Latest / True Crime and Wine Time / S5 E6 Interview with James Altgelt - Good Cops, Bad Cops
Transcript
- 0:14Speaker 1: Hello, love, lies, and welcome to True Crime and Wine Time.
- 0:18Speaker 1: I am Terry true Crime in case this is your
- 0:21Speaker 1: first time joining us, and I guess I need to
- 0:25Speaker 1: let y'all know tonight it's just me. JT is not
- 0:29Speaker 1: feeling well, but just between you and me, I guess
- 0:33Speaker 1: in the universe, I'm kind of wondering if he was
- 0:36Speaker 1: scared to interview a former cop, and now me is
- 0:40Speaker 1: wondering does he got an active warrant? And do I
- 0:43Speaker 1: need to do some deep diving into my co host now? Seriously, guys,
- 0:48Speaker 1: he is not feeling well, so you are stuck with
- 0:51Speaker 1: me for tonight, but I promise it will be entertaining
- 0:55Speaker 1: as always and we have a fabulous guest. Now. To
- 0:59Speaker 1: get all of the details out of the way, please
- 1:02Speaker 1: remember to like subscribe and hit the notification bell, and
- 1:07Speaker 1: if you want, you can become a channel member. And
- 1:10Speaker 1: as a channel member you get exclusive content, so basically
- 1:15Speaker 1: you get more of me and JT, but you also
- 1:18Speaker 1: get shows early and a lot of other fun stuff.
- 1:23Speaker 1: So we are having a member's only show next Friday,
- 1:28Speaker 1: the twenty first, at eight o'clock Central and nine o'clock Eastern.
- 1:33Speaker 1: And there goes the dog barking like she is not
- 1:37Speaker 1: supposed to. But that's okay. We're gonna keep going. So also,
- 1:42Speaker 1: just to remind you, guys, True Crime and Mind Time
- 1:45Speaker 1: is doing an in person live show on May third
- 1:49Speaker 1: at Hamilton Pool Vineyard in Farms in Dripping Springs, Texas. Guys,
- 1:54Speaker 1: I've said this one thousand times. Basically, it's Austin. To me,
- 1:58Speaker 1: it is, but we will be on the stage and
- 2:02Speaker 1: the vineyard has picked for us the shocking case of
- 2:06Speaker 1: the Austin, Texas yogurt shop murders. So if you don't
- 2:11Speaker 1: know anything about that case and you're in the area,
- 2:14Speaker 1: definitely come and visit us now. Tickets are officially on
- 2:19Speaker 1: sale right now, so don't wait to grab yours. They
- 2:23Speaker 1: are on sale I believe until midnight on March fifteenth,
- 2:28Speaker 1: so you want to try to get them while they're
- 2:31Speaker 1: a little bit cheaper now Tonight, I decided to be extra,
- 2:38Speaker 1: which I know anyone that is a normal viewer is
- 2:42Speaker 1: not surprised. I am drinking a black box rose, but
- 2:48Speaker 1: I have a wild hibiscus flower that's marinated in rose syrup. Guys.
- 2:53Speaker 1: It's really cool. But here is what it says. It's
- 2:57Speaker 1: a tribute to the eternal romance of the rose. It's
- 3:01Speaker 1: a glorious feminine indulgence for your champagne or rose. It
- 3:06Speaker 1: adds a bit of flowery taste with a hint of sweet,
- 3:10Speaker 1: and guys, I will tell you it smells heavenly. It's
- 3:14Speaker 1: the first time I've done it in a rose. I
- 3:17Speaker 1: used it on Valentine's Day for our party in Champagne.
- 3:21Speaker 1: But guys, this might be my new thing. And it
- 3:25Speaker 1: truly I've even brought my little things. It is truly
- 3:28Speaker 1: a hibiscus flower. Now I've heard you can eat them,
- 3:33Speaker 1: but I haven't done that. So just know I decided
- 3:37Speaker 1: to be a little extra tonight. Tonight, guys, it's gonna
- 3:43Speaker 1: be a great night. We have some great questions. We
- 3:46Speaker 1: have a great guest. If you have any questions, you
- 3:51Speaker 1: can put them in the chat. We will save them
- 3:54Speaker 1: for the end of our interview tonight so that we
- 3:57Speaker 1: don't break the flow. But tonight, I am honored to
- 4:02Speaker 1: have James ault Guelt, who is a retired police officer.
- 4:06Speaker 1: I am not going to reach all his dossier because
- 4:09Speaker 1: it's vast, and he's going to share some insight into
- 4:13Speaker 1: his career in law enforcement. And how law enforcement has
- 4:19Speaker 1: changed over the years. So hello James, and welcome.
- 4:25Speaker 2: Thank you, Terry. I appreciate you inviting me on the show.
- 4:28Speaker 1: I am glad to have you here. It's exciting and
- 4:34Speaker 1: hopefully it's okay that I didn't read out all of
- 4:36Speaker 1: your experience, because it's a lot. Even somebody who knows
- 4:43Speaker 1: you didn't realize how vast it was. So I appreciate
- 4:48Speaker 1: you taking the time to be with us. So to
- 4:52Speaker 1: get started, the first thing I always like to start with,
- 4:56Speaker 1: can you tell us a little bit about you in
- 4:59Speaker 1: a brief overview of your career in law enforcement.
- 5:04Speaker 2: I started my law enforcement career at a young age
- 5:06Speaker 2: and I went into the police Academy at age twenty.
- 5:10Speaker 2: During my time at the academy, they changed the state
- 5:13Speaker 2: law that said you had to be twenty one to
- 5:14Speaker 2: be a peace officer in the state of Texas. I
- 5:17Speaker 2: was grandfathered, and so I started my peace officer career
- 5:23Speaker 2: in Barritt County, which is San Antonio, Texas, is the
- 5:26Speaker 2: county seat. As a peace officer. I actually started my
- 5:29Speaker 2: law enforcement career though, as a dispatcher jailer Michael County
- 5:33Speaker 2: Sheriff's Office. So when I started as a peace officer.
- 5:37Speaker 2: I wasn't old enough to buy my handgun. I wasn't
- 5:40Speaker 2: old enough to buy my handgun ammunition. I couldn't even
- 5:43Speaker 2: legally drink alcohol in the state of Texas, but I
- 5:45Speaker 2: could enforce the laws and carry the gun wherever I
- 5:47Speaker 2: wanted to, just as long as somebody got it for
- 5:49Speaker 2: me at first. And so that was started off in
- 5:54Speaker 2: nineteen eighty five, nineteen eighty six, actually in nineteen eighty
- 5:57Speaker 2: six eighty five eighty six, and I've worked for a
- 6:03Speaker 2: civil service sheriff's office, a non civil service sheriff's office,
- 6:07Speaker 2: a civil service police department, and a non civil service
- 6:10Speaker 2: police department. And did a little over eight and a
- 6:12Speaker 2: half years on active duty in the United States Air
- 6:15Speaker 2: Force as a security Back then it was called security
- 6:18Speaker 2: policeman its security forces. I did that for a short
- 6:21Speaker 2: term and then was accepted to the Airport Office's Special Investigation.
- 6:25Speaker 2: So I've seen law enforcement on the military, federal side,
- 6:29Speaker 2: as well as on the state side in Texas.
- 6:32Speaker 1: Man, Now I have to tell you, I am shot
- 6:37Speaker 1: to first of all, learn you have to be twenty
- 6:39Speaker 1: one in Texas to be a police officer, because we
- 6:43Speaker 1: let people go into the military at eighteen and have guns.
- 6:46Speaker 1: So I guess it's different on the state level.
- 6:50Speaker 2: You know, that's the law when I went in. I've
- 6:53Speaker 2: been out of the law enforcement for a little over
- 6:57Speaker 2: five years now, and so I can't say what what
- 7:00Speaker 2: it is. You can you can be a jailer, I believe,
- 7:02Speaker 2: at a younger age. But that was the big concern,
- 7:06Speaker 2: and I was worried when I graduated the academy if
- 7:08Speaker 2: the sheriff of Bear County at that time what actually
- 7:11Speaker 2: deputized me or made me wait the extra six months
- 7:14Speaker 2: for me to turn twenty one.
- 7:15Speaker 1: So well, and this just just popped in my head.
- 7:19Speaker 1: So basically, you were grandfathered at the age of twenty
- 7:23Speaker 1: And I don't know anyone else who's been labeled grandfather
- 7:26Speaker 1: that young. So that just hit my little brain. I'm like,
- 7:30Speaker 1: wait a minute.
- 7:31Speaker 2: There you go.
- 7:34Speaker 1: Now, what is the difference between civil service and nonsense
- 7:41Speaker 1: and non civil service departments?
- 7:45Speaker 2: Well, civil services has rules and make sure that there is.
- 7:54Speaker 2: It diffuses the good old boy system, if you will, right, So,
- 8:00Speaker 2: you have to take a civil service test. You have
- 8:02Speaker 2: to pass the Civil Service test. The Civil Service Commission
- 8:05Speaker 2: has get some advised that every step in the application
- 8:07Speaker 2: process as far as we dropped all kilt because he
- 8:10Speaker 2: failed his written test, or he failed his physical fitness
- 8:13Speaker 2: test or his background investigation or his oral interview or
- 8:16Speaker 2: his polygraph if the department requires one. They have to
- 8:21Speaker 2: put out advanced notice for study materials for promotional tests
- 8:24Speaker 2: and give you advanced warning for promotional tests. And then
- 8:29Speaker 2: so you're promoted based on those aspects. And then so
- 8:33Speaker 2: the hiring process is there, and then the firing process
- 8:36Speaker 2: is also that you have to be fired for just cause,
- 8:39Speaker 2: and there is a even though Texas is an app
- 8:42Speaker 2: will and deployment state, in civil service, you have arbitration
- 8:46Speaker 2: and you have a right to appeal and work those cases.
- 8:50Speaker 2: And I've seen there's been very few circumstances where I've
- 8:55Speaker 2: seen an officer terminated in a civil service department that
- 8:58Speaker 2: shouldn't have been terminated, seeing several get their jobs back
- 9:02Speaker 2: that shouldn't have gotten their jobs back. So that side
- 9:07Speaker 2: cuts both ways. The non civil service, they can hire
- 9:10Speaker 2: me on any day that they want to, They can
- 9:12Speaker 2: promote me on any day that they want to. They
- 9:14Speaker 2: can promote me for any reason, but they can also
- 9:16Speaker 2: demote me for any reason where it's a civil service department.
- 9:19Speaker 2: That's not the case on a civil service department. You're
- 9:22Speaker 2: protected up to a certain rank and grade. On the
- 9:26Speaker 2: non civil service department, but the chief or a new
- 9:28Speaker 2: chief can come in, or a new sheriff can come
- 9:30Speaker 2: in and decide that he's going to bring his whole
- 9:32Speaker 2: family in and let everybody else go. So working in
- 9:37Speaker 2: a civil service department can give you the comfort to
- 9:40Speaker 2: believe that you can enforce the law equally and fairly
- 9:43Speaker 2: and not worry about who you write a ticket to,
- 9:45Speaker 2: who you arrest, or who you do not arrest, whereas
- 9:49Speaker 2: in a non civil service department sometimes that comes into bear,
- 9:53Speaker 2: that comes into play. Excuse me as far as who
- 9:56Speaker 2: are you encountering and what are the political ramific case
- 10:00Speaker 2: of what you do or do not do well.
- 10:04Speaker 1: I don't know why, but I thought all law enforcement
- 10:09Speaker 1: in Texas was civil service. So I don't know why
- 10:13Speaker 1: I thought that, but that's what I had in my brain.
- 10:16Speaker 1: I didn't That's why I asked. I didn't know there
- 10:18Speaker 1: was a difference. This is one reason why I like
- 10:21Speaker 1: to have people like you on the show, because you
- 10:24Speaker 1: can teach an old lady new tricks. Because I did
- 10:28Speaker 1: not know that. This whole time, I thought all law
- 10:32Speaker 1: enforcement in Texas were civil servants.
- 10:34Speaker 2: So we're public servants by.
- 10:37Speaker 1: Public servants, but I thought they were also civil So
- 10:39Speaker 1: I thought because I always looked at civil I was like, Oh,
- 10:42Speaker 1: it's kind of like a union, so to speak. But
- 10:45Speaker 1: it's not a union. But there's a little bit more rules.
- 10:47Speaker 1: You just can't walk in and say bye, right thing. Okay, Now,
- 10:51Speaker 1: what motivated you at such a young age to want
- 10:55Speaker 1: to go into law enforcement?
- 10:57Speaker 2: Well, you know a couple of things. Number one was,
- 11:01Speaker 2: is I like the challenge of not knowing what your
- 11:04Speaker 2: day is going to be and having something different every day.
- 11:07Speaker 2: I actually started college to be an accountant, and after
- 11:09Speaker 2: a short lived time, I decided that while I like
- 11:13Speaker 2: crunching numbers, I don't know if I want to do
- 11:14Speaker 2: that every day on the same day for the same
- 11:16Speaker 2: account or the same type of accounts. And really serving
- 11:19Speaker 2: your community means a lot to me. And going out
- 11:23Speaker 2: there helping the people that that that are being taken
- 11:25Speaker 2: advantage of, that can't help themselves, that are going through
- 11:28Speaker 2: difficult situations really fed my soul, if you will. And
- 11:35Speaker 2: with something that that that I enjoyed and and and
- 11:39Speaker 2: continue to work in public service my entire life.
- 11:42Speaker 1: So I will say a lot of things are clicking
- 11:46Speaker 1: now in my brain when you said accounting and then,
- 11:49Speaker 1: I also didn't realize that we had that in common
- 11:52Speaker 1: because that was what I went to school for as well,
- 11:55Speaker 1: was to be an accountant. And I lasted six months
- 11:59Speaker 1: in accounting after getting out, and I wanted to slit
- 12:02Speaker 1: my wrist because you can't lock me in a room
- 12:04Speaker 1: with just numbers all day. You can't. I need something different.
- 12:09Speaker 1: So I never knew we had that in common. Now,
- 12:14Speaker 1: what and how do you think law enforcement has changed
- 12:18Speaker 1: since you entered the field years ago.
- 12:23Speaker 2: I think law enforcement has changed, just like society has changed.
- 12:27Speaker 2: When I grew up, you didn't question adults when they
- 12:31Speaker 2: told you to do something. The teacher was always right.
- 12:37Speaker 2: And my family, while I had and I have, very
- 12:41Speaker 2: loving parents, I was if somebody accused me of something
- 12:45Speaker 2: I was, I was guilty either, even if I didn't
- 12:47Speaker 2: do it. I shouldn't have been there to have been
- 12:49Speaker 2: accused of period in the story, And we weren't as
- 12:53Speaker 2: at that time. When I was growing up, we weren't
- 12:54Speaker 2: as violent in graphic society as we are now. Right.
- 12:57Speaker 2: And so you look at how times have changed. And
- 13:02Speaker 2: so when I first started, you there wasn't as much
- 13:05Speaker 2: high percentage of the population that that questioned your authority
- 13:11Speaker 2: and question what what what what you asked them to
- 13:14Speaker 2: do or what you told them to do. And through
- 13:17Speaker 2: various events in time that that mindset has changed and
- 13:23Speaker 2: and and now it's more so that that there's there's
- 13:27Speaker 2: a lack of respect for for law enforcement to listen
- 13:30Speaker 2: to what they do, and it becomes more of a debate,
- 13:35Speaker 2: if you will, or a trap. And part of that
- 13:39Speaker 2: is is if we're being fair, is because you know, uh,
- 13:42Speaker 2: there have been some events that have that have violated
- 13:45Speaker 2: the public's trust. Right. Some of that has been as
- 13:49Speaker 2: we become a more ligigious society and in some cases
- 13:55Speaker 2: and and in some cases we're society has just evolved
- 13:59Speaker 2: that not only do we we question leadership or question authority,
- 14:02Speaker 2: but we defy it openly sometimes just to see what
- 14:06Speaker 2: will happen. So things when I, like I said, when
- 14:10Speaker 2: I start off in law enforcement, when you ask somebody
- 14:12Speaker 2: for a driver's license, they gave you their driver's license.
- 14:15Speaker 2: You know, now they ask, what's your authority? Why are
- 14:18Speaker 2: you asking me what did I do tell me your
- 14:20Speaker 2: name and your badge number before I do this, and
- 14:22Speaker 2: you go through this rhetoric, and so it's much more
- 14:27Speaker 2: it's much more challenging, and it's a lot more difficult
- 14:31Speaker 2: in my opinion, to be a police officer now than
- 14:34Speaker 2: it was when I first started.
- 14:36Speaker 1: All I know is I was raised. Yes, I had
- 14:39Speaker 1: an uncle who was the constable or sheriff. I'm not
- 14:43Speaker 1: sure what its title was, but back in Hitchcock, but
- 14:46Speaker 1: I was raised. If a police officer asked you a question,
- 14:50Speaker 1: you answer it. You say yes, ma'am, no, ma'am, yes
- 14:53Speaker 1: or no, Sara sir. And if they stop you for something,
- 14:57Speaker 1: you were wrong because, like you said, I was in
- 14:59Speaker 1: the wrong place. If I wouldn't have been there, I
- 15:01Speaker 1: wouldn't be in trouble. And if I came home one
- 15:05Speaker 1: time and I got a ticket a warning, and I'll
- 15:08Speaker 1: never forget. My dad goes, well, why did you get
- 15:10Speaker 1: a warning? I was like, and he goes, what did
- 15:13Speaker 1: you do? I said, well, I told him I had
- 15:14Speaker 1: to go to the restroom, and he took my car
- 15:19Speaker 1: keys away for weeks because I lied to the police
- 15:22Speaker 1: officer just to get out of a ticket, and I'm
- 15:26Speaker 1: glad it stuck with me because I was like, Okay,
- 15:29Speaker 1: it's a big deal to do that. But I look
- 15:32Speaker 1: at people nowadays, it's not a big deal. But I
- 15:36Speaker 1: think it's just different. Just like if a teacher tells
- 15:38Speaker 1: you to sit down, you sit down. You don't say why,
- 15:41Speaker 1: And so that's true.
- 15:43Speaker 2: It's not just interaction with law enforcement, but I think
- 15:45Speaker 2: his interaction with everything, you know, the conduct that you
- 15:48Speaker 2: hear about that's taking place in our schools is is
- 15:53Speaker 2: just it's very disconcerting. And even when you watch behavior
- 15:58Speaker 2: and extracurricular active to use like sports and things like that,
- 16:01Speaker 2: our behavior is just and our value system has changed.
- 16:07Speaker 2: In my personal opinion, it's changed in a lot of
- 16:10Speaker 2: areas for the worst, not the better.
- 16:12Speaker 1: But oh, I agree. I tell people I was a
- 16:16Speaker 1: soccer coach for my kids soccer when they were younger,
- 16:21Speaker 1: and I didn't have problem with the kids, but the parents.
- 16:25Speaker 1: There were so many parents I had to kick off
- 16:28Speaker 1: the field because they were the ones acting the fools.
- 16:32Speaker 1: The kids are doing what they were supposed to, but
- 16:33Speaker 1: the parents were acting of fools, and I can't help
- 16:37Speaker 1: but wonder if that just kept going and trickled down
- 16:40Speaker 1: to the younger generations. I say that like, I'm really old,
- 16:44Speaker 1: but so I am old. Everybody knows I'm old. But
- 16:50Speaker 1: have you ever had a case that you would consider
- 16:54Speaker 1: was your most challenging that you've ever worked on.
- 16:59Speaker 2: There's there are a lot of cases that that I've
- 17:03Speaker 2: worked on as as a patrolman, as a special agent
- 17:06Speaker 2: with the OSI, as a detective with the Sheriff's office,
- 17:10Speaker 2: and and so to bring one to specific to form
- 17:18Speaker 2: to speak about is really difficult for me. It's it's
- 17:22Speaker 2: not a good idea to try to take cases personally.
- 17:24Speaker 2: But but but what you do. You care about the victims,
- 17:29Speaker 2: you care about what what happens. You give it your best,
- 17:32Speaker 2: and you work really hard. And and that's a heavy
- 17:35Speaker 2: burden that that the departments that have their patrolmen that
- 17:39Speaker 2: in that work their cases from cradle to grave, if
- 17:42Speaker 2: you will, from the initial call all the way through prosecution.
- 17:45Speaker 2: It's just it's just, you know, it takes a special
- 17:48Speaker 2: person to be able to do that successfully. You go
- 17:51Speaker 2: to a larger department, that doesn't happen. But then in
- 17:53Speaker 2: the larger departments you have a detective that has a
- 17:55Speaker 2: caseload of thirty forty fifty cases at time, and and
- 18:00Speaker 2: that that makes it extremely, extremely challenging. We're on the
- 18:02Speaker 2: street when I when I work in a larger department.
- 18:05Speaker 2: At the end of my ship, my reports were all done.
- 18:07Speaker 2: I went home and I got to go to bed
- 18:09Speaker 2: with the without any of extra work hanging over my head.
- 18:14Speaker 2: Now you still have to decompress and deal with what
- 18:16Speaker 2: you had during the previous shift. But but the cases
- 18:18Speaker 2: are are challenging, and it can be challenging because of
- 18:22Speaker 2: lack of evidence, because of conflicting witness statements, because of
- 18:27Speaker 2: lack of resources, the timing of the of the incident
- 18:30Speaker 2: when it was reported in things, there's there's lots of
- 18:33Speaker 2: variables that make a case very very challenging, and so
- 18:38Speaker 2: I can't really put my finger on one specific one
- 18:41Speaker 2: for you, Terry.
- 18:41Speaker 1: But no, that's not a bad thing, I think in
- 18:45Speaker 1: some ways, because people ask me all the time because
- 18:50Speaker 1: we cover so many different cases here on true crimeline
- 18:54Speaker 1: time but also in midday missing and they often I'll
- 18:57Speaker 1: get asked, well, which case sticks out the most, and
- 19:00Speaker 1: I'm like, they're all horrible. They are all just horrific,
- 19:03Speaker 1: because if they weren't, we wouldn't be talking about them,
- 19:06Speaker 1: so it's hard to pick that one. So I kind
- 19:09Speaker 1: of get it. And I also like the fact that
- 19:12Speaker 1: you said that you need to decompress and try not
- 19:16Speaker 1: to make it where you live and breathe at twenty
- 19:18Speaker 1: four to seven because the burnout I can imagine if
- 19:22Speaker 1: you're doing it from what I call cradle to grave,
- 19:24Speaker 1: which might not be the rest hut, but cradle to prosecution.
- 19:28Speaker 1: I can't imagine a person doing that. That's just too much.
- 19:33Speaker 2: Well, it takes a big skill set, you know. I'll
- 19:36Speaker 2: tell you what becomes the most frustrating is when when
- 19:39Speaker 2: you have a case and we'll talk about crimes against persons,
- 19:43Speaker 2: and not to say that crimes against property isn't important,
- 19:46Speaker 2: but crimes against persons where someone is seriously injured. It's
- 19:51Speaker 2: very frustrating to not be able to identify the perpetrator,
- 19:55Speaker 2: to not be able to gather evidence and be able
- 19:59Speaker 2: to sent it to the district attorney for a successful prosecution,
- 20:02Speaker 2: because you feel like you've really done the victim of disservice.
- 20:05Speaker 2: But on the other side of the equation is when
- 20:07Speaker 2: you have somebody that's accused of something, you want to
- 20:11Speaker 2: be able to show that they did it. Beyond a
- 20:13Speaker 2: reasonable doubt, or you want to be able to exonerate them, right,
- 20:16Speaker 2: because nobody to walk around with the label that they
- 20:19Speaker 2: did something that they may or may not have done.
- 20:21Speaker 2: And so those are the cases that caused me the
- 20:24Speaker 2: most grief. Is when you have someone who's accused of
- 20:26Speaker 2: doing something and you can't prove it beyond a reasonable
- 20:29Speaker 2: doubt or get successful prosecution. So you're not only doing
- 20:33Speaker 2: a disservice to the victim for closure and things like that,
- 20:35Speaker 2: but you're also doing a disservice to the person who's
- 20:37Speaker 2: accused of that crime because they're labeled and they don't
- 20:40Speaker 2: get for lack of a better phrase, vindicated or cleared.
- 20:43Speaker 2: Even though we have a presumption of innocence in our
- 20:45Speaker 2: country and we follow that, it only takes a picture
- 20:50Speaker 2: on a newspaper or on the television to say that
- 20:52Speaker 2: you're arrested for such and such and such and such.
- 20:55Speaker 2: And then even if you get exonerated, then the question
- 20:59Speaker 2: is is because you had a good attorney or is
- 21:01Speaker 2: it because you didn't you were truly innocent. And so
- 21:04Speaker 2: those are the cases that caused me the most angst.
- 21:08Speaker 2: If you will that I worked when I have those cases.
- 21:11Speaker 2: Was it not being able to get a successful resolution
- 21:14Speaker 2: one way or the other.
- 21:16Speaker 1: Well, okay, you just made me think of because I
- 21:21Speaker 1: always struggle with person of interest in a case or
- 21:27Speaker 1: they're a suspect, and I've often wondered, especially on our
- 21:32Speaker 1: missing person cases or murder cases that are unresolved, that like, Okay,
- 21:37Speaker 1: why don't you just name them as a suspect. Well,
- 21:40Speaker 1: just hearing you talk it, I never thought about the
- 21:43Speaker 1: fact that it's kind of a disservice. If we don't
- 21:47Speaker 1: have the evidence to prove that they did it, we
- 21:50Speaker 1: shouldn't be telling people that they did it, because that
- 21:54Speaker 1: follows them around. And I honestly never thought about it
- 21:57Speaker 1: from that side until you said that, Yeah, thanks for that.
- 22:05Speaker 1: Now I have to go back and rethink everything. So
- 22:08Speaker 1: that's okay, that's okay now, I think, and I'm pretty
- 22:12Speaker 1: sure that you have worked some drug cases. I think
- 22:15Speaker 1: if you're in law enforcement in the Great State of Texas,
- 22:18Speaker 1: you've worked on drug cases. What would you say were
- 22:23Speaker 1: the most common type of drug cases you worked on.
- 22:27Speaker 2: Well, possession of controlled substances you'll find probably pretty frequently,
- 22:34Speaker 2: as as as as a patrol officer or patrol deputy.
- 22:39Speaker 2: Sometimes you may run into a delivery case. Once again,
- 22:42Speaker 2: if you're working that department where you start everything from,
- 22:45Speaker 2: we'll start from the beginning of the crime and the
- 22:46Speaker 2: reception of the crime to the successful prosecution and appeal
- 22:50Speaker 2: of the crime. You may work those When when I
- 22:53Speaker 2: worked in units that specialized in drug interdiction, we did
- 22:57Speaker 2: a lot of delivery cases. Controlled deliveries. We would we
- 23:01Speaker 2: would do bywalks where we would we would have either
- 23:05Speaker 2: through an undercover agent or a a undercover officer or
- 23:08Speaker 2: a confidential informant. We would we would make the prerequisite
- 23:13Speaker 2: number of buys from the house that or the location
- 23:15Speaker 2: that were required to and then we've grown a search
- 23:16Speaker 2: worn on it. And so those are the cases that
- 23:22Speaker 2: I got to work on quite a bit.
- 23:23Speaker 1: On what I guess not what is frustrating about drug cases,
- 23:30Speaker 1: but what's different between like a drug case in a
- 23:35Speaker 1: crime against a person or property. How is it differ?
- 23:41Speaker 2: Well, there's there's there's criminal ways that it's different. Whereas
- 23:45Speaker 2: a crime against a person an individual is the victim
- 23:48Speaker 2: more times than not, or a drug crime it's against
- 23:52Speaker 2: the peace and dignity of the state of Texas. Right,
- 23:54Speaker 2: So a lot of people say that that possession of
- 23:57Speaker 2: crack cocaine is a victims crime. But then I say
- 24:02Speaker 2: say that to somebody who has a crack cocaine addiction,
- 24:05Speaker 2: that that they're not really the victim of the crime.
- 24:09Speaker 2: And so it's the way that society views, you know,
- 24:15Speaker 2: drug offenses, and you know, should someone be in jail
- 24:18Speaker 2: for twenty five years for selling you know, controlled substances
- 24:23Speaker 2: as opposed to somebody who only serves fifteen years for
- 24:26Speaker 2: aggravated assault or something like that. So it just goes
- 24:30Speaker 2: back to our moral standards and what we think is
- 24:33Speaker 2: egregious enough to warrant a maximum amount of.
- 24:36Speaker 1: Jail time and not I mean I agree with that.
- 24:39Speaker 1: I will say there was a time that I thought
- 24:42Speaker 1: Texas I liked that we were hard on drug crimes.
- 24:46Speaker 1: But then I remember, being young, probably eighteen or nineteen,
- 24:50Speaker 1: I was like, why is this person going to serve
- 24:53Speaker 1: more time in jail for having two joints two marijuana
- 24:58Speaker 1: joints than somebody who injured a child? And I was
- 25:01Speaker 1: so young and so naive. I was like, well, that's
- 25:04Speaker 1: a victimless crime. Why are they not? And then I'll
- 25:08Speaker 1: never forget when it came out in the Houston Post
- 25:11Speaker 1: that that child was injured because of drugs and that's
- 25:14Speaker 1: where it led to. And I was like, oh, so
- 25:16Speaker 1: it's not really victimless, and then I started putting all
- 25:19Speaker 1: those little dots together.
- 25:21Speaker 2: Yes, yes, and there's an impact you know, for for
- 25:25Speaker 2: for some people that that have a drug addiction that
- 25:28Speaker 2: they can't they can't afford, then then they resort to
- 25:31Speaker 2: crime to support that habit because you know, psychologically and
- 25:35Speaker 2: physiologically they have no choice but to get the drug
- 25:38Speaker 2: or or or try to go to some type of
- 25:41Speaker 2: detox facility and and and and beat that, and so
- 25:45Speaker 2: it leads to crime. And there's a direct correlation. So
- 25:48Speaker 2: I don't want people to think that I think that uh, using, possessing, distributing,
- 25:55Speaker 2: you know, controlled substances or drugs, is it doesn't is
- 25:58Speaker 2: bad or isn't is not bad for society because it
- 26:00Speaker 2: definitely has its impacts not only on the user but
- 26:04Speaker 2: on the people that that aren't involved in it.
- 26:07Speaker 1: So agreed. Now, have you ever had or been in
- 26:12Speaker 1: the situation where you've used informants where they played a
- 26:15Speaker 1: role in anything. Is that something you ever dealt with?
- 26:18Speaker 2: Yes, we we utilized confidential informants in the military quite
- 26:25Speaker 2: a bit. And we absolutely yes, and and and there's
- 26:32Speaker 2: different motivations and why people will come forward to do
- 26:35Speaker 2: that for us. Some will do it because they got caught.
- 26:37Speaker 2: And so the way you played the game is give
- 26:39Speaker 2: up the person above you, and we would work our
- 26:41Speaker 2: way up the chain for lesser penalty if they if
- 26:45Speaker 2: they cooperated. We had some people that did it as
- 26:48Speaker 2: a motivation because they were looking to be paid.
- 26:51Speaker 1: I was just getting ready to say, didn't they get
- 26:52Speaker 1: paid for being a confidential informant?
- 26:55Speaker 2: Some do and whether and then some do it because
- 26:59Speaker 2: they just have the desire to fulfill that role and
- 27:06Speaker 2: it meets their internal needs. Right. Utalizing confidential informants can
- 27:10Speaker 2: always be problematic when it goes to court. So a
- 27:14Speaker 2: lot of times we would have a confidential informant that
- 27:16Speaker 2: would make a couple of eyes and then introduce an
- 27:19Speaker 2: undercover officer, right, and then those would be the cases
- 27:23Speaker 2: that we would prosecute.
- 27:24Speaker 1: Because Yeah, Now, death investigations, not sure how many of
- 27:31Speaker 1: those you had to deal with. But what are some
- 27:34Speaker 1: key steps in a death investigation that the general public
- 27:40Speaker 1: may not be aware of?
- 27:43Speaker 2: Wow, there are so many key steps in a death investigation.
- 27:47Speaker 2: You you know, there's there's no more egregious crime than
- 27:50Speaker 2: someone who was who was murdered.
- 27:53Speaker 1: Or I think most of us get our information, or
- 27:58Speaker 1: I do, and I know a lot of our normal
- 28:00Speaker 1: of yours. We watch Chicago PD, we watch Law and Order,
- 28:04Speaker 1: so we know it's not totally relevant and that it's
- 28:07Speaker 1: make believe. So we think we know the steps, but
- 28:11Speaker 1: I know there's got to be more steps that we
- 28:13Speaker 1: don't know about.
- 28:14Speaker 2: Well, we'll talk a stereotypical cases. The amount of time
- 28:18Speaker 2: that you spend at the crime scene. You know, an
- 28:21Speaker 2: episode of Chicago PD or whatever is what forty eight
- 28:24Speaker 2: minutes maybe for an hour show with commercials and everything
- 28:28Speaker 2: like that, and you're going to spend much more time
- 28:32Speaker 2: than forty eight minutes in the crime scene is much
- 28:35Speaker 2: much less finding the suspect, interviewing the witnesses, interviewing the suspect,
- 28:39Speaker 2: going the trial, and getting the conviction right. And so
- 28:41Speaker 2: it's the meticulous work that you do at the crime
- 28:44Speaker 2: scene because you only get one shot at it right
- 28:47Speaker 2: to do that, to have a keen sense of attention
- 28:50Speaker 2: to detail, to be able to have excellent active lifting skills,
- 28:56Speaker 2: and being able to interview witnesses, not a victim, mom
- 29:00Speaker 2: sleen a murder, but witnesses, families, suspects, thinking outside the
- 29:05Speaker 2: box for evidence, taking the time to to to catalog that,
- 29:09Speaker 2: to write it correctly, to do that. It's it's it's
- 29:12Speaker 2: it's the ultimate case, right and so normally that's why
- 29:15Speaker 2: you have seasoned detectives that that work those cases and
- 29:18Speaker 2: that have that experience and that go through all the
- 29:21Speaker 2: training that it takes to do those various roles and
- 29:23Speaker 2: rely on those resources. So, uh, to say that one
- 29:27Speaker 2: step is more important than the other, it's really hard
- 29:30Speaker 2: to put your finger on because everything that that you
- 29:33Speaker 2: do is very important. Probably not what you're looking for.
- 29:38Speaker 1: Terry, as far as no, that's great because it just
- 29:41Speaker 1: made me think that you're probably not just checking boxes
- 29:44Speaker 1: and saying, Okay, I did this, I did this, I
- 29:47Speaker 1: did this, because probably each one is different in each circumstance.
- 29:51Speaker 2: Well, there are some proverbial checklists, if you'll right, so
- 29:56Speaker 2: you know, like you want to know, you may want
- 29:58Speaker 2: to know if you don't have somebody that's doing that
- 30:00Speaker 2: for you, if you're in the house, what was the
- 30:02Speaker 2: temperature inside the house, you know, and things of that diagramming, photographing, uh,
- 30:10Speaker 2: looking for for physical evidence, trace evidence, all of that takes.
- 30:14Speaker 1: There's basics and standards, but there's not a template for
- 30:18Speaker 1: every case. I'm guessing, right, But there are.
- 30:21Speaker 2: Some things that that that that I've seen officers that
- 30:23Speaker 2: have used checklists to make sure that they don't forget
- 30:25Speaker 2: to do this or to do that. But but you're right,
- 30:27Speaker 2: you know, no, no two cases are ever exactly similar.
- 30:31Speaker 2: But but your methodology for processing a crime scene can be.
- 30:35Speaker 1: It's a pretty good thing. I was never in law
- 30:37Speaker 1: enforcement because I like checklist, so I can remember what
- 30:41Speaker 1: to do. Now, what if you remember, are some of
- 30:46Speaker 1: the biggest challenges that you've faced in investigating a crime
- 30:51Speaker 1: or in general.
- 30:54Speaker 2: Wow, that's that's that's a pretty broadcast.
- 30:56Speaker 1: My first one. My first thought and when that question
- 31:01Speaker 1: got sent me, I was like, my first thought was
- 31:04Speaker 1: people who don't trust the police and don't want to
- 31:07Speaker 1: talk to them. That to me seems to be the
- 31:09Speaker 1: biggest challenge in my mind, because if people won't give
- 31:13Speaker 1: you information, how do you do anything?
- 31:17Speaker 2: Well? That that is that is a huge challenge, right,
- 31:19Speaker 2: And so there are some there are some cultures that
- 31:25Speaker 2: that have a disherent trust for the law enforcement because
- 31:28Speaker 2: back in their country they've earned it, and there's some
- 31:30Speaker 2: areas that that perhaps here in the United States we
- 31:33Speaker 2: may have earned that that distrust. So, like I said
- 31:36Speaker 2: earlier about being able to interview, about being able to
- 31:39Speaker 2: establish a rapport, establishing that rapport is also establishing trust.
- 31:45Speaker 2: Being able to communicate, being able to listen, you know,
- 31:49Speaker 2: can all be challenges if you deal with a with
- 31:53Speaker 2: a somebody that has English as a second language language,
- 31:57Speaker 2: barriers can be very can be very lounging, and what
- 32:00Speaker 2: is said one way may mean something completely different, and
- 32:03Speaker 2: depending on who you're dealing with. So cultural diversity is
- 32:06Speaker 2: is huge when you when you when you're working and
- 32:09Speaker 2: being able to be successful in different neighborhoods and dealing
- 32:13Speaker 2: with different people. But people not wanting to get involved,
- 32:18Speaker 2: not just because of their distrust of the police, if
- 32:20Speaker 2: you will, but for fear of repercussion, not wanting to
- 32:23Speaker 2: be the person, not wanting to be labeled or rat
- 32:25Speaker 2: or snitch, worried about what may happen to them, worried
- 32:30Speaker 2: about the other repercussions. As far as I don't want
- 32:33Speaker 2: to go to court, I don't want to testify, I
- 32:36Speaker 2: don't want to have to give up this time and
- 32:37Speaker 2: things like that. I just don't want to be involved.
- 32:40Speaker 2: So there's there's a plethora of things that take place
- 32:44Speaker 2: and can be challenges, you know, working some cases. You
- 32:49Speaker 2: know another the service that the television does.
- 32:51Speaker 1: For us is get ready to say does make it worse?
- 32:56Speaker 2: And you send off things to the lab and in
- 32:58Speaker 2: twenty two seconds you have a fingerprinting hit and it
- 33:00Speaker 2: doesn't work that way, or facial recognition when then five
- 33:03Speaker 2: seconds And so I love all.
- 33:06Speaker 1: Law enforcement has a penelope, like on what was it
- 33:10Speaker 1: criminal minds, I think, and she would just go hack
- 33:12Speaker 1: into all these systems and Penelope could tell you all
- 33:16Speaker 1: of this stuff. And I was like, if we could
- 33:18Speaker 1: ever really have a Penelope, I think the world would
- 33:20Speaker 1: be in a great place.
- 33:21Speaker 2: Well, and we may have some penelopes, right, But but
- 33:25Speaker 2: but there's a backlog and and things take time, and
- 33:28Speaker 2: so getting things through through crime labs take a you know,
- 33:33Speaker 2: there's a backlog, and so you don't get some of
- 33:35Speaker 2: that stuff as quickly as possible. And there's there's ways
- 33:37Speaker 2: that you can you can ask for expedited you know,
- 33:41Speaker 2: preference over other cases and things like that.
- 33:43Speaker 1: But once again, everybody's doing that. I would think everybody
- 33:46Speaker 1: thinks their case is the most important, right right.
- 33:49Speaker 2: And and another thing that I'll tell you that that
- 33:51Speaker 2: can be frustrating is you know, when you go to
- 33:54Speaker 2: a crime that it's your fifth crime of the day
- 33:56Speaker 2: as a police officer, and somebody through a brook through
- 33:59Speaker 2: a through a play glass window that costs several thousand dollars,
- 34:03Speaker 2: you know, and you're saying, well, that happened, but the
- 34:06Speaker 2: house I just came from had everything stolen out of it,
- 34:08Speaker 2: and you know, these people are out twenty five thousand dollars.
- 34:12Speaker 2: It's still the biggest crime that happened to that family
- 34:14Speaker 2: that had the window broken. Right. And so now they're wondering, well,
- 34:17Speaker 2: why aren't you taking the brick as evidence and you
- 34:19Speaker 2: can get DNA off the brick and you can do this, Well,
- 34:21Speaker 2: you know what for a class being misdemeanor criminal mischief case,
- 34:26Speaker 2: We're not sending your rock off or to the lab
- 34:30Speaker 2: because it's just fit. There's just histhistical constraints that go
- 34:33Speaker 2: with that, austle. And so besides the backlog of cases,
- 34:36Speaker 2: the probability of getting anything is extremely, extremely minimal. But
- 34:39Speaker 2: once again, television does as at a service because nobody
- 34:43Speaker 2: looks at those items, and you know, the writer writes
- 34:47Speaker 2: in that now we have this fingerprint and buila, we
- 34:50Speaker 2: have the person and they're in custody, and it goes
- 34:53Speaker 2: that route and it's just really not realistic.
- 34:56Speaker 1: Yeah, and I try to tell people would talking crime
- 34:59Speaker 1: stuff with them, I'm like, okay, but we've also got
- 35:01Speaker 1: to use common sense what I call common sense, just
- 35:05Speaker 1: like we all do in normal business. I have to
- 35:08Speaker 1: prioritize things where we're going to spend our dollars to
- 35:13Speaker 1: get the most stuff. And if I have to look
- 35:16Speaker 1: at a family who's had everything out of their house
- 35:18Speaker 1: stolen compared to a brick, the brick in them getting
- 35:22Speaker 1: a window broken is still important, but it has to
- 35:25Speaker 1: be deep prioritized. I don't know if law enforcement would
- 35:30Speaker 1: like that, but that's what I would say, you kind
- 35:31Speaker 1: of have to deprioritize it.
- 35:34Speaker 2: In my book, Well, that happens, right, And so we
- 35:37Speaker 2: have what are called solvability factors. So what case you
- 35:40Speaker 2: actually go out of the patrol division and make it
- 35:43Speaker 2: to the detective division. If you report that your bicycle
- 35:47Speaker 2: was stolen three months ago, and you're reporting it today,
- 35:50Speaker 2: you don't have a serial number for the bike, and
- 35:52Speaker 2: you don't have a suspect. We'll take the police report
- 35:55Speaker 2: more times than not, right, but it's not going anywhere.
- 35:58Speaker 2: But then people are upset because I had my bike stolen.
- 36:01Speaker 2: You aught didn't do anything, and you're busy drinking coffee
- 36:03Speaker 2: and eating donuts instead of finding the person who stole
- 36:05Speaker 2: my bike. And so you have to prioritize what your
- 36:09Speaker 2: cases are and when you look at what your crime,
- 36:12Speaker 2: what your crime rate is, and how many cases you
- 36:14Speaker 2: have and how long are the cases not. Unfortunately, we
- 36:18Speaker 2: don't have the resources that every single report actually gets
- 36:22Speaker 2: a full fledged thorough and investigation because if there aren't
- 36:26Speaker 2: any leads, there aren't any solvability factors and there's nothing
- 36:30Speaker 2: to investigate. And that becomes very frustrating, and it becomes
- 36:34Speaker 2: for police, but it becomes frustrating for the victim too,
- 36:37Speaker 2: especially if it's not their first occurrence. Right.
- 36:41Speaker 1: I mean, it's kind of a lose lose for both
- 36:44Speaker 1: because police want to but there's not stuff. Now, this
- 36:48Speaker 1: is a question that I threw in because those that
- 36:53Speaker 1: know me, I've decided to jump into missing person stuff.
- 36:57Speaker 1: But I need to understand better why law enforcements sometimes
- 37:04Speaker 1: hold back information from the victims' families. Now with that question,
- 37:09Speaker 1: I say, my brain tells me, because you can't give
- 37:13Speaker 1: away everything in the case, you know, because the family
- 37:16Speaker 1: is going to talk to people. But the other side
- 37:19Speaker 1: of me is like, but can't you give them a
- 37:23Speaker 1: little bit more just to make it easier for them
- 37:26Speaker 1: to sleep? And so what's kind of the thought process
- 37:30Speaker 1: behind that?
- 37:31Speaker 2: Well, I think you hit the nail on the head
- 37:33Speaker 2: as far as we can't if we divulge everything to
- 37:36Speaker 2: the family, then when it comes time for trial, the
- 37:41Speaker 2: defense is going to say, is that because you remember that?
- 37:44Speaker 2: Is that because Officer al told you that? And and
- 37:48Speaker 2: that becomes problematic, right, And so we don't release everything
- 37:54Speaker 2: to the to to people outside the investigation that don't
- 37:57Speaker 2: have the proverbial need to know for the reasons, And
- 38:00Speaker 2: it's not because we're callous and we don't want the
- 38:02Speaker 2: family to have closure, but we want to maintain the
- 38:05Speaker 2: integrity of the investigation, so we keep a lot of
- 38:08Speaker 2: things close lift if you will. And then the other
- 38:12Speaker 2: side of the equation is is is while the family
- 38:15Speaker 2: thinks they want to hear some information, some of the facts,
- 38:17Speaker 2: they probably don't want to because that's really not the
- 38:19Speaker 2: way that you want to. You want to remember your
- 38:21Speaker 2: loved one or have that on there. And I know
- 38:23Speaker 2: that you there's the struggle between can I get closure
- 38:28Speaker 2: or not? And I need these facts so that I
- 38:30Speaker 2: can move on with my life. But but so, but
- 38:35Speaker 2: the primary reason that we don't disclose that is because
- 38:38Speaker 2: we want to make sure that one witness a tells
- 38:40Speaker 2: us something. It's because witness they saw it and heard it,
- 38:43Speaker 2: not because we planeted it on them or a family
- 38:45Speaker 2: member told them things like that. So that's one of
- 38:48Speaker 2: the reasons, Terry, that we don't give out every piece
- 38:50Speaker 2: of information. That we're pretty close lips about a lot
- 38:54Speaker 2: of the facts in cases, especially until it's being tried.
- 38:58Speaker 1: And I will tell people that you can just file
- 39:01Speaker 1: the freedom of Information acts and get all of the information.
- 39:05Speaker 1: Even as a family member you think you can get
- 39:08Speaker 1: everything police is done, I'm going to just tell you
- 39:10Speaker 1: you can't. So when they say they can't tell you,
- 39:13Speaker 1: they are still not going to give you because we
- 39:15Speaker 1: have filed some and they say this is still an
- 39:18Speaker 1: open and active investigation. We are not sharing this with you,
- 39:23Speaker 1: or they send it to you and it's all been redacted.
- 39:26Speaker 2: Yes, And the freedom of information is the federal side.
- 39:29Speaker 2: I think it's the Public Information Act or Open Records
- 39:32Speaker 2: in Texas. But you're absolutely right, and the law says
- 39:35Speaker 2: what we have to release from what we don't, and
- 39:37Speaker 2: an active investigation, we have to release the synopsis, a
- 39:41Speaker 2: brief synopsis of the case, and those are usually about
- 39:45Speaker 2: five or six lines and they're very generic and that's it.
- 39:49Speaker 2: And we do that because we also don't want to
- 39:51Speaker 2: disclose potential names, addresses, and identities of witnesses right or
- 39:56Speaker 2: persons of interest. But in the crime police reports there's
- 39:59Speaker 2: suspects and things like that, because once again it's very
- 40:04Speaker 2: important that the that the integrity of the investigation remains intact.
- 40:09Speaker 1: Now, I will say some of us not looking around forbody,
- 40:13Speaker 1: have been lucky, and I think they had a new
- 40:16Speaker 1: hire or an intern when you file those Information Requests
- 40:21Speaker 1: Act and they send you everything. Because I got lucky
- 40:25Speaker 1: and had that happen in a case, and I was
- 40:28Speaker 1: shocked when I got seventy five pages that came across.
- 40:32Speaker 1: I was like, and then I got an email asking
- 40:34Speaker 1: for it back, and I was like, sorry, I already
- 40:37Speaker 1: downloaded that that's on you. Yes, yes, so yes, I
- 40:43Speaker 1: did the happy dance. Now, what advice if a family
- 40:49Speaker 1: came to you, because with us interviewing different family members
- 40:53Speaker 1: and having people on what as law enforcement, would you
- 40:57Speaker 1: give advice to the families about why you can't give
- 41:01Speaker 1: them all of the answers because I know I struggle
- 41:04Speaker 1: with it and I'm not in law enforcement.
- 41:08Speaker 2: Well, you know, be clear, concise, try to assure the
- 41:13Speaker 2: family that the ultimate goal is to identify whoever committed
- 41:17Speaker 2: this crime and have the successful prosecution so that so
- 41:22Speaker 2: that they're held accountable for what they do. And in
- 41:25Speaker 2: order to do that, there's certain things that we just
- 41:27Speaker 2: cannot tell you. It's not because we don't want to.
- 41:29Speaker 2: It's because we're trying to do the best service for
- 41:31Speaker 2: you and for society, and we want to take this
- 41:34Speaker 2: after off the street and sure that somebody else isn't
- 41:36Speaker 2: victimized while that's the same person. And what would really
- 41:40Speaker 2: be tough to live with for me is if I
- 41:43Speaker 2: made that mistake, and I did that, and then somebody
- 41:45Speaker 2: got free and was not held accountable, and then even
- 41:48Speaker 2: worse went on to victimize somebody else, and because my
- 41:53Speaker 2: failure to act accordingly and you know, we go through
- 41:57Speaker 2: different cycles of grief, and so a lot of times
- 42:00Speaker 2: actually when it's when it's new, the family doesn't understand,
- 42:03Speaker 2: they don't want to understand, they're grieving, they're mad, and
- 42:06Speaker 2: so sometimes you know, the officers are the recipients of that,
- 42:10Speaker 2: that grief and anger, and and we are trained and
- 42:14Speaker 2: we have to remember that that it's really not you
- 42:17Speaker 2: personally that they're frustrated with, it's the situation and to
- 42:20Speaker 2: try really hard not to uh not to take it personally.
- 42:24Speaker 2: That's that's tough sometimes, right, but but that's the mindset
- 42:28Speaker 2: that you have to have if you're going to be
- 42:29Speaker 2: able to uh to uh persevere and and have a
- 42:33Speaker 2: long career.
- 42:34Speaker 1: So, now, do you think news coverage, I know we've
- 42:40Speaker 1: talked about TV shows, but do you think news coverage
- 42:45Speaker 1: of police incidents of bad things that breaks trust? Do
- 42:51Speaker 1: you think generally the news coverage because of those few incidents,
- 42:56Speaker 1: do you think they're fair or they biased? Wow, I
- 43:02Speaker 1: will just straight up tell you, I think it depends
- 43:05Speaker 1: on the state you live in, because I look at
- 43:09Speaker 1: news from everywhere and I can pretty much pull out
- 43:12Speaker 1: a map and tell you where they're more law enforcement friendly.
- 43:16Speaker 1: And non law enforcement friendly, just based on me reading
- 43:20Speaker 1: news clips, so I personally think news goes after whatever
- 43:26Speaker 1: is most salacious.
- 43:28Speaker 2: Well, part of that's true, right, you want to have
- 43:31Speaker 2: people come in and view in, so you want to
- 43:33Speaker 2: hear about things. You know, if law enforcement misconduct was
- 43:39Speaker 2: something that happened every single day and made the news
- 43:43Speaker 2: every single day, maybe in time people would become immune
- 43:48Speaker 2: to it. And so when I see that on television,
- 43:52Speaker 2: you know, without knowing all the facts, I don't know
- 43:55Speaker 2: if they're being biased or not right. They're asking tough questions.
- 43:58Speaker 2: But what I've learned when you do with the media
- 44:01Speaker 2: is you be honest, You be timely, and if you
- 44:06Speaker 2: don't know, you don't know. And if you're not allowed
- 44:08Speaker 2: to say, you explain why you're not allowed to say.
- 44:11Speaker 2: But if you you know, where we the old stance
- 44:16Speaker 2: used to be was that we would just say no comment, right,
- 44:19Speaker 2: and it's investigation, And that just doesn't satisfy our society anymore.
- 44:28Speaker 2: And so what we've learned is is to release information
- 44:34Speaker 2: in the appropriate timely manner that we can and to
- 44:39Speaker 2: when it's not jeopardizing a case. Release video release statements.
- 44:44Speaker 2: Do that let the public decide, but a lot of
- 44:47Speaker 2: it will come to what is your rapport with the
- 44:49Speaker 2: media at that time, and if your officer, if you
- 44:51Speaker 2: have an officer that makes a mistake and is out
- 44:54Speaker 2: of lines and does wrong. Nobody likes a dishonest officer
- 44:58Speaker 2: more than police officers because we all carry that. And
- 45:01Speaker 2: something can happen in the in the state of Washington
- 45:05Speaker 2: and people are gonna hold Texas police officers accountable for it,
- 45:09Speaker 2: and vice versa. And so I will tell you nobody
- 45:12Speaker 2: to test the dishonest cop more than than than than
- 45:15Speaker 2: than police officers. Now, there's a difference between being dishonest
- 45:19Speaker 2: and rogue and being human and making mistakes, and that
- 45:22Speaker 2: happens too. The difference is when you make a mistake,
- 45:25Speaker 2: you tell the truth right and you look at what
- 45:27Speaker 2: the consequences are. If you're dishonest, you lie, you hide,
- 45:31Speaker 2: you cover up, and then you try to get other
- 45:33Speaker 2: people to do the same with you.
- 45:35Speaker 1: So you know on that, But don't you think it's
- 45:39Speaker 1: human nature if you make a mistake, And I think
- 45:44Speaker 1: some people their first reaction is to hide their mistake.
- 45:50Speaker 1: And so I struggle with people who in the initial
- 45:56Speaker 1: aspects say, yeah, that didn't happen or no, I didn't
- 45:59Speaker 1: do it. Then an hour later they're like, Okay, I've
- 46:02Speaker 1: had time to think about it, I've settled down. Yes
- 46:04Speaker 1: I did it. I don't know how often that happens,
- 46:08Speaker 1: but I think some people your first reaction, if it's
- 46:12Speaker 1: never happened to you before, is you instantly jumped to
- 46:16Speaker 1: be in defensive and deny it. And maybe I'm wrong,
- 46:22Speaker 1: but I know I see it in the non law
- 46:24Speaker 1: enforcement world all the time. People instantly and then I'll
- 46:28Speaker 1: have people who come back and say, oh, yeah, that
- 46:31Speaker 1: I did it because they had time to settle down.
- 46:34Speaker 2: So I think we maybe talking about the same thing.
- 46:36Speaker 2: But when you're referring to an incident, what we call
- 46:39Speaker 2: a critical incident, right, it could be an officer involved shooting.
- 46:44Speaker 2: So many things happen to you physiologically when you're under
- 46:48Speaker 2: that type of stress and things, and it really takes
- 46:51Speaker 2: you a period of anywhere from twenty four to forty
- 46:53Speaker 2: eight hours to come back to homeostasis, if you will,
- 46:57Speaker 2: and be able to calmly and recollect things. And so
- 47:01Speaker 2: an officer that says I only fired my weapon three times,
- 47:04Speaker 2: but we have twelve cartridges on the ground and it's
- 47:08Speaker 2: fifteen you know around magazine only has three three rounds left.
- 47:12Speaker 2: Were able to realize that he fired more than three times,
- 47:15Speaker 2: That doesn't mean that he's that he's lying about how
- 47:17Speaker 2: many times he fired.
- 47:18Speaker 1: It just hasn't hit yet. He hasn't had time to
- 47:20Speaker 1: process and de compress.
- 47:23Speaker 2: And thanks right exactly because under stress, you your your
- 47:26Speaker 2: your perception of time, your your your uh, your your
- 47:30Speaker 2: span of vision diminishes, you get auditory exclusion. There are
- 47:35Speaker 2: so many things that your body goes through when when
- 47:37Speaker 2: it's fight flight or or freeze kicks in that that
- 47:41Speaker 2: that had that's police officer aren't immune to that either.
- 47:44Speaker 2: So a lot of departments and and and uh. When
- 47:47Speaker 2: I was the chief art department, we would ask just
- 47:50Speaker 2: certain questions of an officer if they were involved in
- 47:52Speaker 2: in involved shooting, Which direction did you shoot? Can you
- 47:55Speaker 2: tell us this? This, this, but all the details and stuff.
- 47:59Speaker 2: We we gave time for that to take place, because
- 48:02Speaker 2: what we don't want to do is put an officer
- 48:04Speaker 2: in an unfair position where he says, I fired three times,
- 48:08Speaker 2: and then later on he goes, wait a minute, no,
- 48:10Speaker 2: I fired seven times? Well, which was it? Was it three?
- 48:12Speaker 2: Or was it seven because they need a time to
- 48:15Speaker 2: decompress also, and so witnesses and victims will can experience
- 48:20Speaker 2: the same thing sometimes. So you know that goes.
- 48:26Speaker 1: I always struggle because TV it looks like, say for
- 48:30Speaker 1: Chicago p D, they always say, oh, you know, you
- 48:32Speaker 1: need to talk right now to I A because you
- 48:35Speaker 1: fired your gun right there before you leave the scene.
- 48:38Speaker 1: And I watched them, like how their adrenaline is still pumping.
- 48:43Speaker 1: They are just dealing with the fact they shot somebody.
- 48:46Speaker 1: How could you ask them to be able to give
- 48:49Speaker 1: back what they did? And I just sit there and go,
- 48:52Speaker 1: I as a person, that's why I'm glad I'm not
- 48:54Speaker 1: law enforcement because I would be like, I don't know,
- 48:56Speaker 1: I need to take a minute, right, And.
- 48:59Speaker 2: So that happens. And so you know, when there's an
- 49:00Speaker 2: officer involved shooting, it depends on the department's policy. A
- 49:04Speaker 2: lot of them in Texas will that are smaller will
- 49:06Speaker 2: have the Texas Rangers come in, and the rangers will
- 49:08Speaker 2: do the criminal side of the investigation. Because there's a
- 49:10Speaker 2: two pronged side. There's a criminal side and an internal side.
- 49:14Speaker 2: The larger departments will do both, but both both investigations
- 49:18Speaker 2: are ran separately. And the left hand doesn't talk to
- 49:20Speaker 2: the right hand when that's happening because they're looking on
- 49:25Speaker 2: the criminal side to see is the officer culpable of
- 49:28Speaker 2: any criminal charges, and they present that to the District
- 49:30Speaker 2: Attorney's office, who normally will present that to the grand jury,
- 49:33Speaker 2: and the grand jury will decide whether the in diet
- 49:36Speaker 2: or no ability officer on the shooting. And then the
- 49:39Speaker 2: other side of the house is did the officer fallo
- 49:40Speaker 2: a policy procedure? Was our policy procedure, our training appropriate?
- 49:44Speaker 2: And so they look at all the other administrative size internally,
- 49:47Speaker 2: and that's where you see the officers from professional standards
- 49:52Speaker 2: or internal affairs talk to the officer at that time.
- 49:57Speaker 1: Now, everybody who watches TV or reads the newspaper our
- 50:01Speaker 1: I guess online news knows that there has been officers
- 50:05Speaker 1: who have not done the right things, and police departments
- 50:10Speaker 1: and law enforcement has lost some trust with the community,
- 50:14Speaker 1: and I think it spreads. What do you think law
- 50:18Speaker 1: enforcement and departments can do to rebuild trust with communities.
- 50:25Speaker 2: Well, you know, there's there's a saying that says it
- 50:29Speaker 2: only takes one to shoot and wipe out a thousand
- 50:32Speaker 2: out of boys, right, and so everybody forgets all the
- 50:35Speaker 2: great that you did in that and that's no different.
- 50:38Speaker 2: But but I think you know to say that you're
- 50:41Speaker 2: going to have a perfect officer who never does anything,
- 50:43Speaker 2: and it doesn't matter how well of a background check
- 50:46Speaker 2: you do, what your screening process is, there will be
- 50:48Speaker 2: some people that that that that make it in that
- 50:51Speaker 2: that shouldn't be. But that's true in any other profession
- 50:54Speaker 2: that we look at. Right, So when you have something
- 50:56Speaker 2: that goes egregiously wrong like that, then then the only
- 51:00Speaker 2: way that the department can can can gain trust, and
- 51:02Speaker 2: it's tough, is that the leadership has to say this
- 51:04Speaker 2: officer was wrong, we don't condone what he's doing. We're
- 51:07Speaker 2: holding him accountable. He's going to be prosecuted to the
- 51:09Speaker 2: fullest extent of the law, and he's no better, no
- 51:12Speaker 2: different than anybody else. And then they have to do that,
- 51:14Speaker 2: right and then hopefully you don't have another incident the
- 51:19Speaker 2: next day and another incident with a different officer the
- 51:21Speaker 2: next day, right, because now now there's a systemic cult, right,
- 51:25Speaker 2: that's that's taken place as opposed to you know once,
- 51:30Speaker 2: you know once is too much, but but reality is
- 51:33Speaker 2: is you're you're never going to be one hundred percent
- 51:36Speaker 2: on everything, no matter how hard you try and how
- 51:38Speaker 2: bad you desire that. And so it's I think it's
- 51:40Speaker 2: a lot of how the department reacts to it and
- 51:43Speaker 2: how they handle that and and and and how they
- 51:46Speaker 2: work with the understanding that that when an officer does
- 51:49Speaker 2: do wrong, he still has the same rights as as
- 51:52Speaker 2: anybody else and it's entitled process.
- 51:55Speaker 1: So well, and I think sometimes people that don't have
- 52:00Speaker 1: law enforcement in their family or they don't know anyone
- 52:03Speaker 1: who's been in law enforcement, I think they forget they're human,
- 52:06Speaker 1: just like with doctors. My ex husbands was a doctor.
- 52:09Speaker 1: I mean, doctors are still human, just like law enforcement officers.
- 52:13Speaker 1: They can make mistakes and it happens, and if they
- 52:17Speaker 1: own it, deal with it. You know that it happens.
- 52:23Speaker 1: What do you think or do you think social media?
- 52:27Speaker 1: Do you think it's made it harder or easier for
- 52:31Speaker 1: the public to understand the realities of what's really happening?
- 52:35Speaker 2: Oh, social media is is is a beast right? And
- 52:43Speaker 2: you know we are an instant gratification society now, where
- 52:47Speaker 2: when I was growing up, if I wanted to spend
- 52:49Speaker 2: the night at a fran's house, I had to wait
- 52:51Speaker 2: till my dad came home, I had to wait till
- 52:53Speaker 2: dinner was over than ask permission, right, And I'm making
- 52:57Speaker 2: a lot more stringent than maybe than what it really was.
- 52:59Speaker 2: But the reality is now is now your child texts
- 53:02Speaker 2: you it doesn't matter where you're at, and that they
- 53:04Speaker 2: want it. They want an answer right then and there,
- 53:06Speaker 2: and and social media is the exact same way. As
- 53:09Speaker 2: soon as as soon as a post hits, if you
- 53:12Speaker 2: can't get in front of it, somebody will get in
- 53:15Speaker 2: front of it for you, and and they will, they
- 53:18Speaker 2: will spin the story and and it's it's it's it's
- 53:21Speaker 2: just baffling, and it's really hard to have the time
- 53:24Speaker 2: and the resources to fight that and have the wisdom
- 53:27Speaker 2: when do I engage and when do I not engage?
- 53:30Speaker 2: Because there would be times on social media where you
- 53:32Speaker 2: can lay out every fact and you can show that
- 53:35Speaker 2: you are absolutely correct, but if people don't want to hear,
- 53:38Speaker 2: they're not going to hear that. So, you know, we
- 53:41Speaker 2: have a lot of people that if they see it
- 53:42Speaker 2: on social media, they really think that's what happened, and
- 53:45Speaker 2: a lot of times that's just really not the truth.
- 53:47Speaker 2: But unfortunately that's the times that we live in.
- 53:50Speaker 1: Yeah, now, being a person who does these kind of
- 53:54Speaker 1: things on YouTube before we listen on podcasts, I I
- 53:57Speaker 1: do like to think that some good can come from
- 54:01Speaker 1: it if we do it in a respectful and look
- 54:05Speaker 1: at it from an advocacy or public information role. So
- 54:11Speaker 1: like we have turned down a lot of interviews because
- 54:14Speaker 1: it was more about salacious shaming people and things like that,
- 54:19Speaker 1: and we try to do it more from an informative thing.
- 54:23Speaker 1: But I do know, and off the top of my head,
- 54:26Speaker 1: producer terrorist is probably gonna kill me that some social
- 54:30Speaker 1: media has helped give tips to help law enforcement. But
- 54:35Speaker 1: I want to say that's probably the exception and not
- 54:39Speaker 1: the role.
- 54:40Speaker 2: No, there were times that when I was still in
- 54:44Speaker 2: law enforcement, we use social media and asked to help
- 54:47Speaker 2: identify a person of interest, right, and posted photos and
- 54:51Speaker 2: things like that, or we talked about a crime and
- 54:53Speaker 2: said if you have any information, please crime call crime
- 54:55Speaker 2: stop number, and you know there could be a reward
- 54:58Speaker 2: et cetera, et cetera on there. Stuff like. So when
- 55:01Speaker 2: I say social media is a beast, it can be
- 55:04Speaker 2: the beast that helps you and it can be the
- 55:06Speaker 2: beast that that that that hinders you, Right, it's just
- 55:10Speaker 2: every We are such a social media society right now
- 55:13Speaker 2: that it's there, and I don't see it going anywhere,
- 55:17Speaker 2: so you know, you need to learn how to interact
- 55:20Speaker 2: with it. But it can be just as positive as
- 55:23Speaker 2: it can be negative. So absolutely, I will.
- 55:26Speaker 1: Say, I personally go to respond to a lot of
- 55:29Speaker 1: social media posts and I stop and think, Okay, am
- 55:33Speaker 1: I going to be happy with myself that I respond
- 55:36Speaker 1: to this in two hours? And then I save it
- 55:38Speaker 1: as a draft, and when I come back in two hours,
- 55:41Speaker 1: I decide if I'm going to post it or if
- 55:42Speaker 1: I just delete it.
- 55:44Speaker 2: Right.
- 55:45Speaker 1: So, looking back on your career in law enforcement, what
- 55:49Speaker 1: would you say you're most proud of? Wow, I mean
- 55:56Speaker 1: my first one and this is just me and I
- 55:59Speaker 1: say this to any officer that I speak with. I'm
- 56:02Speaker 1: glad you're still here because with knowing officers who have
- 56:09Speaker 1: been killed in the line of duty, that is my
- 56:11Speaker 1: first thought, because even have a brother in law enforcement,
- 56:15Speaker 1: when they leave the house, you never know if they're
- 56:17Speaker 1: coming home. So I always say the first thing that
- 56:21Speaker 1: we should kind of be proud of it is that
- 56:22Speaker 1: they are still here with us. Well, and that's because
- 56:25Speaker 1: I'm sappy.
- 56:26Speaker 2: Now that that's true. You know, I'm proud of a
- 56:31Speaker 2: lot of things that I did, and there's a few
- 56:33Speaker 2: things that I wish I would have done differently, right,
- 56:36Speaker 2: But that's true with all aspect. But I'm proud of
- 56:39Speaker 2: to have worked in this career field for thirty plus years.
- 56:44Speaker 2: I'd like to think that I've made some positive impacts
- 56:47Speaker 2: and in people's lives. I enjoyed the training aspect of
- 56:52Speaker 2: my law enforcement career, and I'm just grateful to have
- 56:56Speaker 2: been able to do a job for the amount of
- 56:59Speaker 2: time that I wanted to that I enjoyed, and that
- 57:02Speaker 2: that Uh, I didn't get rich, but but it paid
- 57:05Speaker 2: me well, took care of my family, had benefits, I
- 57:08Speaker 2: have retirement, and I got to help out in the
- 57:10Speaker 2: community and and and play a role that that was
- 57:14Speaker 2: important to me. And and so I'm just I'm pleased
- 57:18Speaker 2: with my entire career.
- 57:20Speaker 1: Now, how did you go from law enforcement to your
- 57:25Speaker 1: current role in emergency management? Because that's how we met.
- 57:29Speaker 1: So I want to know how you got from point
- 57:32Speaker 1: A two point C because you skip point B in
- 57:35Speaker 1: my brain.
- 57:37Speaker 2: Okay, well, I'm not sure what point B was, but uh.
- 57:39Speaker 1: Might B is retirement and you're on a beach in Florida.
- 57:43Speaker 2: Well, I'm.
- 57:46Speaker 1: You're so very young.
- 57:47Speaker 2: I'm too young to sit at home and not do
- 57:49Speaker 2: anything yet, at least that's what I tell myself.
- 57:52Speaker 1: How do you like helping the community?
- 57:54Speaker 2: And and yes. And one of my roles before I
- 57:58Speaker 2: came over to the Bastrop County was I was the
- 58:00Speaker 2: emergency management coordinator for the City of Bastrop. It was
- 58:02Speaker 2: an additional job that I got to do. So I
- 58:05Speaker 2: got I got interested in that and it was once again,
- 58:10Speaker 2: like we said, serving the community in a different aspect.
- 58:14Speaker 2: And one one the pace for the city, UH was
- 58:19Speaker 2: pretty high, and I was at a good point in
- 58:20Speaker 2: my career and I had a I wanted to take
- 58:24Speaker 2: off some time and spend it with my family and
- 58:27Speaker 2: UH and and do those types of things. So I
- 58:29Speaker 2: had already been doing emergency management and decided that I
- 58:33Speaker 2: could make the the transition from working as a as
- 58:37Speaker 2: a as a as a police officer and those other things.
- 58:40Speaker 2: And I'd moved up in city management and so it
- 58:43Speaker 2: wasn't just police that I was doing to emergency management.
- 58:46Speaker 2: And UH, it still meets my needs. Not every day
- 58:48Speaker 2: is the same in emergency management. No. Two emergencies are
- 58:51Speaker 2: the same. I get to help people. I get to
- 58:53Speaker 2: work with wonderful people. I have a great team in
- 58:55Speaker 2: a community that that I care very much about, and
- 58:58Speaker 2: that's a very resist b and strong community that that
- 59:03Speaker 2: perseveres through anything and everything. And so and I'm just
- 59:09Speaker 2: I think I would get bored just sitting at home
- 59:11Speaker 2: all day.
- 59:13Speaker 1: I can't. I mean, I can't sit at home all day.
- 59:16Speaker 2: Now.
- 59:16Speaker 1: I just got messaged on the side, not everybody knows
- 59:20Speaker 1: what emergency management is. So I'm sitting here thinking everybody
- 59:25Speaker 1: should know what that is, because I know, you know
- 59:29Speaker 1: two percent. What does emergency management consist of?
- 59:34Speaker 2: Well, the short answer is is emergency management plans, prepares, trains,
- 59:41Speaker 2: responds to, recovers from, and mitigates natural and man made
- 59:46Speaker 2: disasters that take place in our community.
- 59:51Speaker 1: Now, what would you tell a young person who was
- 59:56Speaker 1: wanting to go into law enforcement today? What advice would
- 1:00:03Speaker 1: you give them? Because even I asked that, and I
- 1:00:07Speaker 1: guess I shouldn't just say law enforcement. Well, we'll start
- 1:00:10Speaker 1: with law enforcement and then we can move over to
- 1:00:12Speaker 1: emergency management because they have a lot of similarities, but
- 1:00:15Speaker 1: yet they're very different.
- 1:00:17Speaker 2: They do knowledge is power. The day that you think
- 1:00:20Speaker 2: that you know everything is the day that you should
- 1:00:22Speaker 2: probably stop. Realize that what you do in law enforcement
- 1:00:28Speaker 2: and you have a literally half a second or less
- 1:00:32Speaker 2: to make a decision. People will have hours, days, weeks, months,
- 1:00:37Speaker 2: years to second guess you. To try to leave work
- 1:00:42Speaker 2: at home, work at work and home at home, and
- 1:00:45Speaker 2: to do something besides being a police officer twenty four
- 1:00:48Speaker 2: hours a day. Take care of your family, have a hobby,
- 1:00:51Speaker 2: and do other things so that you have balance in
- 1:00:55Speaker 2: your life. That would be the and that's what we
- 1:00:59Speaker 2: try to tell the creuits that were coming into the
- 1:01:01Speaker 2: academy is that that's a very important aspect to be successful.
- 1:01:06Speaker 1: I never thought about the hobby's aspect. I always just
- 1:01:09Speaker 1: thought of go home, take care of your family. But
- 1:01:12Speaker 1: now to think about it, having a hobby is probably
- 1:01:15Speaker 1: a good thing because you need something for yourself too,
- 1:01:17Speaker 1: just besides the public and your family.
- 1:01:21Speaker 2: The last thing that I want to say is, you
- 1:01:22Speaker 2: know is that police officers can be clickish, right. And
- 1:01:26Speaker 2: the reason they are is because when I used to
- 1:01:30Speaker 2: go to out the places and stuff like that and
- 1:01:32Speaker 2: people ask me what I did, I tell them I
- 1:01:33Speaker 2: was work for a telephone company or something. Because as
- 1:01:36Speaker 2: soon as they find out that you're a police officer,
- 1:01:38Speaker 2: they want to talk about a ticket they got or
- 1:01:40Speaker 2: something that, this and that, And it's really hard to
- 1:01:45Speaker 2: be yourself, right, So we would naturally flock together and
- 1:01:48Speaker 2: hang out together all the time. And while the camaraderie
- 1:01:52Speaker 2: is very important and things like that, I also think
- 1:01:54Speaker 2: it's important to have balance and have other friends that
- 1:01:57Speaker 2: do other things besides just being in law enforcement, because
- 1:02:00Speaker 2: you deal with about ninety percent of your time, you
- 1:02:05Speaker 2: deal with the ten percent of society that is breaking
- 1:02:09Speaker 2: the law right and I'm using these numbers just for illustrating,
- 1:02:14Speaker 2: but and it can make you cynical that where you
- 1:02:16Speaker 2: think everybody is a criminal and everybody is wrong, and
- 1:02:20Speaker 2: that's not the case. There are far more and better
- 1:02:22Speaker 2: people than there are bad people. But when you spend
- 1:02:25Speaker 2: all your time with that and you stay in that
- 1:02:27Speaker 2: environment all the time, it can it can it can
- 1:02:30Speaker 2: wear on you. So that's why I feel it's really
- 1:02:33Speaker 2: important for people, especially now starting off in law enforcement,
- 1:02:36Speaker 2: that they have that camaraderie and they have that togetherness
- 1:02:38Speaker 2: and that bond in law enforcement, but that they also
- 1:02:41Speaker 2: have people that are outside of that so that they
- 1:02:44Speaker 2: keep that balance. Man.
- 1:02:47Speaker 1: Okay, I just laughed because I just thought because double H.
- 1:02:50Speaker 1: And just so you know, we on here we call
- 1:02:53Speaker 1: my spouse is double H. Twitch stands for Handsome Hobby.
- 1:02:56Speaker 1: But him and my oldest son, Jeffa, they are like, Mom,
- 1:03:01Speaker 1: you need to get out of the true crime world.
- 1:03:03Speaker 1: You need to go drink wine, just to drink wine
- 1:03:06Speaker 1: and take a break because you know way too many
- 1:03:08Speaker 1: stats and way too many things. And hearing you, I'm like, okay,
- 1:03:12Speaker 1: maybe I should like expand my friend networks to the
- 1:03:14Speaker 1: people who don't want to talk about what's going on
- 1:03:18Speaker 1: in the news and about true crime because I tend
- 1:03:20Speaker 1: to live in that world a little bit. Now, I
- 1:03:24Speaker 1: want before we wrap up because we're gonna get to questions.
- 1:03:28Speaker 1: If there's any I think we have one that people
- 1:03:30Speaker 1: have asked. But I do want to cover before we
- 1:03:34Speaker 1: wrap up because I know it's important to you and
- 1:03:38Speaker 1: to others talking about social media and how law enforcement
- 1:03:43Speaker 1: and emergency management handle media communication and share information with
- 1:03:50Speaker 1: the public on social media. And the reason I wanted
- 1:03:53Speaker 1: to talk about that is because following the page in
- 1:03:57Speaker 1: Bastrop County when there's a fire, the fact that people
- 1:04:01Speaker 1: want information every five minutes when you are out trying
- 1:04:07Speaker 1: to handle the situation makes me personally insane. So I
- 1:04:14Speaker 1: think other people feel the same way, but I also
- 1:04:17Speaker 1: feel the same way. Like New Year's when the thing
- 1:04:20Speaker 1: happened in New Orleans with the guy on Bourbon Street,
- 1:04:26Speaker 1: I became that person reading social media every five minutes,
- 1:04:29Speaker 1: and I had to take a step back and say,
- 1:04:31Speaker 1: wait a minute. They're doing their job. They can't update
- 1:04:35Speaker 1: every five minutes for me. So what would you say
- 1:04:39Speaker 1: to general viewers public? How y'all handle that?
- 1:04:43Speaker 2: On the back end, we understand that we are an
- 1:04:50Speaker 2: information meeting society, and especially when you and or your
- 1:04:55Speaker 2: loved ones are in harm's way, you want as much
- 1:04:58Speaker 2: information as possible, and you want it right now, this second,
- 1:05:02Speaker 2: And so there has to be a balance between being
- 1:05:04Speaker 2: able to work the problem and then also communicate the
- 1:05:09Speaker 2: problem right and in emergency management, under the process for
- 1:05:14Speaker 2: the incident Command system and everything, the unified Commander or
- 1:05:17Speaker 2: the command or the incident commander approves all the public
- 1:05:23Speaker 2: information that we put out to make sure that it's timely,
- 1:05:26Speaker 2: that it's accurate. We have a mantra in Bastrop County
- 1:05:29Speaker 2: where we work together and we want one message, one team,
- 1:05:32Speaker 2: so we identify who that's going to be. We put
- 1:05:35Speaker 2: that out. On Saturday, we got report of the fire
- 1:05:41Speaker 2: that happened in the LBA area in Bastrop County. We
- 1:05:45Speaker 2: posted on social media that we were aware of it
- 1:05:47Speaker 2: and that we were responding to it. Once we got
- 1:05:50Speaker 2: there and got a size up and everything, we tried
- 1:05:52Speaker 2: to provide that information and we try to put information
- 1:05:55Speaker 2: out every hour to hour and a half, possibly two hours,
- 1:05:58Speaker 2: and then that temple slows down when that when the
- 1:06:00Speaker 2: when the threat mitigates, right, And to think that, you know,
- 1:06:04Speaker 2: if I'm waiting sixty minutes for an update, that's just
- 1:06:07Speaker 2: unacceptable when I'm worried about my parents' house burning down
- 1:06:11Speaker 2: or something like that going on. But the reality is
- 1:06:14Speaker 2: in order to make what's going on and happening and
- 1:06:16Speaker 2: realizing that that that it's a dynamic situation when you're
- 1:06:20Speaker 2: fighting fire and the wind shifts and things happen and
- 1:06:22Speaker 2: things like that, that you know why, we feel that
- 1:06:26Speaker 2: it's very important that that that the public knows what's
- 1:06:28Speaker 2: taking place. We feel that that being successful and stopping
- 1:06:32Speaker 2: the fire or whatever thread is is has a priority
- 1:06:35Speaker 2: over that. And so we got to find a balance
- 1:06:37Speaker 2: in there, and so that that is what we try
- 1:06:41Speaker 2: to do, and we put that, we put them the
- 1:06:43Speaker 2: information out and when we say this is the last
- 1:06:45Speaker 2: update for the evening unless something else happens, that doesn't
- 1:06:47Speaker 2: mean that we just forget about the fire that firefighters
- 1:06:50Speaker 2: have left or anything like that. But reality, if if
- 1:06:53Speaker 2: if the situation has you know, fires burn and certain
- 1:06:58Speaker 2: things for a fire to go out, and uh and uh,
- 1:07:01Speaker 2: if there's not going to be a dynamic change, then
- 1:07:03Speaker 2: we're not going to post because we also, right wrong
- 1:07:09Speaker 2: or indifferent, need to sleep, we need to recover, and
- 1:07:12Speaker 2: we need to do things also and and uh and
- 1:07:14Speaker 2: you never know how long an event's going to take place.
- 1:07:17Speaker 2: So we understand that that both sides of the of
- 1:07:20Speaker 2: the of the equation where I want the time right away.
- 1:07:24Speaker 2: And and I'm sure that if if it was in
- 1:07:28Speaker 2: an area an event was taking place where where my
- 1:07:31Speaker 2: family and my loved ones and my and in there,
- 1:07:33Speaker 2: I probably would not It's very possible that I wouldn't
- 1:07:37Speaker 2: be as tolerant as as we're asking people to be.
- 1:07:39Speaker 2: But we got to find a balance in between.
- 1:07:41Speaker 1: That, right Well, I actually discussed it with somebody today
- 1:07:46Speaker 1: who's not law enforcement emergency management is in the medical field.
- 1:07:51Speaker 1: And I laughed because she goes, so, what you're saying
- 1:07:54Speaker 1: is you think the doctor should stop doing surgery on
- 1:07:58Speaker 1: your loved one to come out and give you an update,
- 1:08:02Speaker 1: or you want him to tell the nurse to stop
- 1:08:04Speaker 1: giving him the devices he needs to save your loved
- 1:08:07Speaker 1: one to come out and give you an update. And
- 1:08:09Speaker 1: I went, I had never thought of it that way,
- 1:08:14Speaker 1: and considering my volunteer activities, I felt about this small
- 1:08:19Speaker 1: that I never thought of it that way. I think
- 1:08:22Speaker 1: about it knowing what you guys are doing, and I
- 1:08:25Speaker 1: was like, I never thought of it from that aspect
- 1:08:27Speaker 1: that you have to stop doing something.
- 1:08:30Speaker 2: I like that analogy, and Sonna, I'm gonna use it.
- 1:08:32Speaker 2: So thanks you.
- 1:08:34Speaker 1: I mean, I about fell over today because I was like, well,
- 1:08:37Speaker 1: I felled this big asking this question. Well, I want
- 1:08:42Speaker 1: to say thank you. I do know Tara producer Tara said,
- 1:08:46Speaker 1: we have one question to ask and she is gonna
- 1:08:50Speaker 1: pop it up on the screen for us. So Lady
- 1:08:53Speaker 1: and Gray said, my city just settled a lawsuit with
- 1:08:58Speaker 1: victims of alleged sa I'm assuming you know what that is.
- 1:09:03Speaker 1: The PD was audit in in a dystemic failure, as
- 1:09:07Speaker 1: Essay Crimes investigation found, they have new mandatory training. Is
- 1:09:12Speaker 1: this common?
- 1:09:14Speaker 2: So forgive me, but I don't know what absolutely so
- 1:09:19Speaker 2: on a lot.
- 1:09:20Speaker 1: Of social media, we try not to say sexual assault.
- 1:09:23Speaker 2: That's what I thought.
- 1:09:23Speaker 1: I would that it's not San Antonio because when I
- 1:09:28Speaker 1: started doing this, I thought it was San Antonio. But yes,
- 1:09:33Speaker 1: so is mandatory training common they find failures, Like if
- 1:09:38Speaker 1: they find failures in the Department of Law Enforcement, do
- 1:09:41Speaker 1: they come back and say, all of you need to
- 1:09:43Speaker 1: be retrained. Our training was wrong. Let's do something different.
- 1:09:47Speaker 1: Is that I mean, I would think it's common. So
- 1:09:51Speaker 1: figured out what you did wrong? You gotta fix it right?
- 1:09:54Speaker 2: Yes, and and and so you know, I haven't been
- 1:09:58Speaker 2: in law enforcement for five years, so I won't pretend
- 1:10:01Speaker 2: to know exactly what's happening. On the polls. In law
- 1:10:03Speaker 2: enforcement today, it was hard leading and so when I
- 1:10:07Speaker 2: distanced myself, I tried to rate the ties no matter
- 1:10:10Speaker 2: how bad.
- 1:10:11Speaker 1: Five years is like a lifetime, but the way the
- 1:10:13Speaker 1: world has changed, I'm going to just be honest and
- 1:10:15Speaker 1: tell you five years is like a lifetime.
- 1:10:18Speaker 2: But I will tell you that if the state if
- 1:10:24Speaker 2: an investigation reveals that there's a systemic problem that could
- 1:10:26Speaker 2: potentially be across the state, and things like that. They
- 1:10:29Speaker 2: can mandate training that every two years, a peace officer
- 1:10:32Speaker 2: in Texas has to take forty hours of continuing education,
- 1:10:35Speaker 2: and they may mandate that four hours or eight hours
- 1:10:38Speaker 2: or whatever that timeframe may be is involved in this
- 1:10:41Speaker 2: particular topic, right, And so you know, when I was
- 1:10:47Speaker 2: in the Air Force Office of a Special Investigations, there
- 1:10:50Speaker 2: was a time where some of the Department of Defense
- 1:10:53Speaker 2: was found that maybe they were insensitive to victims of
- 1:10:56Speaker 2: essay and that you could never question Before you could
- 1:11:00Speaker 2: question the victim about their story or about the credibility
- 1:11:03Speaker 2: of their story, it had to go all the way
- 1:11:04Speaker 2: up to headquarters for approval because there were some instances
- 1:11:08Speaker 2: where victims were we're being I don't want to use
- 1:11:12Speaker 2: the word bullied, but we're being spoken to in a
- 1:11:15Speaker 2: manner where then all of a sudden they rescinded their account.
- 1:11:19Speaker 2: And some will say they rescinded their account because it
- 1:11:21Speaker 2: wasn't true, but others will say they rescinded their account
- 1:11:24Speaker 2: because they're going through secondary and tertiary victimization. So unfortunately,
- 1:11:28Speaker 2: to your the for the question, I can't speak intelligently
- 1:11:33Speaker 2: as far as if there's a systemic failure of essay
- 1:11:37Speaker 2: crimes being conducted in our area or in the state.
- 1:11:42Speaker 1: Okay, But I mean when I read that from Lady
- 1:11:45Speaker 1: and Gray, my first thought was, even in my day job,
- 1:11:51Speaker 1: if we find a department within the company that there's issues,
- 1:11:55Speaker 1: we look at where the ball was dropped, what tools
- 1:11:59Speaker 1: did we not give them to perform appropriately, and we
- 1:12:03Speaker 1: go look at what training and what resources we need
- 1:12:06Speaker 1: to give them. So when I looked at that, I
- 1:12:09Speaker 1: look at it from that business aspect. Yes, you're still humans.
- 1:12:13Speaker 1: You don't know what you don't know, and then when
- 1:12:15Speaker 1: you know it, you figure out what you need to
- 1:12:18Speaker 1: do to fix it.
- 1:12:19Speaker 2: Yes, But like I said, unfortunately I don't know the
- 1:12:22Speaker 2: facts of the case. I haven't been anything a while,
- 1:12:24Speaker 2: so I can't really answer that intelligently.
- 1:12:27Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, I want to say thank you so much
- 1:12:31Speaker 1: for coming on tonight and letting me ask you so
- 1:12:35Speaker 1: many questions. I have one last question as we wrap up,
- 1:12:39Speaker 1: and it is a question that is going to surprise
- 1:12:42Speaker 1: you probably what is your favorite hobby outside of your job.
- 1:12:49Speaker 2: It's not a hobby, it's an advocation. I really enjoy
- 1:12:53Speaker 2: sports officiating. So I officiate baseball and football from the
- 1:12:59Speaker 2: middle school level all the way up to through high school,
- 1:13:02Speaker 2: some swimmer college, and some semi pro football. And uh,
- 1:13:06Speaker 2: I enjoy the challenges of doing that and and and
- 1:13:09Speaker 2: getting to be interactive and be a part of that.
- 1:13:11Speaker 2: So not a hobby but an applications.
- 1:13:15Speaker 1: I also, I mean I call it a hobby because
- 1:13:19Speaker 1: you like to do it. So to me, hobbies are.
- 1:13:21Speaker 2: Things you like to do, right, And I call it
- 1:13:24Speaker 2: an application because it's not just that I like to do,
- 1:13:27Speaker 2: but because while we're paid some for it, that's a
- 1:13:32Speaker 2: big impact on on people. And so if I have
- 1:13:36Speaker 2: a hobby of painting and I make a mistake on painting,
- 1:13:38Speaker 2: that's one thing. If if I make a mistake on
- 1:13:40Speaker 2: a on a call, it may mean the difference between
- 1:13:42Speaker 2: a team advancing the playoffs or not.
- 1:13:44Speaker 1: So I'll see another thing I learned. I didn't think
- 1:13:48Speaker 1: you got paid for officiating until you hit a high school.
- 1:13:51Speaker 2: And above what some people do volunteer and and and
- 1:13:57Speaker 2: and but uh, for for what I do, we actually
- 1:14:02Speaker 2: get paid.
- 1:14:03Speaker 1: I think it's brave because the parents, after just doing
- 1:14:08Speaker 1: a couple of years of soccer. I don't want to
- 1:14:11Speaker 1: deal with parents. So I want to say thank you
- 1:14:15Speaker 1: so much for coming on. Truly appreciate you taking time
- 1:14:20Speaker 1: out of your evening to join us.
- 1:14:22Speaker 2: Well, thank you for inviting me. I enjoyed it. I
- 1:14:24Speaker 2: appreciate you.
- 1:14:26Speaker 1: No, thank you, and guys, be sure to join us
- 1:14:29Speaker 1: this Sunday. Yes, we are still doing our special where
- 1:14:34Speaker 1: JT and I, along with our producer Tara, will continue
- 1:14:38Speaker 1: our special investigation series into the Zizian Cult unveiled. And guys,
- 1:14:44Speaker 1: I'm going to tell you if you haven't listened to
- 1:14:47Speaker 1: episode one or watched it, you need to because if
- 1:14:52Speaker 1: it wasn't for producer Terra, my head would still be
- 1:14:56Speaker 1: spinning because it is beyond that shit crazy and bunny
- 1:15:02Speaker 1: boiler crazy. So we are still doing this special series.
- 1:15:07Speaker 1: We've got one episode we did this past Sunday. We
- 1:15:10Speaker 1: will be doing it for the next six to seven Sundays,
- 1:15:13Speaker 1: depending on how long we need to put the information.
- 1:15:17Speaker 1: I honestly think we could do an episode every Sunday
- 1:15:21Speaker 1: for the next twelve months and still not cover everything.
- 1:15:26Speaker 1: So if you're interested in cult stuff, you need to
- 1:15:29Speaker 1: go and listen or watch. And I want to also
- 1:15:35Speaker 1: ask you guys, please remember to like subscribe and hit
- 1:15:38Speaker 1: that notification bell so that you know when we are live.
- 1:15:44Speaker 1: True Crime and Wine Time is live every Thursday at
- 1:15:48Speaker 1: eight pm Central Standard Time. And guys, I just got
- 1:15:53Speaker 1: asked in the last couple of days, what's the difference
- 1:15:55Speaker 1: between CST and CDT. I'm going to tell you minute
- 1:16:00Speaker 1: all the time. I am not a natural blonde, but
- 1:16:03Speaker 1: obviously I need to fix my brain. I have always
- 1:16:09Speaker 1: said CST. I know there's a difference between daylight savings
- 1:16:13Speaker 1: and standard time. I do not have the brain capacity
- 1:16:17Speaker 1: to figure that out, so I am going to always
- 1:16:19Speaker 1: say CST. If y'all want to come at me, that's great.
- 1:16:23Speaker 1: If you want to email me weekly and remind me
- 1:16:26Speaker 1: where we're at, I will say please do so because
- 1:16:29Speaker 1: I am not good at that. Also, I do Midday
- 1:16:34Speaker 1: Missing every Monday and Wednesday, where we cover missing person
- 1:16:38Speaker 1: cases that are not getting the attention that they deserve.
- 1:16:42Speaker 1: We at least once or twice a month have family
- 1:16:45Speaker 1: members on that share their loved ones stories. We also
- 1:16:51Speaker 1: will have an update on our special investigation into the
- 1:16:55Speaker 1: Chase Lackey case coming up soon. We are also planning
- 1:17:00Speaker 1: a special in person live event in Crosby, Texas for
- 1:17:05Speaker 1: this summer where we will cover chases event. So I
- 1:17:09Speaker 1: would like to ask you all please follow us on
- 1:17:13Speaker 1: all social media. You do get to see pictures of
- 1:17:16Speaker 1: my bruised feet and JT's craziness. And we're going to
- 1:17:22Speaker 1: start putting some outtakes from our staff meetings because they
- 1:17:27Speaker 1: are pretty funny. And I do have some great screenshot
- 1:17:31Speaker 1: photos I've taken a producer, Tara, and she can't get
- 1:17:35Speaker 1: them from me, so I will be sharing them because
- 1:17:38Speaker 1: she won't be able to stop me. So as always, guys,
- 1:17:43Speaker 1: I want to thank you and please stay safe, watch
- 1:17:48Speaker 1: out for crime, speak up, and I don't have much
- 1:17:52Speaker 1: wine left, but as you know, enjoy your wine time. Guys,
- 1:17:56Speaker 1: have a great weekend and we'll see you on Sunday.
- 1:18:11Speaker 1: To Live, to Grow Up