Latest / APD Pod Squad / Season 2, Episode 20; Officers Brandon Collins, Mark Beddingfield, and Andrew Ammons, along with Hannah Silberman with the History Minute

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Season 2, Episode 20; Officers Brandon Collins, Mark Beddingfield, and Andrew Ammons, along with Hannah Silberman with the History Minute · APD Pod Squad

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_02: Fifth is the APD Pod Squad.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_02: I'm Rick Rice.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_02: In this episode, we'll explore how lateral transfers are significantly contributing to APD's progress toward full staffing.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_02: Joining me to discuss their transitions from other agencies are officers Brandon Collins and Mark Bettingfield.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_02: While APD continues to have success recruiting first-time officers, these experienced transfers are playing a vital role in filling our ranks.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_02: Prior to joining APD, Brandon served with the Montreat and Woodfin Police Departments.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_02: And as an upstate graduate, Mark, who also served in Tryon, comes to the department from the Fletcher Police Department and brings more than a decade of experience in law enforcement.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_02: Happy Father's Day to all the dads out there, including one of our newest officers and first-time new dad, Andrew Amons.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_02: He joins me and we'll see how he's dealing with two new experiences at once.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_02: And Hannah Silberman is back with another History Minute as we go back 75 years to June 9th, 1951, and the call of a man with a gun in Montford, terrorizing the neighborhood.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_02: Find out what evidence led officers right to the suspect who was inside a nearby house when captured.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_02: Getting to know Officer Brandon Collins, new to the Asheville Police Department, really new to the Asheville Police Department.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_02: He's one of our lateral transfers and not yet on the road, correct, Brandon?
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_06: Yes, sir.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_02: Awesome.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_02: So let's just start at the beginning.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, not all the way back to the beginning, which is we always ask people where they were born, because that is the beginning, right?
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_02: But as far as your beginning as an Asheville police officer, because you joining the force is different than many of the other officers we've talked to that come straight out of B L E T, the cadets, they're brand spanking new shiny officers.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_02: You are a lateral transfer, which is one of the ways we're fortifying our force right now.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_02: And the numbers are getting larger and we're becoming a bigger department, which is great news.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_02: What got you thinking about joining the Asheville Police Department?
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_06: Well, as a native of the Asheville area, my family's been here 200 years.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_06: This place is my home.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_06: My grandfather was a policeman here for 30 years from 1961 to 1991.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell Bit of a legacy then.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_06: Yes, sir.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_06: His name was Charles Wilson.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_06: A lot of the older guys here that are, you know, just about to retire or have already retired, my grandfather trained them.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell Oh, wow.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_02: And probably they worked with him a little bit, I would guess.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_02: Like his tail end in their beginnings.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_06: Yes, sir.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_06: There is a uh on the third floor, there is a giant bulletin board with all the officers from years past.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_06: Uh 1986, my grandfather was there on that.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Ross Powell The year I graduated high school.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_02: I know exactly which one you're talking about.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_02: As you come through the front doors and then you push aside those, it's the one right in front of you in that hallway.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_02: So it jumps out to me because of the year, 1986, right?
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_02: I'm thinking high school and I'm looking at the hairstyles and I'm like, oh yeah, that was me.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah, back then they had a policy.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_06: Um well my grandfather was had that policy back from the 60s and 70s.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_06: Every time you walked out of your patrol car, you put that patrol cap on.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_06: And a lot of the guys at the FOP would often joke that, oh, Charlie and that hat.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_02: Well, there's there's some people I've seen with the hat, the hairs like flying out the side because you know the hairstyles in the 80s were different.
• 3:18
  unknown: Oh, yeah.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_02: They are now.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_02: So your grandfather was a member of the APD, which is awesome.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_02: And what department were you at?
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_02: What agency uh prior to coming here?
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_06: Aaron Powell I was with the Montreet Police Department.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus And that's but that's not the only one, right?
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_06: Yes, sir.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_06: I was also before that, I was at Woodfin.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_02: Did you enjoy your time, both those?
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_06: Yes, sir.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_06: I did.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_02: How long?
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_02: How long were you there?
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_06: Uh Woodfin, it was about six, seven months.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_06: Uh then I went to Montreet for about a year and a half, and I decided that I need to make that step.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell A little quiet out at Montreat, I would imagine, right?
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_06: Bears and college kids.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_02: That was guessing.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_02: Bears would be your biggest problem.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_06: Well, they actually listened to me.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_02: But the college kids, not so much.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_02: So that's awesome.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_02: Just make to make the jump to APD.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_02: What made you pull the trigger?
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_06: Trevor Burrus At Montreat, I love the town.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_06: I love the department, and it's just no opportunity for growth.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_06: And also I needed a bit more training to succeed in this career.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell It's a beautiful campus.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_06: Oh, yes.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Ross Powell So it's a campus that is featured, and you've probably read the book.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_02: I'm sure everyone's read the book, one second after.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_02: So one of your professors wrote that, right?
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_02: William Forston?
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_06: Uh I went to Appalachian State.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you worked at Montreat, though.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_02: So one of those professors, I should say.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_02: Are you familiar with the book?
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_06: Yes, sir.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_06: I am.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so you know what I'm talking about.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_02: So it featured the Montreat campus in that area and all those things.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_02: And for people that haven't read that book, it is one of the most page-turning books I have ever read.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_02: I think I read it in a weekend.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_02: I I couldn't put it down because it was in a scary way kind of realistic.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_06: Aaron Powell Yes, sir.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_06: Uh I'm from Swananoa and who saw everything during the storm.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_06: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_02: In the book they called Ingalls, the Ingalls Warehouse, the Ingram's Warehouse, because they didn't want to use the same name.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_02: But the basic premise of that particular uh book is an EMP, an electromagnetic pulse, basically knocks out everything that's electronic, which is everything.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_02: And we basically just get sent back to the Stone Age, and then what happens from there?
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_02: So you went to upstate?
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_06: Yes, sir.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_02: Now was that for uh criminal justice?
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_02: Was that for that or just something else?
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_06: It was for computer science.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Ross Powell Okay.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_02: Clearly not doing computer science anymore, so it just didn't take?
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_06: Well, I tried to join the military rector college.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_06: Uh had a medical issue that prevented me from going, so I thought, well, there's another thing I know and love is law enforcement.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_06: I grew up around it.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_06: I grew up around this department.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_06: Know all the older guys, so might as well try my hand at that.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_02: So you mentioned Swannanoa.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_02: Is that where your your Hall and Trum?
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_02: Is that your origins?
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_06: Swananoa.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_02: So you went to Owen then probably?
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_06: Played for Kenny Ford back in 47.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_02: I played at uh Kenny's golf tournament a few different times.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_02: That that golf tournament was legendary.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not sure if you were ever there.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_06: He takes golf very seriously.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_02: So what what year was that did you graduate?
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_06: I graduated in 2014.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_06: A year before Jagger Gardner.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_02: Oh boy.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_02: Is Swannanoa where you're from?
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_02: Is it still your home?
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_06: Mm-hmm.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_02: So I then I have to ask you had actually kind of mentioned the storm.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_02: How did you and your family do?
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_06: Aaron Ross Powell We fared.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_06: We were high enough on the hill, but we saw everything.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_06: Like during the storm.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_02: That had be terrifying.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_06: Yes, sir.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_06: It was.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, uh I saw what I saw, but not from there, right?
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_02: I I live all the way to the end of the city limits of Asheville.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_02: Technically, it's it's still Asheville.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_02: My mailing address is Candler.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_02: So I don't have a major body of water really right near me.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_02: The first time I saw it was driving into work that Friday morning and I drove by the French Broad River coming down to 240, and and that's when I knew it was worse than anyone had possibly expected.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_02: So when did you know how bad it was going to be?
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_02: What I mean, Thursday was the the day.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_06: When I went to the YMCA and Black Mountain and the river was starting to swell, and we realized we're gonna have another big big system coming in the night next night, and thought, okay, it was just gonna be another thunderstorm.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_06: Right.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_06: But power gets knocked out at six o'clock and things just are going sideways.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_06: Like my my house is up on a hill, but there was actual ponds of water in my yard.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_06: And was able to look out over the road and seeing like cars floating by on the river, like giant propane tanks floating down.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_02: So that that would have been Wednesday, I guess, the night before the because it rained for two days before.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_06: Oh yeah, this this was uh Friday morning of the storm.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_02: Oh okay.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_02: So Friday.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_02: And did you guys evacuate then?
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_02: Did you leave or did you stay?
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_06: We never got the evacuation order until quarter till eleven, that's not that Thursday night.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_06: So we we decided to hunker down.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_02: That's pretty wild.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_06: But uh my father's father was a Korean war vet, and I'll say this, I now understand why he never talked about it.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_02: You know, the PTSD is real.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_02: It you still can remember things so incredibly vividly.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_02: I remember myself, I took some video when it was raining really hard, not from Helene, but from the storms the days previous, right?
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_02: I was just sitting on my front porch and I just like it is really, really, really coming.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_02: Now I just happened to take a video, I still have that in my phone, and every so often I'll look back at it, I'm like, and man, that was before Helene arrived.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, it's no wonder.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_02: It was, I mean, we got inundated before that.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_02: And then the storm arrived, and we're still recovering from it, especially in Swannanoa.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah, I mean, they're they suspended the um Beacon Bike Park for a while, and they're slowly starting to bring that bum back.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_06: Uh they say it's supposed to be open by September this year.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_06: So I mean, there's still places in Swannanoa that the storm destroyed and it's never been touched.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you you you drive right down the main drag there, uh Highway 70, and you know, near the Harley Davidson, you kind of start right there at that exit, and you head out towards Black Mountain, and you can see what was the KOA campground in that whole area uh going out that way.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_02: I I like to golf a lot, and so I've been to Black Mountain Golf Course, which is only nine holes right now, because that got destroyed too.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_02: They're still working on getting that back, and that's just that's just one little bit.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, everything else in that whole corridor, that was right along that river.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_02: And people are still continuing to uh trying to rebuild, although we see we see signs, which is great, but we still got a long way to go.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_06: Oh, yeah, because there's a story that I don't normally tell people.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_06: I was walking down my street and I came across a fellow who was at a bachelor's party at a Airbnb down my down below my house.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_06: His name was John.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_06: I never got his last name, but he was a Swift Water Rescue firefighter from Cincinnati, Ohio.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_06: So he and I we did our best what we could that day, and and I never I tried to find him, I just couldn't find him.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_06: So in a way I don't want to find him, if that makes sense.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_02: So did he survive or not?
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_02: So he did survive.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_02: So he made it.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah, because I he was helping Swannanoa Fire Department the best he could, and I was trying to make sure people don't go down US 70 because there's at least 18 inches of mud.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_06: But it's kind of the mystery of the Lord put puts you in places that he wants you.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_06: And I kind of I told him, I said, Well, I said, see, team blue and team red can work together.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_02: Well, and everyone did then, right?
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_02: Everyone with especially those with experience, any kind of first responders whatsoever.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_02: You did what you did, he did what he did, and you knew you had to because of just the calling, right?
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_02: The being a member of a law enforcement agency in his case, a member of probably a fire department.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_02: You just do it.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah, because uh religious, but in in a way, I feel like I ran across an angel that day.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_02: I feel like I did.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_02: I I think a lot of us did.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_02: Uh you know, angels were there.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_02: That that's for certain.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_02: I have no doubt about that.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_02: All of the heroic stories that occurred uh during that.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_02: And of course we lost a lot of people as well.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so Officer Brandon Collins, lateral transfer, joining the Asheville Police Department is with us.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_02: And your process right now is not yet on the street.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_02: There's there's paperwork, there's all these different things.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_02: So as opposed to a cadet, what steps do you have to take that's different, that's additional, that's less as part of the process?
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_06: Well, in the whole hiring process, just go to the website and fill out your after your information, apply to it, and then one of the recruitment guys will come and talk to you.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_06: There's like an eight-step process, eight or nine steps.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_06: And the first process I did was a written and physical test, which was reading comprehension, an actual police written exam.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_06: Then you had to do the police officer physical abilities test or the Popat.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_06: Though it was modified in what I did in B L E T.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_06: Um a lot when I was in B L E T in 2023, there were people that went here to APD.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_06: This is before the in-house academy.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_06: So they did all that process prior to that.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_06: And then they went to BLET.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_06: Then after that, go through different steps like an actual panel interview, your polygraph examination, medical screening, background investigation, review of the conditional offer, and then you sign that offer and then make sure everything's good to go.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_06: But to answer your question, laterals, they tend to go from one department to another while keeping their certification.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_02: So how long have you been in that room that I found you in?
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_06: This is the third week, because we're still waiting on the North Carolina AOC.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell, so you can't wait to get out of there and get on the street, I would guess.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, sir.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_02: Those four walls you're becoming very familiar with, but it's part of the process.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_02: The paperwork's got to be processed, all these different things.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_02: Uh do you know an estimated date of when you can get in the car?
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_06: I have we know have no idea.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_02: It all depends on the state.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_02: That'll be a good day, though, right?
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, sir.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_02: So when it comes to uh law enforcement, do you have any aspirations, any particular department you'd like to see yourself grow into?
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_06: Aaron Ross Powell Well, since I have a degree in computer science, I'd like to do cybercrimes eventually.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_06: Like things such as illicit drug sales online on the dark web or firearm sales, things of that nature.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell So a detective, part of our computer crimes division.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_02: That'd be kind of cool, though, right?
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_06: Aaron Powell Yeah, but I'd also like to be a training officer.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Ross Powell Well we could always use good training officers.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_02: Now you might have to raise your voice if you were doing that.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_02: And as soft spoken as you are, and with your calm demeanor, have you ever yelled at anyone?
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_06: Aaron Powell Yes, I have.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_02: Just want to make sure you know how to yell because you're very soft spoken.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I just I just don't see you getting that excitable that you're going to raise your voice to somebody.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_02: But I'm sure you will when the time comes.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_06: I have.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_02: Well, welcome to the force, Officer Brandon Collins.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_02: Looking forward to seeing you out there in your uniform.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_06: Thank you, sir.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_02: Getting to know another lateral transfer.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_02: It's officer or maybe senior police officer Mark Bettingfield.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_02: We're still working that out, right?
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_02: So we have several levels, obviously, here at the Asheville Police Department.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_02: And you came from Fletcher, and we'll talk about that.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_02: But how many years of experience in law enforcement you said?
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_05: So I've got 13 total years.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_05: Okay.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_05: Almost 13.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_05: Okay.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_05: 10 were at Fletcher and two and a half were at Tron, Police Department.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm going to go out on a limb and say probably SPO, maybe SPO two to get started.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not giving you a rank of sergeant or anything like that.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_02: We're not putting you in the position of authority just yet.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_02: Not yet.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_02: So where are you from?
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_02: You're from Asheville?
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_02: From Hendersonville.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_02: So western North Carolina, right?
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_02: Not too far.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_02: Which explains, I guess, working in Fletcher.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_02: So do you live in the Fletcher area or the Hendersonville area?
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_05: No.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_05: I moved all the way down to Rutherford County about four years ago.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_05: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_02: So you'll need probably to move again.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_05: I like it down there.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_05: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_02: So you're going to make the commute every day, yeah?
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_02: What kind of a drive you're looking at for that?
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_02: About an hour drive.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_02: I was going to say that's a that's a bit of a drive.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_02: So you're you're probably hoping the gas prices go down.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_02: I do.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_02: Just definitely.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_02: A little bit.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_02: But I I get it.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_02: It's beautiful country out there, right?
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell Yeah.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_05: And it's honestly a lot cheaper down there.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus It is.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_02: I know people that actually live in like Landrum, South Carolina, or just over the border in areas right there, and they commute to say, my wife works at Mission Hospital, so she's got some people that work at the hospital that come from South Carolina.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_02: And I mean, if you don't hit really bad traffic on 26, which we all kind of know you're gonna.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_02: It's not far if if you don't.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_02: Right?
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_02: It can be like a 40-minute drive, which isn't awful.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_02: No, it's not bad.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_02: But when you hit that traffic and you gotta sit in it, it's the worst.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_02: Take you over an hour and a half to just, you know, get where you need to go.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_02: So let's talk about your start in law enforcement.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_02: So Fletcher, you said in Tron.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_02: In Tryon.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_02: Another beautiful community.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_02: Horse country there.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_02: It is.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_02: With the Tryon Equestrian Farm out there, right?
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_02: Yep, the Equestrian Center.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_02: I remember when they opened that.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_02: I'm old enough, yes.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_02: You're saying, is this guy yes, this guy is old enough.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_02: In my previous career uh in radio, remember they had like a big ribbon cutting and they invited all the media to come down and they put on this big fancy spread because you know, horse people got money.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_02: They whined and dined us and all of that.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_02: Oh wow.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_02: At the time there was nothing there.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_02: It was an open field in like a tent, but they had all the drawings and all the visions and everything.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_02: And now, of course, it's you know, it's a big deal.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and they even host the uh the Spartan races there.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_02: They do.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_02: And so as a group, we've all run there several years.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_02: Oh wow.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so you could do that with us this year if you'd like.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_05: I just did my first Spartan in Charlotte a couple months ago.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_02: Well, congratulations.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_02: Aru, Aru, Aru.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_02: You might not know by looking at me, but I got way into Spartan races a few years back.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_02: Well, more than a few years back when I was doing CrossFit 2 and and I did a bunch.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_02: Just take a random guess.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_02: How many Spartan races do you think I've done?
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_05: I don't know.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_02: Seventeen.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_02: Oh wow.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_02: One year I got a trifecta, and then the following year, a double trifecta.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_02: I was a younger man.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_02: But I I did it last year, though.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I did it last year, I did it the year before, so I'm still hanging in there.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_02: I'm definitely the elder statesman.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_02: What what made you want to do your first one?
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_05: Just guys at Fletcher that I worked with the idea, and I was like, well, they invited me, so I was like, I'll try it.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_02: I I mean, I always tell people like, why are you still doing it?
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_02: I'm like, because how often, as an adult, do you get to get muddy?
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_02: That's what it is.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_02: It was a lot of fun.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_02: It's just a big obstacle course in the mud, and the you put on a suit, you do all these things when you get to my age, and it's like, when do you get to just get a little, you know, get a little nasty, get a little muddy, get a little sweaty, maybe even bloody.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_02: It's just it's kind of fun to do.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_05: It really is.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_05: It was.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_05: I had I had a blast.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_02: Did you catch the bug?
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_02: Are you going to do some more?
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_05: So we've we've talked about doing the one in August for the Ashville.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_02: I'm going to see you there, though.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_02: I'm going to hold you to it.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_05: I don't know.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_05: I don't know.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_05: It depends on what my schedule is here.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_02: All right.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_02: So you joined the try on police department first.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_02: What got you inspired to do that the very first time to be a member of law enforcement?
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_05: So I grew up in law enforcement.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_05: Uh my father, he's uh chief of police right now at Biltmore Forest.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_05: And then whenever I was 16, I actually had an uncle who passed away from a drug overdose.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_05: So just my goal was to get into it and get as much dope off the streets as I could.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell Okay.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_02: So you've done a little bit of that, I would guess.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_02: 16 years behind you.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_02: So a few years at Tryon, and then you moved on to the Fletcher Police Department.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_05: Yep.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_05: Fletcher moved to Fletcher, uh just bigger area.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_05: At the time, Tryon didn't have a take-home car program.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_05: Right.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_05: Um, so I was having to commute back and forth using my own personal car and gas, and Fletcher had a take-home car program, so that helped out a ton.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_05: Just bigger area and more opportunity.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_02: And now with the Asheville Police Department.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_02: So what what prompted that?
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_05: Once again, just bigger department.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_05: Uh able to at Fletcher.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_05: Um I loved Fletcher, don't get me wrong, but they didn't have any specialty programs like a traffic team or like SWAT or anything like that, and here being a bigger department, just be able to further my career and so you kind of asquire to one of those departments here.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_02: You mentioned traffic.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_02: Traffic has only been a few months.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_05: Yep.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_05: I would uh that's actually the one I would love to be on.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_05: I I've already got my traffic crash reconstructionist uh certificate through the Just Academy.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_05: I've done that and just love traffic.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_02: I'm sure they'd love to have you.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_05: I hope so.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_02: You've met Hunter Wellbourne, I would guess, right?
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_05: I have not.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_02: He's your guy.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_02: Got to talk to Hunter.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_05: Okay.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_02: All right, he's he's your man.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_02: He'll get you get you in there, I'm sure.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_02: Cool.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_02: I I don't want to automatically say there's an opening, but uh don't want to speak for him.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_02: But I know that that was recently relaunched, one of the many units that they wanted to get.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_02: And so pretty soon the housing unit, uh the Hacker uh unit with our housing authority uh also being relaunched in the process of that.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_02: All of this as we continue to restock our shelves, so to speak, uh we hit a low in about 2020.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of the reasons, of course, the George Floyd riots, COVID, all those things led to mass retirements, resignations, transfers, all those things.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_02: And so we've been slowly building the Asheville Police Department Force back up ever since.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_02: And lateral transfers are a big part of it.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and it's great to get all these young cadets, but to get people like yourself that have actual law enforcement experience, that's huge.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_02: So what do you think you bring uh from your years of experience that maybe you can even help with the young guys with?
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_05: Really, just the experience.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_05: I've worked uh a few fatal crashes, successfully prosecuting them.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_05: Um I've been to just about any type of call that you can go to.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_05: I was big on DWI enforcement, um drug enforcement.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_05: I've had several trafficking cases under my belt.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_05: I've prosecuted, sent people to prison for 10 plus years, just my experience in general.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, what you can learn from, you know, textbooks is great.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_02: But uh in this profession, maybe more so than almost any other.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_02: What you see out there in the streets and your experiences, I've got to think that's so much bigger.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_02: You know, just what you see every day and how you react.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_05: Aaron Powell Yeah, it's massive.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_05: There's one officer that I learned from.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_05: Um he's actually moved to Texas now um with Homeland Security.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_05: But I learned more from him than I did any class that I ever took.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_05: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_02: Senior Police Officer Mark Battingfield is with me, or we think senior police officer.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_02: He's not 100% sure as a lateral transfer how the 16 years will translate into his new position here at the Asheville Police Department.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_02: But like I was talking with Brandon, uh you're getting probably a little bit sick of those four walls in there as the as the paper gets processed and all those different things.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_02: Getting a little anxious to get on the street, I would imagine.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_05: Aaron Powell Yeah, I'm I'm ready to get back at it.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_05: Do you know approximately when?
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_05: I'm going to say at least three more weeks.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_02: I mean you're at the mercy of the paperwork.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_05: Yes.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_05: At the mercy of the state.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_02: But you did have to uh do a lot of the things that regular employees have to, even like myself.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_02: You still have to undergo the background checks and the polygraph.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_02: Do you have to do the polygraph again?
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, I had to do the polygraph again and the psyche vow holding yours.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_02: Polygraph, man.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_02: I am telling you, I was sweating buckets in the room.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_02: Because as a civilian, like coming in here, I was not a member of law enforcement before I took this job.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_02: And they they put all those diodes or whatever those things are.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_02: They're all over the place.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_02: They're they're on your arms, they're on your chest, they're on your they're on your button cheeks.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, it's they're everywhere.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_02: They are and you're just like okay, I got nothing to be nervous about, but I'm incredibly nervous.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_02: And and how did you do?
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I fared horribly, but I passed.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, that was my second one.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_05: And uh even being thrown at once before, I still wasn't.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_02: Which is exactly what you shouldn't do.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_02: And that was my big thing.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_02: It's like I'm telling the truth, but what if this thing says I'm lying?
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_05: I was more nervous about that than anything I've ever done.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_02: New APD officer via lateral transfer, Mark Bettingfield, joins me.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_02: We're going to treat you like you've been here forever, though, because the question that we always ask is something that most people don't know about you.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_02: And being brand new, they really don't know anything about you, so you could shout out anything.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_02: Let's put it this way what would you like your fellow officers and maybe members of the community to know about you?
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, one fun thing about me, I race dirtbox with my kids.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_05: It's called hair scramble racing.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_02: Hair scramble racing?
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, I am not familiar with that.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_05: So it's I've the tracks are usually I've been on one as short as six and a half miles, and I've been on one as long as 13 miles.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_05: Um it's up and down mountains, and it's usually an hour and a half to two hour race.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_05: Wow.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_05: You do as many laps as you can in two hours.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_02: So where do these take place?
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_05: There's a big national series called GNCC.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_05: It's Grand National Cross Country Racing.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_05: They're all over.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_05: Um, Georgia, Florida, all over.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_05: And then there's a North Carolina series.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_02: Is there any around like here in the mountains?
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_05: North Carolina series.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_05: Um it's uh North Carolina Hair Scramble Association, they uh Morganton, um, Taylorsville, those areas.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_02: Now you gotta come somebody else you gotta talk to besides Hunter Wellborn, you gotta talk with Sergeant Booth, Justin Booth.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_02: So he was in our uh last episode, because May is motorcycle safety awareness, and he got started on well, not on that circuit, but on that style of bike.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_02: So kind of more like the dirt bikes, the you know, those type things.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_02: That's how he got started way back in the day, and he's continued his love for motorcycles by mostly riding on the street.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_02: But I know for a fact that's how he got started, like way back.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_02: So you guys have something in common there.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_02: See, so you're learning, I'm learning, everyone's learning.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_02: So try on, then Fletcher, and now the Asheville Police Department as a lateral transfer, third stop, and we hope it's your last.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_05: I'd like to finish it here because having to go through another hiring process I don't want to do.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_02: I don't blame you.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_02: Um you mentioned Traffic Safety Unit, any other aspirations with the APD?
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_05: Maybe get back as a supervisor because I was a sergeant at Fletcher.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_05: Um, so get back there one day.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_02: Awesome.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_05: Um that's about it.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_02: Well, senior police officer, we think Mark Bettingfield, thank you so much for joining me and for joining the Asheville Police Department for being a part.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_02: Getting to know Officer Andrew Ammons, how are you?
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_02: Good sir, how are you?
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_02: This took a minute to get us uh in one room together.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_02: It sure did.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_02: For all the reasons that we're here, actually, you're a busy guy, right?
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_02: You're currently in training.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, sir.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_02: Right?
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_02: And you're also a new dad.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_02: And with Father's Day coming up on June 21st, you got a lot of newness in your life, don't you?
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it it doesn't feel real at all like having a child to go home to.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_04: It's the greatest it's the greatest thing, but it's also weird almost feeling.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you're a young man.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_02: How old are you?
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_02: I'm 22.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_02: Good lord.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so I'm fifty-seven, right?
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_02: And I wasn't even married until I was thirty.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so the thought of children did didn't even come into existence for me.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_02: And then I quickly decided it wasn't for me.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_02: You obviously decided it was for you.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_02: And we'll get into that here in just a couple of seconds.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_02: Let's go back to the beginning of where are you from?
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_04: So I'm from Brevard, North Carolina.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_04: It's like probably 45 minutes south of here.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_02: I know where Brevard is.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_02: I've lived here for 25 years.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_02: So I've been to Brevard.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_02: Love Brevard, as a matter of fact.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_02: It's a great little community.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_02: I go out there, I golf, there's the waterfalls, there's some nice breweries.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's a real nice community.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_02: It's like really what Western North Carolina is all about.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_02: It sure is.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_02: You know, the small town feel and all of that.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_02: So you're from Brevard, but you work for the Asheville Police Department.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_04: I do.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_02: So why not Brevard?
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_04: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_04: So my dad's in law was in law enforcement for 34 years.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_04: We've lived in Bravard my whole life.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_04: I didn't want to base my career off of his career.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_04: I didn't want to just follow in his footsteps of just being Tom Ammons' son.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_04: I did.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_04: I wanted to be my own man and create my own upcoming in law enforcement.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_02: So he worked for the Brevard Police Department.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_04: No, he worked for the SBI.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, okay.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, he did that um for twenty-something years.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, he was uh he worked for Bunkham County for a little while, uh, worked in Henderson County until he retired about about two weeks ago, actually.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell So then he would be probably why you wanted to get into law enforcement though, right?
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_04: So my my grandfather was a hired patrolman out in Winston-Salem, and then my dad was a SBI agent.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_04: So it kind of just feels like it's in my blood, honestly.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell, you're I mean you were exposed to it, the lifestyle and everything that encompasses it your entire life.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Powell Exactly.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so it you're a dad.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_02: All right.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_02: So we're gonna jump right into that now.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_02: And you're already married at age twenty two.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not married yet.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_02: I'm engaged.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, okay.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_02: Well, so you're you got that going.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_02: Oh my god.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_04: I'm on the path to it.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_02: But holy cow, that's another new thing you got coming up, then, right?
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_02: Then the whole Bettle process.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_04: That's gonna be Dude.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_02: Don't you want to just haven't you thought about maybe spreading these things out just a little bit?
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_04: I've never I've never been I've never been a patient guy.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_04: I've always like when I know I want something, I just I just do it.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Ross Powell One at a time, though.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_02: I mean because you're about to become a solo officer.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_02: How close are we to that?
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_02: Six days, six shifts.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_02: Oh wow.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_02: You're really close.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_02: So even by like by the time this is out, you'll be like right there on the cusp.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_02: So now we obviously had a ceremony when you graduated from B L E T.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_02: There's no real ceremony when you go solo, right?
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_02: Except maybe get in a car.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_04: Maybe.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_04: Maybe.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_04: Maybe a car.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, right now because we're kind of short on cars because we've got so many of you guys.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_02: You had 21, I think, in your class.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_02: Is that the right number?
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_02: That's a lot.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_02: That's good for us, though.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it was it was our biggest class in years, and it's one of the reasons we were able to bring back the uh B L E T program in-house.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_02: So that was must have been pretty exciting too, right?
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_04: It was great.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_04: I love being in-house.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_04: I was around the people that I'm gonna be on the road with.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, just being exposed to even just the area that we're in, um, even being for Brevard, I I didn't come to Asheville very much.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_04: So understanding Asheville, just coming to to class was was a helpful tool for me.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_02: So you're learning the city, Kate.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_02: You're learning how to be a cop?
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_02: Learning how to be a dad.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_02: All in one.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_02: So how's the dad thing going?
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, it's great.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_04: Yesterday I literally spent the whole day with her.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_04: We watched Clifford.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_04: That is her biggest thing.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_02: Big red dog.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_04: Big red dog.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_02: Loved Clifford, right?
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, her age, she's three months, so she's starting to see colors, and the big red dog is a huge part of her life right now.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_02: It's a big red dog, it's a big color.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_04: So I mean, she her eyes just get so huge when you when she looks at Clifford, and um, it's just an awe of the TV.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so let's talk about when she was born.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_02: All right, it was only three months ago.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_02: And those aren't memories that are gonna fade anytime quickly.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_02: Oh gosh, no.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_02: But it was just three months ago.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_02: So what was that like?
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_02: Were you there for the delivery?
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_04: I was.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_04: So I it's kind of kind of a story.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_04: So I was in phase one of field training.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_04: Um, I had let my field training trainer know, like, hey, this is what's coming up.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_04: And so like she'd been in the hospital a couple days, she got released because she hadn't got to one centimeter yet.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_02: So a bit of a false alarm then she thought, and then not ready to get quite ready.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_04: We were in the hospital for three days leading up.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_04: Like I was there and then I went home to go to work and then come home.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_04: It was just a whole thing.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_04: So like the day of I remember it very, very well, obviously.
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_04: It was like nine o'clock in the morning.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_04: I got a call, like, hey, I'm going to the hospital.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_04: Like, this is this is happening today.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_04: I was like, oh my.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_04: And I looked at my FTO, uh, John Derrick, and I was like, I I think I need to go.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_04: And he was like, What do you mean you think?
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_04: You need to go now.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_04: Like, what are you still doing here?
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_04: Um so I mean I believe John Derrick's father, right?
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_04: He is.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, so he knows.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, he knows, yeah.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_04: Um so uh he was like, just go.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_04: Don't even worry about work, don't worry about your time, don't worry about field training, go be with her.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_04: I was like, Yes, okay.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_02: Some things are more important.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_02: And that was that was definitely one of those things.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_04: So she was born uh that night at it was like 9 30 in the 9 30 at night um that she was born and like my whole world just changed in literally half a second.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, literally.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_02: And and so there's that.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_02: There's the hospital, of course, and and the but then it gets real when you go home.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_02: So now there's no doctors around, there's no nurses around.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_02: There's just you and your fiance and your child.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_02: And then the child's like, uh child's gonna cry, the child's gonna this.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_02: The child it's all these things you guys gotta figure out.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_04: So I mean it's it it's definitely an adjustment.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_04: Like when we came home, I think we came home like two days later from the hospital, and we're sitting there going, Holy cow, this is real.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_04: First thing very real.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_04: First thing we did is like when she was sleeping, we were out.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_04: Like we went straight to sleep as soon as we got home, and when she was sleeping, and honestly, she didn't really cry when we first got home.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_04: She wasn't a huge crier probably till about a month.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_04: Like she slept a lot in her first month.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_02: Well, that's good for you and your fiance, of course.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, it it's honestly it's still been very well.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, she sleeps twelve hours a night.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_04: She goes to bed at seven o'clock and doesn't wake up until six thirty, seven o'clock in the morning.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_02: It's because I understand it's different for everybody.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_02: It's just every case is different and there's no rhyme or reason to it.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, we have a great routine with her.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_04: We'll we'll eat dinner together about six o'clock, give her a bath, make her a fresh bottle, and then take her take her to our room where it's completely dark.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_04: Um, she has a sound machine that lights up bright red, which is supposed to be good for the uh the child.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_04: So we just tuck her in, put her blanket in the dryer where it's nice and warm as she gets out, and have like prop up her bottle with the blanket.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_04: She's out like a light.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, now you can share the name or not share the name.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_02: It's up to you, but who got to choose the name?
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_02: Oof.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_04: I was very indecisive.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_04: Like my my fiance chose probably like twenty names, and I said no to every single one of them.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_04: And so we had a list of two.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_02: I hope you said no nicely.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_04: I I tried.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_04: There were some names in there, I was like, these are just not gonna work.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_02: That's awful.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_02: That's horrible.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_02: We're not calling her Beatrice.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_02: It's just we're not doing that.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_04: No, um um so the kind of a backstory is her name's Emery.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_04: So it's a pretty name.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_04: So my grandparents lived in Tennessee and they went they lived in a community called Little Emery.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_04: And that's where they went to high school, like middle school, like all like through grade school, it was Little Emery.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_04: And we love we fell in love with that name.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_04: And then also with that name, she has a lot of like nicknames she can go by.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_04: Um We call her M right now.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_04: M E.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_02: Little Emery, just like the name of the town.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, then her middle name is Magnolia.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_04: So she can I mean it's just a beautiful name.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_04: And she has so Emory Magnolia Ammons.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_04: Yes.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_04: That does just roll off the tongue, doesn't it?
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_02: It's nice.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_02: That's a nice one.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_04: So I mean she she can go by her middle name.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, this she has endless options when she grows up.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, we were really excited when we came across that name.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell, I'm just uh gonna give you a warning you're not gonna get a Father's Day gift this year.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think Emory is gonna go out and get you anything.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_02: You might get a gift from someone else, but you're not you're not getting it from her.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_04: No, no, no.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_02: Well, that's awesome.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_02: Congratulations on that, with Father's Day coming up.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_02: So the other new thing in your life, a new officer of the APD.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_02: Is it everything so far that you kind of thought I mean you just got out of B L D T what, three, four months ago?
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_02: Six months maybe close.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_02: Closer to six months.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_02: So for the last five, six months, you've been on the road now.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_02: Which is different than being in a classroom.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell Much different.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_02: But is it kind of what they taught you?
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_02: Is it kind of the things that you're seeing on the road are kind of what they kind of braced you for?
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, in a sense, I feel like they you you you obviously can't predict any call that we're going to go to.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_04: Like literally every single day is completely different.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_04: You cannot like for me, I can't predict my day because then it it doesn't happen.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_04: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_02: Well, look on the difficulty we have scheduling this.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_02: As far as predicting your day, your schedule.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_02: It took us forever, but I'm glad I'm glad you're joining me.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, me too.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_04: Um but yeah, like it it it's uh it's definitely 100% different than being sitting there in the classroom.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_04: It's just they can't expose you to exactly w what call you're gonna go to.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_04: But I've been very grateful with my field training officers.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_04: Like they've been amazing.
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_04: They've taught me a lot about just being a law enforcement officer, how to be a because all of my FTOs were are dads too.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_04: So they all understand of how to be a dad and to be a police officer.
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_04: And then just teaching me how to be a police officer and a dad all at the same time.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_02: Well, the work life balance is incredibly important.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_02: It's not just a job.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_02: I think you're figuring that out already.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_02: It is it's a life, it's a lifestyle.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_02: It is and then to balance that with your home life and the support from your family, your growing family now is going to be vitally important to your success.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, for sure.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_02: So pretty excited about the next week or so?
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_02: You're gonna be solo and on your own in a matter of speaking, but of course, your fellow officers never far away.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_04: No, never.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_04: And I it's a bit of a scary feeling to be solo, not knowing like my there's not an officer sitting beside me.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_02: But um, I'm sure everyone's uh ever in the history of policing has felt that way.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_04: But I feel like it's just like a it's just a learned skill.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_04: You just repet it like doing it over and over again, it it'll just come.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_04: It'll just click.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_02: So biggest surprise that you've encountered thus far, the one thing that you just did not see coming.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_02: Like is the paperwork?
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_02: Is it the is it the long days?
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_04: Is it the long days don't really bother me as much.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_04: I think it's I think it is just the amount of like there's some days that are just literally report days.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_04: You'll get to work and you have reports from last night that you gotta finish, and then you get calls and they're it's only reports.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_04: So you just feel like you're just typing all day.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_04: Um some days where you're just like you're enjoying yourself.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_04: Like I I like traffic.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_04: I like doing traffic stops and getting out with people.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_04: Um so some days I'll just be doing that, and other days I'll just be typing away with my fingers.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_02: So you're just getting started, but is there a certain area that you think you might want to focus on as you are here a little bit longer at the Asheville Police Department, uh be it the CID or canine, or is it traffic?
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_02: It's traffic.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_02: TSU is definitely where my end goal is.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_02: Um that unit just got relaunched, so you're in luck.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_04: Exactly.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_04: So I'm I'm excited to to go to the trainings and get all the stuff that I need um and just get more out there and just do the job more and because I feel like once I do it longer, it's just gonna come more naturally and like specialized units are gonna be in view where I can actually achieve what I want.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_02: Well, congratulations on so many things.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_02: I appreciate it.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_02: In just a few days, and maybe by the time this airs, you'll be a solo police officer.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_02: So one more box can be checked in your life.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_02: Congratulations on being a dad with Father's Day coming up.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_02: I appreciate it.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_02: And congratulations on the wedding, which will be coming soon as well.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_02: We'll see.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_02: I th I'm thinking probably next fall.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so you've got a little time to plan on that one.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_02: Fingers crossed.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_02: Take a deep breath and maybe let's get this daddy thing down.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_02: And then we'll plan for the wedding.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_02: All right.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_02: Well, congratulations to you and your future bride and the mom and to Emory Magnolia Ammons.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_02: Love that name.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_02: Officer Ammons, thanks so much for joining me.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_02: Time again for another History Minute with Hannah Silberman.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_02: Welcome back.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_00: Happy to be here.
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_02: In this one, I guess we go back 75 years, right?
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_02: To 1951, right about now in 1951, June 9th.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_02: And I was just reading a blurb about this one.
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_02: Now you've got way more details.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_02: But this reads like it's straight out of the movies.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_02: A shootout in Monford.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_02: Do tell.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_00: So about 9 50 p.m., two police officers, patrolman Don Poor and JD Baker, were called to Morrow Street in Montford, and there was a man who was chasing people around the neighborhood with a gun.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_02: That's not good.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_00: So when they got there, they found the man standing in an alley next to the address they were given on Morrow Street, and he was armed with a shotgun.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_00: And so the officers challenged him and said, drop it.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_00: They pulled out their guns.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_00: But that's when he shot at police officer poor.
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_02: Wow, with a shotgun.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_02: Any damage?
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_00: The uh two police officers pulled out their guns and, of course, started firing back.
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.: How do you any idea how close they were to each other?
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_02: Because a a shotgun can kind of depending on what you got in there, it could be pretty scattered.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Powell I don't imagine he was close enough, uh especially since the officers immediately fired back.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_00: But they were able to summon eight on the radio.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_00: But before the uh backup could arrive, the police officers had already emptied the chambers of their gun.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_00: And so they were waiting.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so now they've emptied their gun.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_00: This man who presumably has another shot left is you know showing down with them in this alley.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.: So just shooting at each other, basically.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.: Yep.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_00: Officer Poor decided to lay down prone in the shadows of the alley because he knew that this man was advancing on him.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_00: And apparently the suspect heard the click of the empty gun and knew that the officers were out of ammo and started screaming, I'm coming to get you.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_00: And as uh the cruiser started to come, he fired another shot which caused some amount of damage in a follow-up article.
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_00: It said that either gravel or parts of the shotgun shell actually hit the face of Officer Poor caused some damage.
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_02: Like hit the ground maybe and ricocheted up.
• 38:55
  SPEAKER_00: I'm trying to figure out where that Morrow Street in Montford Trevor Burrus Today it is that little road where Montford Park is under the community center.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's kind of that gravel when you are in the parking lot and you have to take the road that connects you down to Portland.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so not an alley anymore.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_02: But at the time that wasn't alley.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, I'm starting to get the mental image now, the visual.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's still kind of an alley.
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_02: You're right.
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_02: It is still kind of an alley.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_02: Not not the alley that I envision.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_02: When I think alley, I'm thinking, you know, walls on both sides, downtown type stuff.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_02: That's what I think of when I think of alley.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_02: But in reality, any of those kind of quick little cut-throughs qualifies as an alley.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, it's that little cut-through from the the parking lot under the Montford Community Center.
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_00: Going south back towards the Trevor Burrus.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_02: So he shoots kind of into the ground, gets some ricochet up.
• 39:47
  SPEAKER_02: I'm coming to get you.
• 39:47
  SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus Finally, the sound of the approaching cruisers frightened him off.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_00: So he he ran away and left a trail of blood because he had been shot in the finger by the police officers returning to the Trevor Burrus.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_02: In the finger?
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_02: Holy cow.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_02: That is a small target, and what are the odds?
• 40:02
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Powell Yeah.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_00: But they they did catch him using the trail of blood and a house in uh the nearby neighborhood.
• 40:08
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus Well, at least that they could call for backup.
• 40:11
  SPEAKER_02: Because remember, we talked about a story one time that was in the Emma area.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_02: I guess that one would have been probably in the early 1900s when there were no police radios.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_02: And if you're if we remember, that one lasted a little longer and had a little more because there's no help coming.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_00: I think that was right behind the police station.
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_02: But you couldn't call anybody.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 40:32
  SPEAKER_00: She went to a neighbor's house to reload his ammo.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_00: If you remember in that story, he ran out.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_02: Can I borrow some bullets?
• 40:37
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_02: I remember how that story unfolded.
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_00: But Officer Poor didn't have that, and he had an armed person coming for him, but thankfully he he did run away.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_02: They found him, though.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_00: They did.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_00: And it actually mentions officers who caught him, included uh police chief Harold Enlo and Assistant Chief Sluter.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_00: So everybody came to the call.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_02: It was an all-hands on deck for that one.
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus, Jr.: Absolutely.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_02: So police radio is there, getting the word out and everyone coming.
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus, Jr.: Well, a couple of days later, they did publish an article about his sentence, and his defense said, quote, I don't know a thing about that.
• 41:04
  SPEAKER_00: I was drunk.
• 41:07
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think that's really an adequate defense, but I mean you go with what you got.
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_02: But look at how quickly that process was from incident to capture to trial.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it was in the police court, which existed at the time.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_00: So it was run by a police court judge and the processes moved a lot faster.
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_00: I I'm actually not 100% sure because I thought felonies were processed in the superior court.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_00: Most of the time the police court, to my understanding, was for like intoxicated people and misdemeanors.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.: So do you think possibly they wanted to keep that one there?
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Ross Powell That's quite possible.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_00: But they said that they sentenced him to four years, quote, on the roads.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_02: Aaron Powell So on the roads to me sounds like kind of chain gang type stuff.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_02: Not like today where they put that little vest on you and you pick up garbage along the side.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_02: I'm thinking it was a little harder back in the day.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_02: Not sure exactly what they were doing, busting rocks or whatnot, but on the roads it sounds like that uh was not easy time.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus Yeah.
• 42:03
  SPEAKER_00: I would imagine it was probably not very pleasant.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus So four years for that one.
• 42:07
  SPEAKER_02: And uh and thankfully none of the officers were really hurt badly, just a little bit of a a ricochet from a shotgun.
• 42:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 42:13
  SPEAKER_02: But that had to be terrifying.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_00: It says they're not sure if it was from the shot or the gravel, but he definitely um got it when he was flattened out on the the alley trying to hide.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm sure that was a pretty terrifying moment for the Aaron.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and they had to be close enough.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_02: He heard the click of the gun.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_02: So clearly they weren't like a hundred yards apart.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_02: They were uh close enough proximity that they could hear that.
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_02: So two officers on one side, assailant on the other, he with the shotgun, them with their pistols, and just firing away like Hollywood could write that script.
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_00: No, but thankfully those officers showed up because it it did use the term terrorizing the neighborhood, and he was uh apparently willing to shoot that quickly at the responding officers who knows what he would have done if they hadn't got shown up.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_02: So I wondered if he had fired at anybody else or fired in the air, done it terrorizing the neighborhood to me.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, just wandering around yelling doesn't quite mean terrorizing, but I bet he fired the weapon probably several times.
• 43:06
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 43:06
  SPEAKER_02: So they did get him.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_02: That's the good news.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_02: So we have a happy ending to that one, and it occurred on June 9th, 1951.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_02: We've got a good one coming up in July, we're gonna talk about.
• 43:16
  SPEAKER_02: Uh tease this one for the next episode.
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_02: This one is called The Worst Traffic in Asheville's history.
• 43:23
  SPEAKER_02: Now, people can relate to this because they would argue that currently is the worst traffic in Asheville's history, as we're in the middle of multiple interstate projects right now, including the bridge is about to be completely built and dismantled and this whole thing through I-26 and 40 and 240 and all of that.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_02: So to be worse than that is gonna take some doing.
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, but that occurred on July 3rd, 1951.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_02: So the same year.
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_02: So we will do that one in uh one of the upcoming episodes in July of the APD Pod Squad.
• 43:56
  SPEAKER_02: But another History Minute with Hannah Silberman.
• 43:59
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you again for joining us.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for having me.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_02: That does it for another episode.
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you to my guests, officers Brandon Collins, Mark Bettingfield, and Andrew Ammons, and Hannah Silberman with the History Minute.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_02: And thank you for listening, especially all the dads out there.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_02: A very happy Father's Day to you.
• 44:19
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• 44:20
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• 44:21
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• 44:32
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• 44:48
  SPEAKER_02: I'm Rick Rice, and this is the APD Pod Squad.