on Officer Badger. These included Curtis Cobb, age 13 of the Troup School, and Gary Henderson and Jammal Cunningham, who go to Wexler Grant, and DeAngelo Franklin, who goes to Hillhouse. Cunningham is Tiffany Franklin's son. They are all related, brothers, cousins, relatives, friends, united in a struggle against a world of guns and gun temptation.
"Everyone in this room," said Officer Badger," has an irreconcilable moment when you need to change, to resist, or you will get in deep trouble, and worse, for if current statistics hold, one in four of you will be on my caseload."
Not if this program can help it. Was it working?
"I think the cops should raid every house in the world," said 13-year old Curtis Cobb, who lives on Shelton Avenue, "and take away all the guns."
Until that happens, there's this important program. (Click here to learn more or to register your kids or to make a gift.) "I'm a police officer," said Abdusabbur, "but this is my life's work, artistic work of saving lives. If we had the funding, we could do one of these in Newhalville, one in Fair Haven. This is my Mona Lisa for the community where I grew up."
Bravo.