Crime shows such as Law and Order and the CSI franchise have painted a very inaccurate picture of the modern-day cop, local officers say.
From the patrol cars to the investigation and solution of crimes, the television has caused ordinary citizens and citizens who serve on juries to carry around a false perception of how things should work.
Then there’s the other side of the scale.
Emporia Police Chief Gary Smith said he’s noticed a public perception of the police department that is about 20 years behind the curve. Smith said he received a question from a member of the public asking why officers don’t wear hats anymore. Some people find it intimidating, Smith said.
Technology also has changed dramatically over the years.
“The technology aspects of this job have really increased five-fold in the past 10-15 years,” Smith said.
Traffic officers essentially have a mobile office now, Smith said, meaning they work out of their vehicles.
“They spend a majority of their time either responding or in their car,” Smith said, adding that the officers need to be on the street more and out in the community.
The technology in the patrol cars also has grown by leaps and bounds, Smith said. In the cars are radios, a laptop computer, camera equipment, radar units plus the officer’s personal gear.
On patrol
Tanner Monhollon has been a patrol officer in Emporia for nearly a year and a half. On May 3, he started his night at 10 p.m. with a squad briefing. The briefing brought the third shift officers up to speed. Right after, Monhollon hit the streets taking his duty bag with him that contains reports, extra notepads, writing utensils and several other items.
“I have anything I need,” Monhollon said. “Any type of report.”
He used tuning forks to calibrate his radar before leaving the parking garage at Emporia Police Department.
“We have to calibrate it to verify that it’s working correctly,” Monhollon said.
A key piece of equipment in the car, Monhollon said, is the laptop computer. It’s set up so officers can receive case information and talk to dispatch and each other as well. It also is used to write up reports.
Monhollon’s routine on a typical night is to patrol his assigned area. At about midnight he starts to zero in on drivers under the influence.
At 10:30 p.m., Monhollon was called to a domestic dispute. At 10:47 p.m., a man was arrested in that case.
After returning to the car, Monhollon said law enforcement is starting to see some of the strain caused by the Tyson Fresh Meat layoffs early this year.
At a domestic violence case, protocol is to separate the two individuals. Officers make sure the parties have their backs to each other and can’t see each other.
“That way one won’t intimidate the other,” Monhollon said. “Ninety-three percent of communication is non-verbal.”
They also have to be out of earshot of each other.
“We investigate to see if a crime has occurred,” Monhollon said, adding that in Kansas, state law mandates an arrest in a domestic violence case. “Somebody has to go to jail.”
VVV
Also on the streets on the evening of May 3 and morning of May 4 were Officer Bill Ross and Lt. John Koelsch. Ross has been in law enforcement for 13 years and Koelsch for 28.
The two were patrolling in an unmarked car and in plain clothes looking for alcohol violations. Koelsch said that anything can happen when working that detail.
“You just never know what you are going to get,” he said. “You can get some that are really cooperative and others can be a real jerk when you catch them red-handed.”
At 12:36 a.m. May 4 Ross and Koelsch sat in their car down the street from a house party. As they watched, a car pulled in and hit another car.
The officers searched the new car that had arrived and found open containers of alcohol. The driver was arrested for DUI and underage drinking.
The pair also conduct bar checks and try to prevent bar fights before they happen.
“A lot of times you can tell by the chemistry of the bar,” Koelsch said. “It’s kind of an instinct thing.”
VVV
Kelly Davis has been on the streets for eight years. Before that he spent two years working as a jailer in the Lyon County Jail. Davis was patrolling in the early morning hours of May 4. He said most of what he does is in his car.
“Most reports are done in cars,” he said. “This is my office.”
The lull time, which generally starts around 3 a.m., can be used to sit and run radar in cars and catch up on reports.
“We’re basically self-sufficient in our cars,” he said. “We don’t have to go to the office unless we have to print.”
Davis talked about the cameras in the vehicles. The newer cameras are recording at all times. When the sirens come on, the camera automatically saves the information and backs it up 15 seconds — often catching the traffic infraction on tape.
“A picture is worth a thousand words,” he said.
Speaking about the challenges of his job, Davis said there are several things to keep in mind.
“The important thing is that everybody gets home safe,” he said. “In the middle you take each call one at a time.”
VVV
Willie Turner has been a patrolman for 26 years. On May 13, he gave a tour of the police department, showing some of the gear police officers have to wear. Vests often weigh between 3-5 pounds and the gun belts average close to 15 to 17 pounds when all the equipment is attached to them.
“Some guys choose to carry a little less or more ammo,” he said. “It’s like a loaded construction belt, you’re all the time adjusting them.”
Vests used during raids generally run 17 to 18 pounds without the ceramic plate. The plate adds another 10 pounds. Add to that the equipment used to break down doors, shields and helmets and it gets cumbersome.
Then there are the forms.
“As a patrol officer we use 34 different forms,” Turner said as he peered into the cabinet that holds the various forms.
There are forms for criminal citations, property, juvenile intake, court, DUI, accident reports, lab and criminal trespass.
“We even have a form to fill out when the headlights go out on the patrol car,” Turner said, with a chuckle.
Also inside the cabinet that holds the forms are the various field test kits. There are kits for drugs such as marijuana and cocaine. A small sample of the substance is put into a tube and the officers look for color change.
“That tells us we have a positive field test,” he said. “This is a cabinet the patrol uses constantly.”
Another duty of Turner’s on May 13 was to go to an elementary school and eat lunch with the students.
“It’s something we are trying to implement,” he said.
Turner said the longer an officer is on patrol, the more apt he is to develop a specialty in his profession. A few of Turner’s fortes are sobriety testing, DUIs and working accident scenes.
Although there are specialties, Turner said the officers pretty much get called out to do it all, from a dog at large to a neighbor’s trash being blown over.
“The big misconception people have about our job is what we do and the amount of time we have,” he said.
Turner said cases are very time consuming. For example, a DUI stop can take 25 to 30 minutes in the field, another 30 minutes at the jail plus another 15 minutes at the jail for paperwork. Back at the station there is another 45 minutes of paperwork waiting to finish processing the case.
“It’s not unusual for some cases to have 35 to 40 pieces of paperwork,” he said.
Another misconception is how many officers are on the street at one time.
“Right now there are five of us working,” Turner said. “There are a lot of people who think cops are behind every piece of wood out there but they’re really not.”
There are training requirements for officers each year, Turner said.
“Yearly we all have to have a minimum of 40 hours of training for our certifications,” he said.
The training could be a variety of things, both in-house and outside of the home agency.
“Most of those 40 hours are done within the department,” Turner said.
But there are several trainings that have to be done outside Emporia, where they’re more readily available.
“We go all over,” Turner said.
Working for the police department doesn’t always equal an eight hour day. During the recent Cinco de Mayo event a lot of patrol officers were working 10- to 13-hour days.
“A lot of people don’t have the concept of the hours we put in,” he said. “Some of it can be very long at times.”
VVV
Not all patrolling in Emporia is done from the inside of a patrol car. Officer Jeff Eubank is a member of the bike patrol, which started in 1993. Officers have to apply for the patrol, and it takes a unique individual who is assertive and can speak publicly as well, Eubank said.
“I feel lucky and privileged to be able to go out and do what I enjoy doing,” he said. “My big passion down here is the bike patrol.”
The department has three full-time bike officers. The duties vary by shift. The day shift includes school talks, community talks and general patrolling. The night shift officers see a wide variety of duties as well. Duties on either shift can be anything from bad check issues to parking issues and making arrests. The only thing they can’t do is transport someone other than themselves.
Bike officers have a strong presence at events such as the Farmers Market and Live in the Lot. They also make it a habit to check up on businesses.
Eubank said bike officers are more approachable.
“There’s a lot more interaction with the public,” he said. “You don’t have the car between you. We try to do as much as we can with talking to people. We give a lot of safety talks.”
On an average day, a bike officer can put 20 miles on his bikes.
“It kind of varies,” Eubank said. “If you’ve got a lot of miles you’ve probably haven’t had a busy day.”
When buying a bike for a patrol officer, Eubank said departments need to decide how visible they want the bikes to be. The Emporia Police Department has chosen the stealth side, with lower-profile bikes.
Investigations
In criminal cases, where the patrol officers leave off, the detectives come in.
Like patrol officers, there is no typical day in the the investigations division, according to Emporia Police Department Detectives Lisa Sage and Mark Senn. Sage has been in law enforcement for 10 years and Senn for 25 years.
Sage said her days usually begin with a glance at the “yellow sheets.” The yellow sheets are reports that contain information about crimes. Sage also checks the pawn tickets and compares those to items stolen.
Pawn shops are required by state law to submit their pawn tickets to the police department, Sage said.
The detectives also handle any kind of felonies and occasionally a misdemeanor case. Cases include burglaries, robberies, homicides, kidnappings, rapes or any type of sexual assault, firearms crimes and child abuse cases. The department also performs background checks on employees within the department and handles internal investigations if needed. In addition to working on their cases, detectives attend meetings and are involved with several other agencies.
“A lot of times we’re asked to give a lot of talks at various places,” Sage said.
A big part of the detective’s job is paperwork and preparing cases for court. Large case files have to be organized into smaller files so they are easily pulled out during a court hearing.
“Preparing a case for court takes a lot of time,” Sage said. “Obtaining records is very time-consuming.”
Detectives investigate unattended deaths as well.
“We are required by statute to investigate all (unattended) deaths,” Senn said.
Investigation of deaths can be challenging when family members are around. It’s often hard for family members to understand why photos have to be taken of the deceased.
Being a detective involves a lot of prioritizing and time management, Sage said.
“I could be right in the middle of an important rape investigation and somebody dies and I have to go investigate that,” she said.
Cases are organized by their solvability and the severity of the crime, such as whether the victim is a person or property, Senn said.
There’s a lot involved in processing a crime scene as well. Photos have to be taken and evidence has to be processed. Legal issues at the scene have to be considered as well. Investigators must determine whether they need a search warrant to be there.
“CSI shows have made it very difficult,” Senn said.
Cases cannot be turned over and a conviction given in an hour like fans see on TV.
“We average about nine months to get DNA results back from the lab,” Senn said. “That’s difficult for people to understand.”
Even fingerprinting still takes time, Sage added. The fingerprinting itself doesn’t take much time, but it takes time to get results back from a database. Fingerprinting is done with the traditional powder or by heating superglue and using the vapors to raise the print. With superglue, the item is destroyed.
“You can lift prints over and over but it ruins everything it touches,” Senn said.
The shows also put pressure on investigators when getting a case ready for court.
“We are thinking down the line as far as court and what the juries expect out of a court case,” Sage said. “It really affects what we do.”
A crime scene van is taken to every crime scene. The van includes everything investigators need to collect evidence from a scene. There is a “death kit” used in deaths that includes a thermometer to determine time of death. The van also holds camera equipment, crime scene tape, an alternate light source used to detect body fluids, a shop vacuum to pick up fibers and several other items.
“The things we collect for evidence take a lot of time and money,” Sage said. “We have to know what we will be using them for.”
Documenting a crime scene is very time consuming. The reports are very specific in where evidence is found and detectives are constantly stopping to take notes.
“There’s a lot of note-taking,” Senn said.
Comments
Post a comment
We allow registered users to post comments on this Web site. Our goal with this feature is to encourage thoughtful discussions about the news stories. Using the comment feature to make random attacks on people is not acceptable. Emporiagazette.com neither endorses nor guarantees the accuracy of any user contribution. Responsibility for what is posted or contributed to this site is the sole responsibility of each user. To learn more about our posting policies please read our User Poster Agreement Policy.
(Requires free registration.)