It also gives citizens a chance to meet and interact with the Sheriff and some of his deputies in a friendlier setting than standing outside your car window asking to see your license and registration. I’ve always found that to be conversation stopper. I don’t know about you but there is something about a uniformed officer with a gun, handcuffs and arrest authority that makes me want to pucker up.
Many police departments and sheriffs nationwide have CLEA programs. The goal of these programs is to establish better trust, communication and cooperation between the community and law enforcement. Citizens who participate in a CLEA course walk away with a better understanding of law enforcement practices and services and, hopefully, a greater appreciation for the difficult role that law enforcement has in our society.
Lord knows we need more of that these days. The irony is that we need more of that in places like Detroit, Chicago, Compton or Dearborn, Michigan, rather than places like Fannin County. Most people around here already respect law enforcement. We also respect the military, God, country, Mom, apple pie, Andy of Mayberry and what used to be the called the American Way of Life. Law and order are not a hard sell in these parts. Call us hicks and rubes if you like but I think we’re a whole lot freer, safer and more civilized than those other places.
I must say that I am very impressed with the FSCO. I defended cops and police departments in civil lawsuits in state and federal court in Florida so I think I know a little about good departments and bad departments, good police policies and procedures and bad police policies and procedures.
When I signed up for the class I didn’t know what to expect. On the scale of things the FCSO is a relatively small department. While the size of the agency is not necessarily an indication of whether it has good, defensible and constitutional policies and procedures, my experience was that the smaller departments were more likely to have problematic policies, procedures and practices than larger ones. It’s simply a function of leadership, experience, manpower, money and training. Thus it would not have surprised me to find that the FCSO was a little behind the curve.
However, I am happy to say that based upon what I saw in the CLEA course my impression is that the FCSO’s policies, procedures, practices and training are consistent with those of the most modern and current departments nationwide. That makes me a happy camper and taxpayer. My understanding is that a lot of that is due to the current sheriff, Dane Kirby, and what he has been able to accomplish in the eight years he has been in office. Kudos to him and those who serve under him.
One of the requirements of CLEA is that you have to do a ride along with a patrol deputy. I did mine a couple of days ago.
I requested a ride along with the K9 deputy mainly because I defended a couple of interesting K9 cases during my career and learned a lot about what it takes to comply with national training standards for K9s and K9 officers.
I met the deputy and his dog at the sheriff’s department and played with the dog while the deputy did some preliminary paperwork. His K9 is a sniffer dog trained to detect drugs (as opposed to a tracker dog or a bite dog). We played with a toy that consisted of a short piece of thick nylon rope with a hard rubber ball at the end. I think the object of the game was to see if the dog could break my wrist trying to get the toy away from me.
When the deputy is not taking his K9 to a scene for the express purpose of sniffing for drugs he mainly runs traffic. That means he mostly cruises around looking for traffic violations or sits and runs radar looking for speeders. Of course, he backs up other deputies and responds to other calls when the need arises.
There’s only one four lane road in Fannin County, and that’s the main highway that runs through the county. The other roads are of the two lane variety. I’ll be honest. I was kind of hoping for a ninety plus mile an hour pursuit down a back country road but that didn’t happen. There were a couple of hairy moments when he passed some cars on a narrow road to pull over a speeder but that was about it.
I was pretty impressed with how observant the deputy was to traffic infractions like no tags or expired tags or weaving in the lane. Most of the time he detected the infraction on cars that had passed him going the other way. He spent a lot of time driving in one direction while looking in his rear view mirror. Don’t try that at home.
When he detected a suspected infraction in his rearview mirror he would suddenly and with no warning accelerate and do a U-turn. It was like talking to someone with U-turn Tourette’s Syndrome. I'd be having a conversation with him, and the next second my head was bouncing off the side window as he whipped into a quick U-turn.
Whenever he got out of the car to talk to a stopped driver I would remain in the passenger seat, and his dog would immediately start barking. Fannin County roads do not have shoulders which means that usually half the squad car was in the road. I figured it was only a matter of time before someone plowed into the back of the car.
Most of the people he stopped he let go after he heard their explanation. I guess the highlight of the day was when he stopped a Tennessee car for speeding (75 in a 55 mph zone) and the driver turned out to be a Mexican national with no license and a visa that had expired over a year ago. The guy claimed he couldn't speak English which was probably bullshit. He got arrested because he was out of state and was driving without a valid license. Another deputy responded to haul the guy to jail while the K9 deputy stuck around to have the car towed and perform a vehicle inventory. I was hoping he would find 100 pounds of cocaine in the trunk but no luck.
I noticed that whenever the deputy approached a stopped car he was very cautious and kept his hand on his weapon. That got me to thinking about what I was supposed to do if someone came out firing. I mean I’m sitting in the passenger seat of the patrol car with my seatbelt on and a barking dog attracting attention and no means to defend myself. Not exactly the right place at the right time. I’m going to suggest to the Sheriff that in the future ride along passengers be instructed to stand at the back of the cruiser and run like hell if shots are fired.
After the Mexican got arrested we returned to the Sheriff’s Department so the deputy could fill out some paperwork. Which is good because I really had to pee by then. Another high speed U-turn, and I would have peed myself. That was over four hours into the ride. I could have ridden with him for a full 12 hours but decided I had enough excitement for the day.
If you ever get the chance to take a CLEA course or go for a ride along with your local law enforcement agency do it. I think you’ll come away with a greater appreciation for what cops do.
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