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The death of a Tampa man in police custody in April 2014 is the genesis of a new law taking effect today. As Mike Vasilinda tells us, from now on, police will be trained to know the difference between intoxication and a diabetic seizure.

Arthur Green was stopped for driving erratically. Police though he was intoxicated. He wasn’t…but was having a diabetic seizure. He died in 2014 after being transported to a hospital. Since his death, His family made it a crusade to get police better training.

Wife Lena Young says proper training could have saved her husband. “And had they recognized he was having an episode, they would have, should have called paramedics. They didn’t” says Young.

The family came to the Capitol en mass earlier this year as lawmakers ordered the training be offered.Son Arthur Green III says they are still trying to make sense of what happened.  “He lives through us and we just want to make sure that what has happened hasn’t gone in vain.”

The diabetic recognition training went on line Wednesday.

Police officers must undergo forty hours of training every four years. And while the diabetic recognition course isn’t mandatory, it will count against those hours.

Dwight Floyd is the director of training for the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

“What it does is help the officer distinguish between the symptoms of an intoxicated person or a person who is going through drug overdose and as person who’s actually diabetic” says Floyd.

Son Kareem Young says the passage of the legislation is a step in the right direction..for everyone.

“We’ve been doing a lot of work internal analysis as a family to heal ourselves, and this is joust one stage we believe we should move towards” says Young.

An estimated 29 million Americans are diabetic.

Arthur Green was 63 when he died. His family has a lawsuit pending against the Tampa Police Department.