Latest / APD Pod Squad / Episode 13; Detective Sonia Escobedo, Retired Lieutenant Jon Kirkpatrick, Officer Dennis Pace, and The History Minute with Hannah Silberman

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Episode 13; Detective Sonia Escobedo, Retired Lieutenant Jon Kirkpatrick, Officer Dennis Pace, and The History Minute with Hannah Silberman · APD Pod Squad

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_04: This is the APD Pod Squad.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_04: Coming up on this episode, we'll get to know the most senior member of the Ashville Police Department, Detective Sonia Escapito.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_04: Retired APD Lieutenant John Kirkpatrick sits down to discuss the manhunt for Michael John Shornock and what happened afterwards.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_04: Another edition of the History Minute with Hannah Silberman with a nod to Black History Month and Officer Dennis Pace of the Community Engagement Division will get to know Dennis.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_04: Thanks for tuning in.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_04: I'm Rick Rice, and this is the APD Pod Squad.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_04: Kicking off this episode by getting to know Detective Sonia Escobedo.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_04: And as we continue to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the Asheville Police Department focusing on history, we have with us the most senior member of the APD.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_04: Thank you so much for joining me today.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks for having me.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_04: Now, first of all, I should ask straight up so I don't get on your bad side, is it Sonia or Sonia?
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_02: Sonia.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_04: Sonia.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_04: See, I thought so because I did take three years of Spanish in high school.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_04: I don't remember anything, but I can still manage pronunciations.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_02: Perfect.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_04: That's my massive skill level for that.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_02: Perfect.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_04: As we continue to celebrate the Asheville Police Department's 150th anniversary, uh, this is another tie-in to that because you are our senior employee, and I say that with all the respect in the world.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_04: You could walk away at any minute, but you choose to remain and stay here.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_02: Um I've been here since 96.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_02: I've only worked for the Asheville Police Department.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_02: I've not worked for any other agencies.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_02: So this is my home.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_02: I grew up here per se and basically seen myself grow as a person, mature as a person, but also professionally.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_04: So it's your home now, but it's not where you were born.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_04: Where did you grow up and where were you born?
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so um from California, Los Angeles, California, around the Chinatown area, Capark.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_02: In 93, I graduated high school, and my parents decided that we were gonna move here to Asheville, and I've been here since then.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_04: Any chance you're a Dodgers fan?
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_02: I was a Dodgers fan.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_02: Uh my whole family is a Dodgers fan.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, that makes me happy.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_04: Because I am also a Dodgers fan.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_04: So how long were you in Los Angeles?
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_04: When did you leave?
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_04: Like how old were you?
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I was just right out of high school, graduated, had just turned 18.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_02: We took the uh Interstate 40 from LA and landed here in in Asheville where the rest of my family was uh waiting.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, so it wasn't just you that moved away to come pursue a career or do something, it was your whole family?
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_02: That's correct.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_04: I bet you have some pretty fond memories though, because uh growing up your early teen years and your younger years in Los Angeles, there's a lot to do out there.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_02: We had a lot of time, uh a lot of fun in the 80s.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_02: It was, you know, roller skating.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um we were free to go about our way.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_02: So we had Chinatown not far from where we lived, uh also downtown Los Angeles and Echo Park.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_02: So we were a group of kids of the same age and out exploring the world.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_04: You know, plus people think Los Angeles, California, that area, they think Hollywood, they think movie stars.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_04: I bet you had some encounters.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_02: Believe it or not, I did.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um, when I was age 13, I was start working a part-time job with uh my family, my aunts and my uncles who worked at a little convenience store.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_02: It looks uh something similar to the fresh market.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_02: Uh in Bel Air off of Mulholland Drive.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_02: I started working there.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_02: I started at the Delhi, then I started at the bakery uh or moved on to the bakery, and then I progressed into the uh cash register.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_02: So while running the register and ultimately the bakery, I got to meet some uh some movie stars.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_04: Who stands out?
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_04: Who was the biggest?
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_02: To me, the biggest that I was a huge fan of it was Tina Turner.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, Tina Turner, though.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_04: She strikes a presence.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, she's a amazing.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_02: Uh she's an amazing, amazing artist, as you know, and just uh walking through the door, it was like a glow to her.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_02: And she was so nice.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_02: So kind of she was there with her assistant.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_04: Did she look like I would expect her to look, or was she just kind of dressed down?
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_02: No, I can't remember.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_02: She she was not like look at me.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_02: Uh she she looked like very uh down to earth, very humble kind of person.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_04: So she wasn't wearing her six-inch heels that particular day with No, not at all.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_02: But that the you know, her hair is is quite uh stunning.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_02: So I mean she always does her her face up, her hair up.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, just a beautiful individual.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Powell So grew up in Los Angeles, moved to Asheville, North Carolina what year?
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_02: In ninety three.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_04: In nineteen ninety three?
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_04: What prompted you to join the Asheville Police Department?
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_02: My grandmother and my father, primarily my father, he he wanted something better for me, for his kids um in life, and he saw a potential in me.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_02: And he ultimately led me to to the police department and I think he actually brought me the application and he's like, here you go, here put in for put in for the uh police department, made sure that he made me feel like they had my back, my support, and didn't feel like I was not gonna be capable of of of such an uh accomplishment.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_02: And thereafter, my grandmother was a huge supporter of that.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_04: So we're getting to know Detective Sonia Escobido, who's been here since what was your year of graduation from B L E T?
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_04: 1996.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_04: So you are the senior employee, be it uh non-sworn or sworn, I believe, in the entire department.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_02: Believe so.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_04: That's quite the honor, right?
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_04: I know people probably ask you all the time, how much longer are you gonna be here?
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_04: And you you've told me you don't know.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_02: Every day I run into somebody once once the last day.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_02: Um I've had a great career.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_02: I see this as a career profession.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_02: As any place that you're longer than uh a couple of years, you're gonna have ups and downs.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_02: But I love it here.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_02: I love the uh community that we serve, even with the challenges that we deal with.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_02: Uh love the the folks that I work with.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_04: And you're not the only Escobido here?
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_02: I'm I've now have a cousin that is following the steps.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_04: So that's gonna make you proud, right?
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_02: I feel like this job, this profession, is it is a passion.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_02: It's in your and it's in your blood.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_02: I feel that it's in my blood.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_02: I enjoy getting up in the morning knowing that I'm gonna come into work and looking forward to whatever the team has planned out for today and what we're gonna go out and and and accomplish.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_04: So you're currently a detective, but nobody starts there.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_04: Correct.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_04: So what else have you done in your long and illustrious career with the Asheville Police Department?
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_02: So I worked um patrol.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_02: We were platoons when I first started.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_02: I was on first platoon.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_02: Uh we worked at rotating shifts nights and days.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_02: Uh thereafter I went we went to permanent shifts.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_02: I worked night shift for patrol for about nine years, nine and a half.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_02: And then I put him for uh canine.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_02: I was able to uh had the uh the privilege to work with uh a dog, uh Melamois, and his name was Racker.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_02: So I worked with Racker, we were partners for seven and a half years.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_02: So he was a great dog, very stubborn, very uh independent in his thinking.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_02: So he's like challeng would challenge me.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_02: But I feel like we managed to understand each other.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_02: Uh the more we trained with each other, the more we were successful in in what we were to accomplish.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_04: So we're getting to know Detective Sonia Escobito.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_04: As part of this segment, we always ask maybe one, maybe several unique items, something that you've been here so long, people probably know most everything about you.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_04: But maybe what's something they don't know about you?
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_02: I say those that are close to me might already know, but I'm a huge soccer fan.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_02: More in particularly uh the women's national team.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_02: So I try to follow them as as best as I can.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and if I can afford it too.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_02: I have to, you know, I have four years to follow them wherever the World Cup is.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um so I've had the fortune to follow them to Canada when they were in Canada.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_02: And then they went to um uh France.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_02: I did not go to Australia.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_02: It was uh an expense I could not make at that time.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_02: But I was making sure that I watched every single single game.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_04: So did you get to meet Mia Hamm when she was in town here in the early 2000s?
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_04: I remember she visited.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_04: I met her that day.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_04: Uh that was uh I was working in radio, of course, at the time, and she was making an appearance at Ingalls on Brevard Road, I believe.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_04: I don't know if she did other ones, but were you there for that?
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_02: Unfortunately I was not.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_04: She was wonderful.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_02: I I hear that she's a great person.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_04: So did you play soccer yourself?
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_02: Not uh not in any school capacity, uh street, just on the streets with the the children uh of the neighborhood.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_02: We would just, you know, hang out and play soccer.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_04: So have you seen the women's team win a major championship, either an Olympics or a world championship or things along those lines?
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell Uh I've been there for the games, uh, but I did not stick around uh France or Canada when they actually won the the championship.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_02: But I was there before the championship game, if that makes sense.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_04: Uh it does.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_04: Uh I confess, not a soccer fan.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_04: Uh don't dislike it either.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_04: It was just something I wasn't exposed to much growing up.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_04: The the sports that I played usually occurred at the same time of the year and the same season, and so I just never got into it.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_04: I will say this about soccer fans, like yourself, probably.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_04: And it's the one thing where I probably could relate to it is their passion.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_04: When you see them attending a game with especially with their country, it seems like the chance in the stands and the enthusiasm, it's kind of what I would attribute to as a Buffalo Bills fan.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_04: It's kind of a the mania that takes place, just kind of it's just all-encompassing when you're there.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, absolutely.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_02: It's the best time.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_02: You just let loose and cheer for them and yell at the top of your lungs and raise your fist up in the air, and every time they score, you celebrate.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_04: And part of that's probably because the scoring doesn't happen that often.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_02: So it's That's correct.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_04: You can go to a whole game and not see a goal.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_04: So when it does happen, I can see why you'd be excited about it.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_04: So you've been here since 1996.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_04: We're coming up on 30 years, just shy of 30 years.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_02: Correct.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_02: I think as of the end of this month, I'll be 29 years in, actually.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_04: So you've seen a lot, a lot of changes in those years.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_04: And we've spoken spoken with some other officers that have been around for a while that have mentioned the same thing.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, I arrived here a few years after you joined the department.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_04: I got to Asheville in 1999.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_04: I know what I've seen, that's like the big changes that I have seen.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_04: With your job and just living here and what you've seen, what would you say is the biggest difference, the biggest change in either what you do or what the city is in those three decades?
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_02: I've seen the city grow.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_02: I remember when I worked downtown, a lot of the just patrolling downtown, a lot of this the businesses were boarded up.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_02: There was not much activity, per se tourism, the the restaurants.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_02: We have amazing restaurants.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_02: The food here in Nashville is is amazing.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_02: All the breweries that we have, they're also amazing.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_02: Back then we didn't have any of that.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so that's great change.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_02: We flourished as a as a as a city.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_02: Uh we attract a lot of tourism, but unfortunately Helene happened.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_04: I think we're seeing a decline of Yeah, definitely, but hopefully a temporary decline.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_04: But we did miss out on our busiest time of the year for tourism, which is fall, and so a lot of businesses suffered, and unfortunately, some had to close their doors permanently, including some longstanding, well-established restaurants.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_04: You mentioned restaurants and food.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_04: Do you have a favorite restaurant?
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_02: I don't have a favorite, because I I I enjoy all types of food.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_02: So I've I like to experiment different flavors, so uh no, not not one in particular.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_04: I guess people would think naturally, because of your heritage, you would uh instantly go toward like uh like curate or some one of the Spanish tapas restaurants or something like that.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_04: But you like all the different varieties?
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_02: Oh absolutely.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_02: I love Indian uh mala's, uh Chi Pawnee, I think Layla's downtown now, the uh Shanghai uh on Biltmore Avenue, they have uh great Chinese food.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_02: You know, coming from uh Chinatown, uh I still can't find Chinese as good as the Chinese food in in Los Angeles and Chinatown where I grew up.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_04: Isn't that always the way it is, though, when when an area specializes in something, even though another area might do that type of restaurant, it's not the same.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_04: That's correct.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_04: I I mean, where I grew up, Buffalo, not exactly known as a culinary destination, yet there's a few things they do spectacularly well.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_04: Chicken wings and things like that.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_04: You can order them anywhere, but I'm here to tell you they don't taste like they do there.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_04: So it's the same thing with Chinese food, huh?
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_02: I keep trying.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_02: I'm looking, I'm trying to find the the place that I can say it's as close to, but I've I've yet to find it.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_04: Well, if someone's listening to this podcast and has a suggestion where Detective Escobido should go for amazing Chinese food, see we have this email as part of the APD podcast, and you could just send us that suggestion.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_04: APD Podcastfeedback at AshevilleNC.gov.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_04: So Excellent.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_04: We'll try and get your answer and find that place if it exists.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_02: Looking forward to.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_04: And I enjoyed getting to know you.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_04: Detective Sonia Escobido, you let us know when you decide on that retirement date because we've got to make that big announcement.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, excellent.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_02: I'll uh maybe one day I'll wake up in the morning and say, you know, today's the day.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_04: You gotta let me know that day because we're gonna have you back on one more time.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_02: All right.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_02: Sounds like a plan.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_04: In episodes two and three of the APD Pod Squad, Detective Sam DeGrave shared the story of the manhunt for Michael John Shornock, which happened the week of Thanksgiving in the year 1986.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_04: Almost 500 law enforcement officers gathered near Sugar Loaf Mountain outside Hendersonville in the search effort, including about a dozen members of the Asheville Police Department.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_04: Among them was Officer John Kirkpatrick, now retired, who took the shot that ended the manhunt and the life of Michael John Shornock.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_04: Joining me now is John Kirkpatrick, retired downtown district commander, to talk about the manhunt and what happened as a result, the formation of Asheville's first emergency response team.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_04: John, thanks for joining me today.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_04: Thanks for having me, Rick.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_04: The year for the manhunt was 1986, but let's go back further than that to the year you joined the Asheville Police Department.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_04: What year would that have been?
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_03: I joined in October of 79.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_03: Just shortly prior to that, gotten out of the Marine Corps and joined the PD and was assigned to the uh life narcotics detective when in 86 when the uh Shhornock incident happened.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_04: And when did you retire from the Ashville Police Department?
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_03: Oh five.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_03: Oh five.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yes, I have.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_03: You miss it at all?
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_03: I missed the guys.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_03: I missed the uh fun stuff, I miss the camaraderie.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_03: And uh, you know, just coming into the building and seeing the chief and deputy chief Artima, who both used to work for me, i it was great bringing back memories.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_03: But yeah, I missed the the fun stuff and the guys uh and gals.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_04: So you know I'm sure things have changed since you're retired.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_04: My goodness.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, uh even when you were a part, if you think of when you started to what's happening like right now, first of all, obviously in the 70s, you know, cellular technology didn't exist, drones didn't exist, body cameras, I don't think existed, any of those things.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_03: No, computers, none of that.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_03: Well, computers existed, but uh computers in the car, most of us were using wheel guns and uh just little six-shot revolvers, and no long guns were assigned to anybody in the in the police department.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_03: So yeah, a lot of huge changes.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_03: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_04: You know, we were talking with Hannah Silberman, who's kind of our resident historian, about some of the things as you go way back to 1875.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_04: You want to go back 150 years as we celebrate the anniversary this year.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, they didn't have flashlights even.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_04: So I I mean, how rudimentary was policing in 1875, and then you flash forward to now.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_03: It was uh funny when I first started, not the first day, but one of the first days hired, we had to get uniforms.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_03: And where we got our uniforms, and we went up to the top of the this building in the old jail, and there were piles of uniforms just laid out that people previous to us had worn.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_03: And you picked your your way through them to get your sizes of pants and shirts.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_03: And uh I think they gave you uh a leather belt and a police baton and a gun and six rounds of ammunition and everything else you provided.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_04: And so obviously, even then when you joined, there's there was no there was no stun guns, there was no no goodness.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_04: Nothing like that.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_04: So all the things that are, you know, that exist now that didn't exist then.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_04: So we just kind of roll with the punches, though.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_04: Let's talk about 1986.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_04: Now that's a year I remember well because in the fall of 1986, I was a freshman in college.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_04: The Shhornock manhunt happened during the week of Thanksgiving.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_04: I would have been home on Thanksgiving break, and you were probably getting ready to celebrate Thanksgiving with your family.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_04: And I'm sure then uh roundabout then you got the news.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_04: How did you hear that you would be involved in the Michael Shhornock manhunt that occurred uh near Hendersonville, essentially, Edneyville?
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_03: We uh heard about it, I think a day or two prior, just you know, that it was going on through Henderson County.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_03: The chief, Fred Hensley at the time, got a request from Henderson County for mutual aid assistance.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_03: He put it out and asked for volunteers that he needed 10 or 12 people to go down there.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_03: Most of the folks that did go down there from these volunteers were from the detective office because we weren't on the road and it wasn't going to really uh impact the department as much to uh pull us as it did to pull people from the road to go down there.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_03: We got the volunteers and we uh went home and changed clothes and geared up with what whatever we had and uh loaded up into cars and and headed that way.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_04: Trevor Burrus So there was no standard at that time.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_04: It wasn't you in particular uniforms or particular things you took with you.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_04: You just probably thought you were going on a you know, to be crafts a hunting trip of sorts.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_04: You probably dressed like you were going into the woods.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_04: That's exactly right.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_03: You just dressed warm because it was cold and rainy and wet and uh so you dressed warm, or I did, and I had some camouflage gear from the Marine Corps that I wore.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_04: Now, did you take your personal weapon with you?
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_04: Because I know you had a long rifle.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_04: Was that a department issued or was that yours?
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_03: No, that long rifle, uh it was a shotgun.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_03: I had the raymonton, it was department, and I think we had been issued those and kept it in the trunk of my police vehicle, my detective car.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_03: So I just pulled it out of the trunk and some AMO and my handgun, because I was in Vice, we weren't weren't required to carry the Model 66, I think it was, the revolver that the street guys were carrying.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_03: So I was carrying a Browning high power.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_04: So do you remember how many Asheville Police Department officers joined you on that?
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_03: About a dozen, ten or twelve.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_04: And did did you go out there altogether?
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_03: We convoyed in about three or four police cars.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_04: Prior to your arrival, there had been two Henderson County Sheriff's deputies that had been shot by Shornock, and another sustained injuries from shards of glass off his windshield of his cruiser as part of a police chase when Shhornock fired back at them and hit the windshield, so the interior glass had gone into his eyes.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_04: Thankfully, none of those officers were killed, but three wounded.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_04: Did you know any of them?
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_03: Back in 86, law enforcement as a community was a little bit closer knit than it is now.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_03: The Henderson County deputy that was shot in the face knew his brother, because his brother was a deputy here in Buncombe County.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_03: I knew one of the uh highway patrol officers got involved.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_03: It was either uh, I think, shot in the magazine in his leg.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_03: When the chief got requested to provide mutual aid to Henderson County, you know, it was almost personal for a lot of us folks.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, we wanted to go help, and it was almost our duty to go help.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Powell Yeah, not just as a member of the law enforcement community, but you were helping your friends.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_03: Aaron Powell Yes, and our community.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_03: You know, not just the law enforcement community, but the community that we lived and resided, and people we knew.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Powell He'd already done damage.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_04: He'd already shot two people, and who knows how much more damage could have been done.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_04: Yes.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_03: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_03: We were under the impression that uh the two people that were dead were because of him.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_03: You know, before uh you know all the information has come out, you know, we just took all the law enforcement assumed that he had killed two people other than the ones he had shot at that party that he had attended, that house party.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_03: The information we got was that he had killed people there.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_04: So plus he may or may not have killed somebody in Georgia that they just they they to this day, I guess they never really confirmed that, but that sounds like it could have been him.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_04: Could have been.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_04: So much more damage could have been done if you guys didn't step up when you did.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_04: That's right.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_04: That's right.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_04: So let's fast forward to you arrive on the scene.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_04: What do you remember most about kind of the first time you arrived at the location?
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_03: We went to a uh local fire station or a church where they were using it as the uh command post.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_03: You went inside and there was a lot of officers middling around.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_03: And uh I think Lee Carver, who was a lieutenant in the detective office at the time, I think he was the uh senior ranking officer, and I think he liaisoned with uh the folks there in Henderson County.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_03: We got our assignments, and uh, I was on the perimeter stuck out.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_03: I went they dropped me off in the woods uh on the perimeter of where they thought, you know, trying to keep him within this perimeter.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_03: I sat at the base of a tree for about six or seven hours.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_04: So based on what they knew.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_03: Trevor Burrus, Jr.: Not my vicinity exactly, no.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_03: No.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_03: They just knew he was within a perimeter, and it was a uh pretty large area.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Ross Powell Yeah.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_04: Let's fast forward now after six hours braced against a tree to when he was spotted.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_04: I understand that occurred just outside of a farmhouse, a farm?
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_03: It was on uh Sugarloaf Mountain.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_03: And our assignment uh that day was I think a lot of those residents up there had been vacated, and I think they were cleared a day or two prior to, but they had been vacant.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_03: So the guys in charge wanted to clear those buildings again using the SBI's team, their tactical team, and they were dropping off individual, they were playing was dropping off individuals, officers at each of those residences after they've been cleared to keep them secure.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_03: So we were in, I don't know, four or five vehicles.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_03: And there was three or four of us in the uh, if I remember right, we were uh going up side uh mountain, sugarloaf mountain, and we had cleared a couple houses and had dropped folks off, and uh we're still continuing up the mountain, and the uh tactical team was in front of us.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_03: You know, they were at the head of the convoy type thing.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_03: We were proceeding up, and there's four or five of us in the bed of a pickup truck.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_03: And we heard shots, several shots, and we jumped out and I jumped out and looked to where the shots were coming from, could see a barn type thing.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_03: It was uh again, if I remember right, it was an open-faced barn with different stalls in it.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_03: And could see a man running with his arm held up, running away from the barn.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_03: You could see he was the SBI agent, you know, he was in a tactical vest type thing.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_03: He was running away because he had been shot.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, wow.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_03: So me and uh one of the guys that went down there with us was an ABC agent by the name of Jack Bradley.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_03: And he was with the alcohol beverage control board.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_03: And because I was working Vice at the time, him and I had worked a lot of different things together.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_04: Sure.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_03: So he was tagging along.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_03: So the two of us jumped out.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_03: I looked to my right, could see the man running, could see the barn, and to the left of the barn, could see another man running, and he was carrying uh a long gun with a magazine.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_03: I could see that.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_03: We had ran a few twenty feet, maybe, through the woods.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_03: I saw him and yelled to Jack.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_03: I said, There he is.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_03: He said, Where?
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_03: And I said, right there, and I was pointing at him.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_03: And he said, right where, goddammit.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_03: And it was hu it's humorous now.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_03: But that that was the uh the way it happened.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_03: So he was blocked by a tree or just Or he wasn't looking in the right place.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_03: So the woods.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_03: Everyone anyone that looked into the woods, hard to spot stuff.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_03: Sure.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_03: I fired.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_03: I took the shotgun and fired around.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_03: The guy spun and wasn't aiming at me, but I think he spun back towards the barn and with the rifle kind of at his hip type thing, and sprayed a couple more rounds, turned back around and was running that.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_03: And in the meantime, I thought I had run about 10, 15 feet to get cover behind the tree.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_03: Fired another round and he dropped.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_03: Just, you know, just dropped.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_03: No running a few feet and dropped, just dropped like he'd been smacked on the top of the head with uh a board.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_03: He just crumbled.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_03: So about how far away was he?
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_03: It was they told me later it was 90-something yards, but I don't uh it didn't seem that far, you know.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_03: And I think they may have measured, because it was through a ravine and they may have measured linear feet going down the ravine instead of straight across.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_03: It just didn't seem that far to me.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_04: Still a heck of a shot.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_03: You know, um my memory kind of played tricks at the time because I said I ran 10 feet and uh fired another shot, but the photo evidence in the photo records that they took afterwards showed two shotgun cell shells laying side by side, and I hadn't moved an inch.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_03: Wow.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_03: But then uh after we fell, me and Jack, and by this time a uh a sergeant Gene Simmons had hooked up with us, and we made our way down the ravine and up the ravine, keeping trying to keep him covered, got to him, and he was very obviously dead.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_03: So we uh took the rifle and and moved it aside and went ahead and cuffed him.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_03: You know, just I don't know why we did.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_03: Well, you know, but you know better safe than sorry.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_03: I think we waited for till the SBI, till some SBI folks got there, then went back to where the vehicles were and got back to the church and or the fire station and went through, you know, an hour or two debrief with the SBI.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_04: So and that's how it happened.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_04: Retired, longtime member of the Asheville Police Department, John Kirkpatrick joins me right now as we discuss the Michael John Shornock manhunt from 1986.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_04: So at what point did a conversation begin, and and maybe you remember who began it, that we need a unit to do this specifically.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_03: We probably started on the way back, you know.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_03: On the car ride.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_03: On the car ride back, we were talking.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_03: I think Randy Cogburn, he was an I think he was another sergeant at the time, was one of the guys that had gone down and uh and when we got back, we had a kind of a debrief at the police department.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_03: And I think it was uh it was brought up then too that you know something we can go up against them.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_03: Uh the guy I was with Jack Bradley, he had his personal handgun and a shotgun issued by his agency.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_03: I think somebody may have brought their deer rifle with a scope, but I think the majority of us were carrying our issued handguns or our personal handguns and uh Remington 870 is a shotgun.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_04: Well, as everybody knows, nothing moves fast in the world of bureaucracy when it comes to government.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_04: So I'm sure this uh it wasn't just a matter of days or weeks before something official happened.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_04: So uh do you remember much of the process, how that how that came to be?
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_03: I know they had talked about it, and the brass here at the uh police department realized that it was needed.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_03: So I think they uh told somebody, and it may have been Carver, it may have been Sergeant Randy Cogburn, too, to uh go ahead and start the uh process of finding out what gear we needed, what type of individuals we needed, and it didn't take a whole lot of time.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_03: You know, I think within I I'm sure within a year, you know, we had the rudiments of a team with gear and and stuff like that.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_04: So was there any kind of uh training for that first ERT team, or was it just like, okay, it's gonna be you, you, you, and you know.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_03: No, I think it's pretty much we had volunteers, and uh I think it was pretty much, yeah, I'll take you.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_03: They may have interviewed and and took into account, you know, their history at the department, any military type history they had, what they did in the military, if they did have military experience, uh how long they've been around, you know, that sort of stuff.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_04: I imagine it was probably a lot of the guys that were on that Shornock manhunt.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_03: Uh actually, no.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_03: Cogburn, I think, wound up being in charge.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_03: Kevin West, uh, I think he was out there and he joined it, but uh Walt Robertson didn't join it.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_03: Levon Warren didn't join it, Lee Carver didn't join it.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_04: So you weren't a member of the original ERT.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_04: You were definitely a part of the formation of the original ERT, emergency response team for those listening that aren't in the cop world.
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_04: Uh a lot of people would just say SWAT.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_04: Pretty much the same thing.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_04: I remember the TV show that was at the time SWAT.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_04: But I don't think most police departments at that time in the late 80s, they had a unit like that.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_04: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_03: I wasn't aware of them.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_03: I know the state did.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_03: Henderson County may have, maybe when I said state, maybe the FBI, and I don't think the Higher Patrol did, but they may have.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_04: Now it seems pretty standard.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_04: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_03: I think so.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_03: I think so.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_04: Almost everybody has some unit, large or small, and to some extent, like obviously the Asheville Police Department has a vehicle and a lot more, you know, obviously technology than some smaller departments.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_04: But I think just about everyone recognizes the value at this point.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_04: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_03: You almost have to have it.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_03: They uh once the situation gets so bad that uh it's beyond the capability of the routine patrol folks, it's you know, if they're gonna be spending all kinds of time at the scene and you know, if it's so bad, yeah, you've got to have one.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_03: The patrol units, to me, have the more difficult task because they're getting right there on the scene when it's hot, when nobody knows what's going on except them, and they don't have the equipment that the uh SWAT guys have.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_03: So to me, the patrol units are the ones that uh are the heroes or you know the the the the ones that are have it the toughest.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_04: So even though you were a detective at the time of that incident, you ended up moving to patrol, right?
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_04: And because you were a district commander?
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_03: Correct.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_03: Uh yeah, I was uh I spent several years in Vice Narcotics, four or five years in General Assignment in the detective office.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_03: After some time there, decided I'd like to go back to patrol.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_03: And the uh patrol commander at the time was the ex-chief Will Anorino, and he was in the detective office when he was uh lieutenant detective office when I was down there.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_03: So I went to Will and said, you know, I'd like to be go back to patrol.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_03: He said, Yeah, come on.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_03: Went back to patrol and I think for in about a year just did routine patrol and then was promoted and then was promoted again.
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_03: Uh yeah, patrol to me is the greatest place in the police department to be.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_04: So I moved to Asheville in 1999 when it was just kind of uh turning the corner, really.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_04: It was starting to develop as a destination.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_04: Uh downtown, a lot of the buildings were were not fully occupied, but we're getting there.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_04: You know, the brewery business had just started, things of that nature.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_04: So, but you were there, and I hear stories from the folks that when it was like in the 80s and the 90s, so how different was downtown Asheville during your era of patrol versus, like, say, early 2000s and even now?
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_03: Unbelievably different.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_03: Downtown had two or three uh places that were open at night, and they were usually dive bar type things.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_03: There was no pedestrian traffic.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_03: When you were working at midnights, one of the things it was slow, you know, there weren't a lot of calls for service.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_03: And one of the things that we would do for just to pass the time is in the cruisers, we played hide and seek in the downtown area.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_03: So, you know, you had the time to do it.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_03: The people weren't out, they're but now it's just so much different.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_04: It's hard for people to understand now that there's nobody downtown.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_04: But this much I know from just you know researching a little bit, they created the Bel Share Festival to bring people downtown because there weren't people coming downtown.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_05: Yep.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_04: A portion of downtown almost got bulldozed to for a mall.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_04: That's right.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_04: Could you imagine that?
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_03: No, no, I can't.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_03: That'd be uh it'd be something.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_04: But I guess the big impediment to that was they didn't have the money.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_04: So the lack of funding for that actually ended up saving what's a lot of great architecture and character for the city.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_04: Because imagine the Asheville Mall plopped down right in the middle of downtown Asheville.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_03: Aaron Powell That'd be sad.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_03: It would be Yeah, it would be sad.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_03: Asheville has changed so much since I've been here.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_03: You know, and I've been here since 79.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_03: Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_04: So you moved here in 79 the same year you started with the police department.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_03: I moved here because of the police department.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_03: I had just gotten out of the Marine Corps and was over in Wilson, North Carolina.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_03: And Asheville offered me a job, so I uh moved here because of of that.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Powell And retired for 20 years and you stayed here, so you must love it, right?
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and my family's here.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_03: I've got family here.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_03: My mom and and stepdad subsequently moved over, and uh my son was born here, and my daughter lives here.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_03: So now, you know, I'm I'm here until uh the grandkids decide to leave or go someplace and I'll follow them wherever they go.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_04: So well, we appreciate you joining us today and talking a little bit about that time back in 1986, which at the time was the largest manhunt in North Carolina history.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_04: Yes.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_03: My family, I've got extended family in California, Illinois, Florida.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_03: They all had heard about it when they heard I was involved.
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_03: They just said couldn't believe it because they were talking about it, you know, like I said, in California and Illinois.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_03: Because it wasn't that common back then.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_03: It wasn't just a local store.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_03: No, it was nice.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, it was yeah, it was unbelievable.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_04: Well, you got him.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_04: It it it did end well for you, but not for him.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I'm sorry I had to come to that for his fa or his family's sake, but uh he made choices and left us none.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_04: So it seemed like the result was inevitable.
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_03: I think so.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_03: I think so.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_04: John Kirkpatrick, retired downtown district commander.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_04: Thanks for joining us today.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_04: Thank you.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_04: It's time again for the History Minute with Hannah Silberman, the official APD historian.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_04: Thanks for joining us.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_00: Glad to be here.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_04: Sorry, there's no raise that comes with that title, but we are going to make this an official segment for the remainder of the year as we celebrate the 150th anniversary of the Asheville Police Department.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_04: And as we'd mentioned the last time that you were here, we're going to try and tie something in historically that also kind of corresponds with when this episode lands.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_04: So in this case, we're talking end of February, early March, looking back in history into the annals of the APD and something historic that happened.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_04: So what do you have for us in this week's History Minute with Hannah Silberman?
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_00: In February of 1946, the department hired our first black police officers.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_04: That's pretty historic.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_04: And as we celebrate Black History Month, a perfect timing.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_00: It is.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I mean, as early as 1943, black citizens had petitioned Ashle City Council for the addition of black officers.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_00: At the same time, they were asking for things like public restrooms for black community members and many other sort of reasonable requests.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: But that continued for many years until in 1946, uh Chief Dermud said that yep, we're hiring two black police officers.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_04: So 1946, I mean, for most of our listeners right now, that will trigger thoughts of the end of World War II, where at least at the outset, black soldiers were relegated mostly to activities behind the lines, not frontline combat.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_04: Things like cooking, cleaning, working in motor pools, administration, things like that.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_04: As the war progressed, many did end up seeing combat.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_04: And then upon return from the war, I'm sure they expected some of the same advances here.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, and also they took the place of two temporary officers who were hired during World War II, so they had the leverage to hire more officers right at that time, which was good.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_00: And actually Gilbert Sly, who's one of those first black police officers, was a World War II veteran.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: He was a corporal in a tank company.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_04: How about that?
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_04: So he actually was fighting that if he was a corporal in a tank company.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_04: So in 1946, so we're talking about now at that point the APD is at the halfway mark to where we are now.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_04: So about 75 years came a long way from its origination in 1875, but still not quite there yet.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_04: So where would the training have been around then in the mid-40s?
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_04: What kind of training would a new officer like these have received?
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_00: Most new officers got no training, no or very little training.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: They were sort of expected to learn on the job.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_00: You were likely given a hand-me-down uniform, you bought your own gun, and you just went out on the street and hoped that a senior officer would let you know what to do.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Powell So kind of hang out with Larry and do what he tells you to do.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_04: Was there anything official uh involved in it at all, or just part of just a hiring process?
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_00: Just the hiring process, which at the time was a civil service exam.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_00: You had to take an exam that meet all of the initial application requirements, which for a long time were like height and weight, age, uh you had to be a resident of the city, and then you had to score highly enough to be on the top level for them to pick you.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_04: Was it the same civil service exam that say a mailman would have, or was it different?
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_00: It was different.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_04: So what were, I'm curious, the height and weight requirements.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_04: Do you have those?
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_00: So at least in the 1950s, the requirement was you had to be between 21 and 34 years old.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_00: You had to be at least 5'9, 160 pounds, and live within the city of Asheville.
• 38:05
  SPEAKER_04: Well, I know that currently officers do not have to live within city limits, so that is different.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_04: I know there is a physical requirement, a physical fitness test, the Popat, and you're the accreditation manager, so you would know this.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_04: Is there anything now that indicates size?
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_00: No, absolutely not.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_00: If you can do the physical requirements of the Popat, which is the physical abilities test, that's fine.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_04: The History Minute with Hannah Silberman, and with this being a Black History Month, the month of February, some people might listen to this in March or or later.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_04: It is uh February as we record this.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_04: Let's get back to talking about those uh two officers, the first black officers at the Asheville Police Department.
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_04: Do you have anything about them individually that stands out about their service to the department?
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_00: Gilbert Thly was one of the first black police officers, and like I I mentioned before, he was a World War II veteran.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_00: And only a few months after his military discharge, he got hired by the department, and he was very active in the law enforcement professional groups.
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_00: He remained with the department until 1960 when he suffered a strain back while making an arrest.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_00: Subsequent health issues after that caused him to retire in 1962.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, so he was with the department a good time though, 14, 16 years.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Delaney Horn was formerly a coach at the Stevens Lee High School, which was the black high school in the days of segregation.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_00: Uh he was a high school coach there and a teacher for many years before he became a police officer.
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_00: He actually leaves the department in 1948 and returns to being a coach at Stevens Lee, but unfortunately he passed away in 1954.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_04: Stevens Lee, that's not what became Asheville High School, right?
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_00: No, Stevens Lee is up on the hill, uh the recreation center now.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_04: Oh that was Stevens.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_04: So I've heard the name mentioned over the years, and I guess I never really put two and two together.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_00: Asheville High used to be Lee Edwards.
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_04: That's what it is, Lee Edwards.
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_04: So Stevens Lee is right there.
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_04: I guess that's Charlotte Street, right?
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_04: Well, there we go.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_04: The History Minute with Hannah Silberman.
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_04: We're going to be doing this in every episode of the APD Pod Squad Podcast in the year 2025, as we continue to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the Asheville Police Department.
• 40:12
  SPEAKER_04: Joining me now is Officer Dennis Pace.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_04: I've gotten to know Dennis a little bit, but now you're going to get to know Dennis a little bit, and we'll find out what is happening in the world of community engagement, which is his department.
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_04: Dennis, thanks for joining us today.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_04: Thank you.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_04: So it's your first time on the show, and I know you're a regular listener, so you know to expect these questions.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_04: We'll start with where were you born?
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_01: I was born in Columbus, Indiana.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_01: The the fact about that is it's Cummins Engines headquarters.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 40:41
  SPEAKER_01: Their world headquarters is in Columbus.
• 40:43
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, so for people that don't know Cummins, it's diesel engines.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_01: Diesel Engines.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_01: Columbus is about 45 minutes south of Indianapolis, about an hour and fifteen minutes north of Louisville.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, so I lived in Evansville, Indiana for about six months, give or take.
• 40:57
  SPEAKER_04: So that's not too far from there.
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_01: So Evansville is about three and a half hours, because I went to college in Evansville at University of Southern Indiana.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_01: I was down there for about six years before I moved back home for a little bit before I started working for the state of Indiana.
• 41:11
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Ross Powell But I know you've been around.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_04: So you were born in Columbus, Indiana, but it wasn't a direct route from Columbus, Indiana to Asheville, North Carolina.
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_04: So what all happened to you in between college and all these different things?
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_01: Went to work for the state of Indiana doing uh drinking water compliance.
• 41:33
  SPEAKER_01: So I did that for about 10 years, and we decided that we didn't like the cold Indiana winters.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_01: And we my wife and I decided we want to move, and Asheville came up.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_01: And so we moved down here with a small, probably five-month stay over at my in-laws to help them out before we moved down here in 2016.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_04: So why Asheville?
• 41:53
  SPEAKER_04: What was it about Asheville?
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_01: I really liked the outdoors.
• 41:56
  SPEAKER_01: I like the hiking in the mountains.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_01: My wife grew up in eastern Kentucky.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: She missed the mountains, and the end kind of flat.
• 42:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 42:03
  SPEAKER_01: And she was willing to go back to the mountains.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_01: And uh at that time, my father-in-law was a disabled Vietnam vet.
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_01: He was housebound, and we had a five-hour drive to see him, and Asheville was a five and a half hour drive.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_01: So we were used to that drive, and everybody was pointing out that we like Asheville.
• 42:20
  SPEAKER_01: We came down, visited, fell in love, and put our house on the market.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_04: And what year was that that you came here?
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_01: We came down here uh in 2016.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Ross Powell Oh, in 16.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_04: And when did you join the Asheville Police Department?
• 42:30
  SPEAKER_01: I started working for Asheville Police Department and Animal Services the November of 16th.
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_04: So you started in that department, so not a sworn officer at first.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_01: Not a sworn officer at first.
• 42:40
  SPEAKER_01: I did that for about a year and a half before I went to the police academy in 2018.
• 42:45
  SPEAKER_04: So had you thought when you were part of the Animal Services, did it ever enter your mind about being like a cop?
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_04: Like, or was that just something that you saw people doing it and thought it might be right for you?
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_01: Aaron Ross Powell When I first started with animal services, I thought, oh, this is what I love.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_01: I'm out in the public.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm doing something.
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_01: I care for the animals.
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_01: I go out and investigate any kind of cruelty or stuff like that.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_01: I thought that was going to be my career path.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um and then a few months in and I got past my probationary period, and they sent an email saying they're looking for officers to join the next academy class.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, you know what?
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_01: Let's see what happens.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_01: There's a lot more things I can do being a sworn officer than I could with just animal services.
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I put my my application in like everybody else does and went to the whole hiring process.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_04: And you know, I happen to know this because I know where your office is.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_04: You still get to kind of experience an animal just about every day.
• 43:37
  SPEAKER_04: Officer Cora is usually a few feet from where you're located down there.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, so Officer Cora, when she comes into the office and I'm at my desk, she always runs over to me.
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_01: Officer uh LaCroix, Debbie, her handler, actually, because Corey comes to my knee so often, put a dog bed behind my desk.
• 43:54
  SPEAKER_01: So she'll go over there and lay behind my desk most of the day.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_04: Officer Korra is a dog.
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_04: Just want to clarify that we think everyone knows, but maybe everyone doesn't.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_04: So Officer Cora is our therapy dog.
• 44:08
  SPEAKER_04: Yes.
• 44:08
  SPEAKER_04: And does a great job at it.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_01: She is she is wonderful.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_01: She loves to go out and see people.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um and a lot of people love her and and we'll go plexes and people ask if if we know Officer Cora and go from there.
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_04: It's always a good icebreaker.
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_04: It it really is.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_04: And so is this, as part of our getting to know segment, as we always ask, something unique about you that not everybody knows.
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_04: So what would that be?
• 44:33
  SPEAKER_01: So I was trying to think about that, because like I said, I listen to this a lot and I do a lot of different things, but one thing that I don't really talk a lot about is when I was born, I was born with a cleft-flipping palate, meaning that I didn't have a hard palate when I was born.
• 44:47
  SPEAKER_01: I was probably, I think, 10 or 12.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_01: I had a major surgery where they took part of my hip bone and put it into my hard palate.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_01: So part of my hip is in my mouth.
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_04: That would be unique.
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_04: And they'd have to change that song.
• 45:00
  SPEAKER_04: Was it the hip bones connected to the I guess the mouth bone?
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, something like that.
• 45:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um also because of the surgeries, I probably had close to a hundred surgeries because of this.
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_01: Wow, that's quite the ordeal.
• 45:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um I've had tubes in my ears seven plus times as a kid.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_01: But I was probably 13 and I had to get my eardrum reconstructed.
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_01: Man, you've had a lot of tough luck.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_01: I had a rough life to begin with.
• 45:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um but it was it was great.
• 45:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh my parents were there for everything, and they're still around and they still do what they can.
• 45:34
  SPEAKER_01: They're still back home in Indiana.
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Powell, well that's awesome.
• 45:36
  SPEAKER_04: Let's talk about the community engagement division.
• 45:38
  SPEAKER_04: You guys are incredibly active, and as the weather starts to warm up, we'll be doing a little more things outdoors, but we're still kind of sloughing through the end of winter where the weather dominates the schedule.
• 45:48
  SPEAKER_04: So I'm guessing we're doing a lot of things indoors until spring arrives.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_04: So what do we got coming up at the end of February, beginning of March?
• 45:55
  SPEAKER_01: Aaron Powell So we just completed the Battle of the Badge.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um I want to thank everybody that came out for that.
• 46:01
  SPEAKER_01: That's a big um blood drive that that really helps the American Red Cross.
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Powell Yeah, and there really is a shortage right now.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_04: It sounds like we're always saying there's a shortage because lately there is.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_04: It's just not as many people donate blood just in general as used to.
• 46:17
  SPEAKER_04: And so there's a lot more actual blood drives and activities than just back in the day.
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_04: People used to just do it on the regular.
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_04: My dad did it every whatever it was, three months or whatever it happened to be, like for 50 years.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_04: And and everybody else he worked with just did it all the time.
• 46:31
  SPEAKER_04: I think it was that generation that came out of, you know, the world wars and all those things, and it was just kind of drilled into them that that was part of their civic duty, but not as much anymore.
• 46:39
  SPEAKER_01: No, you don't see that as much anymore.
• 46:41
  SPEAKER_01: I try to donate as much as I can, um, especially having to go through all the surgeries that I did.
• 46:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 46:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um, there is one time that I remember one of my dad's friends had the same blood type and they knew it was gonna be a major surgery, so he donated blood specifically just in case I needed it.
• 46:56
  SPEAKER_04: That's awesome.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_04: But it's also it's something people can do like that.
• 46:59
  SPEAKER_04: It's just it doesn't cost you anything but a little bit of time.
• 47:02
  SPEAKER_01: A little bit of time, and you get uh snacks and everything else afterwards.
• 47:06
  SPEAKER_01: So I will recommend that don't come hungry, eat before you come because I jade one time go without eating for breakfast and I got really light-headed and they laid me on the ground for about 10 minutes with a cold cloth.
• 47:19
  SPEAKER_04: Oh but you had some Oreos waiting for you when you were done.
• 47:21
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, absolutely.
• 47:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 47:23
  SPEAKER_01: Oreos nice little sprite or orange juice or something like that.
• 47:27
  SPEAKER_04: These days, usually, regardless of which you know organization is running it, it's there's usually a cash incentive or like a gift card to something, too.
• 47:34
  SPEAKER_04: So uh there's good reasons for you to do it, and then also a little something for you at the end.
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so I want to thank everybody that came out for that.
• 47:39
  SPEAKER_04: Thank you, everyone that donated blood in the battle of the badges.
• 47:43
  SPEAKER_04: What else is going on?
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_01: So we have the Citizen Police Academy is going to be starting up March 13th.
• 47:48
  SPEAKER_01: There might be a few seats available.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_01: We are running short on open seats, so if I would check it out, if you can get into that, great.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_01: If that's something you're thinking about, I would say go ahead and put in for it.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's a great experience.
• 48:04
  SPEAKER_01: You'll learn a lot about the department.
• 48:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um we try to run two of them a year, so if you don't get in this one, then there'll be one hopefully in the fall.
• 48:12
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and we were talking about the snacks from the blood drive.
• 48:14
  SPEAKER_04: We feed you a full meal, a complimentary meal every time that we meet, which is once a week for 10 weeks, I believe.
• 48:20
  SPEAKER_01: Once a week for 10 weeks from 5 30 to 6 o'clock, is usually when we have dinner.
• 48:25
  SPEAKER_01: And at 6 o'clock to 9 o'clock, we have presentations from members of the department talking about different aspects of what they do with uh within the department.
• 48:35
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and there's some really cool things too.
• 48:37
  SPEAKER_04: It's not just sitting in the classroom all the time.
• 48:39
  SPEAKER_04: You get to go out into the field in some cases and see how things operate.
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_04: Uh join the SWAT team and find out what they do sometimes.
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_04: When I say join the SWAT team, I don't mean join the SWAT team, but be among the SWAT team as they show you their vehicles and their stuff and some other things, the bomb squad and all that.
• 48:54
  SPEAKER_04: Mm-hmm.
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_04: So there's a lot of fun stuff.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_01: We are trying to partner with Big Brothers and Big Sisters.
• 49:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we're trying to foster that relationship and we're going to be participating in the bowling for kids' sake on March 15th.
• 49:07
  SPEAKER_01: So it's going to be a new partnership, so we're not quite sure how that's going to play out.
• 49:10
  SPEAKER_01: Hopefully, it will be a great partnership that we can look forward to doing a lot of things in the future.
• 49:15
  SPEAKER_04: And bowling is something that anybody can do.
• 49:18
  SPEAKER_04: Anybody can go bowling.
• 49:20
  SPEAKER_04: Mm-hmm.
• 49:20
  SPEAKER_04: So if it's something that you want to try at some point, that's uh that's great.
• 49:23
  SPEAKER_04: I love that idea of getting bowling going because it does something anybody can do.
• 49:26
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, yeah.
• 49:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it's been a long time since I've grabbed the bowling ball, but it's something that's always enjoyable too.
• 49:32
  SPEAKER_04: Just make sure you find one that with the uh the holes are b big enough for your fingers.
• 49:36
  SPEAKER_04: I've I've seen it happen.
• 49:37
  SPEAKER_04: People shove their fingers in there.
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_04: Next thing you know, ball's not coming out.
• 49:41
  SPEAKER_04: So find the appropriately sized ball.
• 49:44
  SPEAKER_04: And pro tip, wear some pants with a little bit of flex in them.
• 49:48
  SPEAKER_04: So what else we got coming up?
• 49:50
  SPEAKER_01: One thing that Chief Zach did when he was here, he started a cookout for patrol officers.
• 49:56
  SPEAKER_01: For patrol officers.
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um He would serve hot dogs in Buffalo.
• 50:00
  SPEAKER_01: He would serve hot dogs, yes.
• 50:02
  SPEAKER_01: And when he left, Chief Lamb continued that, and that's something that we picked up in community engagement of kind of being the forefront of setting that up.
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that's only one time a year.
• 50:12
  SPEAKER_01: And we were wanting to do something also for patrol officers.
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_01: So at the end of this month and beginning of next month, we're gonna do a breakfast for patrol officers and and staff of APD.
• 50:21
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we're gonna come in probably about five o'clock in the morning and have breakfast for patrol officers that work the night shift to eat before they go home, and food available for officers coming in to eat before they start their shift.
• 50:36
  SPEAKER_04: That's kind of a little bit of what happened during Helene, as you remember.
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_04: It it really is.
• 50:40
  SPEAKER_04: She had some of the cadets uh that were here uh that were cooking for us.
• 50:44
  SPEAKER_04: So I'm on the third floor, right?
• 50:45
  SPEAKER_04: You're on the second floor.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_04: And uh first floor patrol is turned into like a little commissary, like a little captain.
• 50:52
  SPEAKER_04: And so I knew when they were starting to make breakfast every morning because I could smell the bacon.
• 50:57
  SPEAKER_04: I'm up there in my office and I'm like bacon.
• 51:00
  SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah.
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_01: Something about this building, everything just kind of goes everywhere.
• 51:04
  SPEAKER_01: You can smell everything.
• 51:05
  SPEAKER_01: So will will there be bacon?
• 51:07
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's gonna be traditional cutine breakfast with bacon, egg, sausage.
• 51:11
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not quite sure the menu.
• 51:12
  SPEAKER_01: I think we're gonna try try to do bacon or sausage or both.
• 51:16
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 51:17
  SPEAKER_01: Eggs, pancakes and waffles, uh, fruit and and yogurt.
• 51:22
  SPEAKER_01: Nice.
• 51:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so we're gonna try to get everything a little a little bit for everybody.
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_04: I'll know when you're doing it because I'll smell it up at the top.
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely, yes.
• 51:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um but that's gonna be the end of this month.
• 51:33
  SPEAKER_01: One one uh we're gonna do two of them, one at the end of this month, one at the beginning of March.
• 51:39
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, sounds good.
• 51:40
  SPEAKER_01: Anything else you guys got coming up?
• 51:41
  SPEAKER_01: We've got our junior police academy that we're taking uh applications in for now.
• 51:46
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 51:47
  SPEAKER_01: And that the application process is started.
• 51:49
  SPEAKER_01: We're looking at kids that have an interest in law enforcement from 14 to 18 years old.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_01: We put on a free uh what we call junior police academy one-week program.
• 51:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's gonna be June 16th through June 20th.
• 52:02
  SPEAKER_01: We've got uh officers going to different schools right now to talk talk to kids, usually around lunchtime, talk to kids, see what their interest is.
• 52:10
  SPEAKER_01: If you have any any interest in that, you can always reach out to us.
• 52:13
  SPEAKER_01: Our email address is apdcommunityengagement at ashwell nc.gov.
• 52:19
  SPEAKER_01: If you have any questions about that, but that that program's really fun.
• 52:21
  SPEAKER_01: We did that last year.
• 52:22
  SPEAKER_01: We're trying to make it better this year.
• 52:24
  SPEAKER_01: But they get real hands-on experience of what we do.
• 52:27
  SPEAKER_01: Each day we have a different theme of the department.
• 52:30
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a little different than what the CPA is, but it's more hands-on what happens with uh when you become a police officer.
• 52:37
  SPEAKER_04: So where would they find out a little more info and sign up?
• 52:40
  SPEAKER_01: At our website or so, yeah, at our website.
• 52:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you can also Google Asheville Police Department, Junior Police Academy, and there'll be a link for that there.
• 52:47
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, there's a little video there.
• 52:49
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we have QR codes that that we have that will take you straight to the application process as well.
• 52:54
  SPEAKER_04: Fantastic.
• 52:54
  SPEAKER_04: And and everyone knows the Google, so just do that.
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_04: The uh Junior Police Academy, Asheville Police Department.
• 52:59
  SPEAKER_04: You look that up and you'll find it.
• 53:01
  SPEAKER_04: And and then hopefully we'll see you there for the looking forward to it.
• 53:04
  SPEAKER_04: Officer Dennis Pace, thanks for sitting down with us today and getting to know you.
• 53:07
  SPEAKER_04: Well, thank you.
• 53:08
  SPEAKER_04: We'll see you again soon.
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_04: Yes, sir.
• 53:10
  SPEAKER_04: That does it for another episode of the APD Pod Squad.
• 53:13
  SPEAKER_04: Thanks so much for listening.
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_04: Make sure you subscribe, like, get a reminder, whatever it takes, however you listen, where you get your podcasts, so you don't miss an upcoming episode.
• 53:24
  SPEAKER_04: We'd like to thank those that joined us on this one.
• 53:26
  SPEAKER_04: Detective Sonia Escobito, the longest tenured employee of the Asheville Police Department, retired APD Lieutenant John Kirkpatrick, thank you for your service, sir.
• 53:36
  SPEAKER_04: Hannah Silberman for another History Minute, and Officer Dennis Pace of the Community Engagement Division.
• 53:42
  SPEAKER_04: Don't forget, if you got a question for Chief Lamb who will join us on the next episode, you can ask the Chief by calling 828-250-8800.
• 53:51
  SPEAKER_04: That is 828-250-8800.
• 53:55
  SPEAKER_04: You can leave a voicemail at that number, or you can email us if you're more comfortable with that.
• 53:59
  SPEAKER_04: APD Podcastfeedback at AshevilleNC.gov.
• 54:03
  SPEAKER_04: That is APD Podcast Feedback at AshevilleNC.gov.
• 54:09
  SPEAKER_04: See you next time.
• 54:10
  SPEAKER_04: I'm Rick Rice, and this is the APD Pod Squad.