Law Enforcement 101

In early August, I posted on my Facebook that I had been accepted into the local law enforcement Citizens Academy. Within a day, that post had 67 likes from my friends and family…one of my more popular posts! I’m not sure whether they were happy for me or thought that I needed some straightening out!

I have completed week four of the 11-week course and so far it has been interesting and in some cases, fun. The academy was developed to give the general public a more up close and personal look at what our law enforcement officers deal with on a regular basis. I decided to apply for it for several reasons. I wanted to build a better working relationship between the Saline County Commission on Aging and local law enforcement. It’s not that we have a bad relationship. I just think it could be stronger. I also wanted to participate because I have always had an interest in what law enforcement personnel do. I grew up in a time when it was the in thing to have a radio scanner in one’s home. I chunk of my childhood was listening to 10 codes. The other reason was because of my uncle. He was in the Citizens Academy in 1994. He died before he could finish the class, so I am finishing for the family.

The academy was shut down a number of years ago, but our new police chief, Brad Nelson, who was used to having an academy at his previous post, visited with Saline County Sheriff Glen Kochanowski about restarting the academy. The two of them, along with numerous personnel from both the Salina Police Department and the Saline County Sheriff’s Office put the program together and my class is the first one in the new era!

Our first night included a tour of the jail and of the law enforcement complex. I had toured the jail a few years ago, but it has changed since then. On my first tour, two of the prisoner pods were for men and one was for women. At that time the jail was full. Now, two of the pods are used to house women, some of the men are housed at other facilities, and the jail is still full. As our tour guide put it, the women are wanting to be as tough as the men and are doing more crimes that in the past were only associated with men. Also, long time law enforcement personnel are now seeing the children and grandchildren of people they arrested years ago being booked into jail. Perhaps if we could find a way to break that cycle we could reduce crime.

I also thought the approach in dealing with the prisoners was interesting and one that could be applied to the outside world as well. Our tour guide said that when dealing with prisoners, corrections personnel cannot act as though they are better than the prisoners. “I am no better than they are. I just made better choices,” she said.

My group began its tour of the law enforcement complex in the public lobby of the police department. We were buzzed through the door into the police department and a few steps down the hallway we came to a memorial to Patrolman Jerry Ivey (yes, the man for whom the park was named), who was killed while pursuing a robbery suspect near Thomas Park in north Salina in June of 1975. Included were his badge and other hardware he wore on his uniform, as well as a rubbing of his name from the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial in Washington, D.C.

A bit further down the hallway was a room used for children who have been taken out of bad family situations. Instead of making the children sit in an office, the Police Department has created an inviting, kid-friendly room in which the children can stay until they are picked up by relatives or child services personnel. The room is dedicated in the memory of Christopher Abercrombie, the five-year-old boy who was murdered along with his grandmother (Carol Abercrombie) and great-grandmother (Dolores McKim) in McKim’s home in July of 1996.

While winding through the labyrinth of hallways, we passed numerous offices and meeting rooms, evidence lockers, an evidence lab, the dispatch area, Emergency Management offices, and a wall dedicated to the retired dogs of the canine unit. We also came to a room on the upper level near the Chief’s office that serves as a sort of museum for the Police Department. In it are an old log book, various weapons confiscated from criminals, weapons used over the years by the Police, a list of the retired officers, and photos/details of the Police personnel killed in the line of duty over the years.

Many, many photos of various personnel line the walls of the Sheriff’s Office.  In the conference room are photos of most of the sheriffs, including one who, as it turns out, was the grandfather of one of my friends. Display cases with numerous Sheriff’s Office artifacts and some creative items made by prisoners in the jail (a cowboy hat made of toilet paper mache, for instance) line one hallway. Recognition/appreciation of personnel achievement was quite evident.

Coming up next: Dogs, Dispatch, DUIs, and Dents