July 11, 2025 • 50 mins
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In this powerful episode of Security Halt!, former law enforcement officer Jeff Wenninger opens up about his 30-year journey in policing—from the gritty streets of Los Angeles to the front lines of community reform. Jeff shares raw, firsthand insights into the realities of policing violent neighborhoods, navigating the cultural complexities of diverse communities, and living through the infamous Rampart Scandal.
More than just a career retrospective, this conversation dives deep into the importance of empathy, mentorship, and leadership in modern law enforcement. Jeff discusses how training, accountability, and compassion must evolve to better serve both officers and the public they protect. Whether you're a veteran, first responder, or concerned citizen, this episode sheds light on the future of policing and how to lead with integrity and purpose.
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Chapters
00:00 The Call to Service
04:52 From Personal Experience to Law Enforcement Career
09:24 Understanding Humanity in Policing
14:04 The Role of Mentorship in Law Enforcement
18:51 Navigating Race and Community Relations in the 90s
23:36 Understanding Law Enforcement Culture
28:55 Transforming Police Practices
37:56 Lessons from the Past
43:33 Personal Reflections and Future Aspirations
Instagram: @securityhalt
Tik Tok: @security.halt.pod
LinkedIn: Deny Caballero
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LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeff-wenninger-4247a854/
Website: https://jeffwenninger.com/
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https://jeffwenninger.com/book/
Produced by Security Halt Media
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Security Odd Podcast.
Let's go the only podcastthat's purpose-built from the
ground up to support you Notjust you, but the wider audience
, everybody.
Authentic, impactful andinsightful conversations that
serve a purpose to help you.
And the quality has gone up.
It's decent and it's hosted byme, danny Caballero, jeff
(00:26):
Winninger how are you doing, man?
Speaker 2 (00:28):
I'm doing.
Great thanks.
How are you?
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Doing well, man.
Welcome to Security Out Podcast.
I am excited to have a brotherof our law enforcement
background today.
The Warrior Tribe is large andincludes so many of us, not just
military folks, and what I loveexploring is that call to
service.
You and I both know that beinga law enforcement officer is one
of the toughest professions outthere.
(00:50):
When I deploy, I have theability to finish my mission
overseas and come back home andredeploy is re-engage and
redeploy each and every day.
What was your calling toservice?
Why did you find yourself goinginto this career?
That has historically been onethat doesn't have a lot of
(01:13):
celebration.
You don't get lifted up.
Everybody loves you when theypick up the phone and have that
emergency moment, but they areso quick to forget about all the
great things you do for us whenthe political climate shifts.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
Well, you know, I had an experience, personal
experience that prior to I wouldhave never thought I would want
to pursue a career in lawenforcement.
Essentially, it was a Fridaynight, I was 20 years old and I
was division one collegiatehockey player, and I went out
with one of my teammates um, myteammates and we closed the bar
(01:47):
as we, as we often would do.
Everybody that was in the barwas flown out onto the sidewalk,
which wasn't large enough toaccommodate everybody.
So a number of us were flowingout into the street and my, my
buddy, who I was out with,thought it'd be kind of cute to
to prop himself up on the hoodof this car that was trying to
(02:07):
get through.
I think his motivation was forvery attractive women in the car
and they didn't really care forit and they sped up and slammed
on the brakes and when he wentrolling off the hood he grabbed
the antenna and snapped it off.
And that kind of ages me alittle bit back when you had
antennas on the hoods of cars.
But, um, so as a result of that, or as a police officer right
(02:28):
up the street that saw this alloccur and came down, grabbed my
buddies, slapped the handcuffson them and threw them in the
backseat of the police car.
So you know, when we go out, wego out with a buddy system.
You know we're not.
We gotta gotta get get our, ourpartners out of trouble.
So I need to.
I thought I needed to inquireabout where they were taking
them, how long it was going totake to process them.
(02:49):
Would he be being released?
And if so, you know, what wasit going to cost me to bail them
out?
And so I approached the policeofficer and he was really
belligerent and made it veryclear that if I didn't get back
up on the sidewalk, I was goingto jail as well.
So I'm like I understand that.
So I got back up on thesidewalk and he had called for
backup and two more officersarrived and they confronted me
(03:12):
and they walk up to me and saidlet me see your expletive
identification.
And so, as I was reaching forit, they began to beat me and
before I knew it, I was inhandcuffs, being taken down to
the police station and I wasbooked for disorderly conduct,
resisting arrest and interferingin official business.
And when I'm down there, I'mlike where's my buddy?
(03:35):
And they're like we let him go.
I'm like the ridiculousness ofthis.
I'm like you've got to bekidding me.
So I ended up staying.
It was a long weekend.
It was a Labor Day weekend andI stayed in jail through the
weekend.
It was a Friday night and theydidn't have court, because
courts close on Monday.
So they didn't have court untilTuesday and I went to court and
then the judge let me out on myown recognizance and I'm like,
(03:57):
ah, I didn't do anything wronghere.
I said you know, I'm going tofight this thing.
So I got an attorney.
I spent my entire summer'searnings I worked as a laborer,
um, that entire summer but I hadto spend all my earnings on an
attorney and I refused to takeany of the plea deals and I went
all the way to jury trial.
And prior to the jury trialI'll be starting.
They offered me something Icouldn't refuse.
(04:20):
Everybody said if you sign thisticket it's a $60 ticket we'll
drop all the charges, and Ithought that was reasonable.
So that's what I did.
The ridiculousness of thisdoesn't even uh, doesn't end
there.
About a year and a half later,um, I saw an advertisement for
(04:44):
correction officers in the veryjail that I sat in that weekend
and, kind of out of a joke, Iapplied, they hired me.
So I mean, that's how seriousthey took.
You know the offense that theyarrested me for.
You couldn't have had a moreclear exoneration of any
wrongdoing than to have theagency that actually arrested
you.
And you know the jail that yousat in for an entire weekend to
(05:04):
be the place that you worked in.
So that was that.
You sat in for an entireweekend to be the place that you
worked in.
So that was the beginning of mylaw enforcement career.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
I gotta tell you, Jeff, I've heard a lot of origin
stories, but never one likethis.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
So so you know, really what happened was I was a
finance major, you know, I Ididn't really think I would go
into law enforcement and so Istarted taking some criminal
justice classes and thingsbecause of this experience and I
really enjoyed it, it resonatedwith me.
So my father well, he was asociology professor and I
thought about academia,following my footsteps, my
(05:38):
father's footsteps in academiaand perhaps being a criminal
justice professor.
So when I finished my schooling, I was looking at going to get
my PhD and my father encouragedme to go get five years of
practical experience working ina large law enforcement agency
and I thought what better placethan Los Angeles?
And that's where I went, withthe intention of staying five
years and then going back andgetting my PhD.
(05:59):
I stayed 33 years.
I can't tell time.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Yeah, the same problem that a lot of my
military friends have.
That's not a short period oftime, man, that is a commitment,
that is a life.
That is you wake up, you liveit, you breathe it, you sweat it
.
And in LA, yeah, chances are,chances are you might bleed out
(06:27):
and go out in a blaze of glorytrying to serve the people of
that community, because it's nota safe place.
There are a lot of bad peopleand it's hyper aware, like every
police officer in that area ishyper aware, that every movement
, everything they do, is beingrecorded, being watched, every
single second.
Ila was just like you had tofigure out the hardest place to
(06:51):
go to.
You know, los.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Angeles.
If you would have asked me whenI was in high school, I
actually had a high schoolgirlfriend that had an older
brother and he had moved outthere after he graduated.
So she went out to visit himone summer and I thought who
would ever want to live in LosAngeles?
No-transcript, I would have hada fairly formidable
(07:37):
professional career if I hadn'tsustained some of the injuries,
that I hadn't made the decisionto move on rather than beat my
body up any further.
I hadn't made the decision tomove on rather than beat my body
up any further, but it justresonated with me.
You know LAPD, you know theywere the originators of SWAT,
you know the tactical prowess ofthe organization, the
opportunities available to youin an agency that large, how you
(07:59):
can diversify and get all kindsof different specializations
and things.
It just appealed to me and,like I said, I went out there
initially for five years.
I thought, well, I'll get alittle taste of the different
things.
But that's really why I wentout there.
I just thought, I thought itwas cool.
You know I was.
I was full of wind, piss andexcitement, as they say.
You know, back when I was in myearly twenties and I just
(08:20):
really I feel bad for my dad.
No-transcript.
(08:48):
So you know it was.
It was something that I notonly wanted to be part of the
LAPD, but I wanted to work themost difficult and challenging
assignments in the LAPD.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
Yeah, and I have to imagine you're going there.
I mean there's still an aspectof humanity.
I mean you're going there toprotect and serve.
We often say it's a war zonedown there or it's like man, I
don't want to live there, Iwouldn't want to work there as a
police officer or EMT.
It's just too violent.
But at the end of the day,people live there, people make
their homes there.
(09:19):
How do you balance that?
How do you balance that?
Speaker 2 (09:40):
How do you go there knowing that you will be facing
some of the toughest individuals, hardened criminals out there,
but at the end of the day you'rethere to protect and the truth,
the vast majority of peoplethat live in these communities
that we would identify as beingthe most violent, vast majority
of them are are hard-working,well-intentioned, god-fearing
people.
You know, at the end of the dayit really is a challenge
because as a police officer,you're handling the worst within
(10:02):
that environment and it's veryeasy to believe that this
applies to everybody, that youpaint everybody in that
community with the same broadbrush.
And I was fortunate.
You know, my father was asociology professor at Kent
State and he actually did hisPhD dissertation on the
professionalism of lawenforcement, and so he was kind
(10:24):
of aware of what time it was andwhat kind of experiences I was
going through.
And he was a very learnedindividual, very wise, and he
didn't speak unless there wassomething worth saying.
And I'll tell you, as a youngman growing up, when he spoke I
listened because there was amessage and a lesson to be
learned and something tocontemplate.
He never told me what to do orhow to think, he would just
(10:47):
suggest.
You know it used to come out ofhis mouth all the time.
Well, it seems to me you mightwant to consider, and then he'd
lay out and you know, then he'dlet me go.
The kept my eyes open to thesociological issues that play
(11:08):
into everyday criminality in oursociety and that you know
there's a lot of factors thatare involved and it's not
necessarily.
You know these peopleoftentimes are a product of
their environment, not so muchyou know evil people and
themselves.
He used to always tell me.
(11:28):
He said, son, you know you were, I was adopted by my folks.
He says you were quite fortunate.
We were able to financiallyprovide you with opportunities
where you had, you know, diverseexperiences.
You had the ability to get ahigher education on your
horizons through some travel andthings like that.
(11:49):
And, um, you know, you focusedon your energies, on on
athletics and sport, and a lotof people don't have that
opportunity.
And it goes, quite frankly, ifyou were born and raised in some
of these communities that youwork in, your natural
personality tendencies may havedriven you to be the leader of
the game, to be honest.
So when he put it in that kindof context, basically I had a
(12:10):
sounding board and somebody tokind of.
You know, it's kind of likebowling with the rails he kept
me on the lane, you know, andthen I really did make a
concerted effort to, outside ofwork, have friends that had
nothing to do with lawenforcement.
So I had experiences with themand I saw insights from them
(12:32):
that were very different,because, you know, if you can
say anything about lawenforcement, at times it can be
a little too insular and webegin to have this group think
and we go down these rabbitholes and we begin to believe
some of the nonsense that wespeak.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
It becomes an echo chamber.
We see it in any profession,military as well.
You pointed out something Iwant to touch on and kind of
dive into a little bit.
It seems from the verybeginning you had a broader
understanding of humanity, thatcommon humanity Like.
If we just look at everythingthrough that narrow scope, we're
just going to see nothing butan episode of cops when we go to
the streets.
(13:07):
And I would argue that honestlyit's made things worse for the
way we police, because now thegeneral public has seen good and
bad, Just the stereotypes thatwe see on TV shows like cops.
And then our police officersoftentimes are also consuming
the same media.
So if they're visualizing theirworld as being just black and
(13:28):
white, bad people, they're goingto be in this area.
It's going to be hyperawareness of everything that I'm
surrounded by.
It's nothing but low.
Life degenerates.
It's like, wait a second.
How do we change the narrative?
More importantly, how do wechange the idea of what it means
to be a police officer, what itmeans to be a serviced?
(13:49):
You had a great individual inyour life to help you understand
that.
A lot of us don't get that.
We develop that so late in lifeand I think that's something
that we need to explore.
And I think that's somethingthat we need to explore.
Is that something that youdeveloped and understood and
were able to give to your fellowpolice officers and sort of
(14:10):
like mentor while you were stillin, or was that?
Speaker 2 (14:15):
something that had to be developed on the outside.
I've always said I think thatone of the most influential
positions you can ever have onthe job is that as a field
training officer.
That as a field trainingofficer, because you're getting
a police officer straight out ofthe academy who is now learning
how to police on the streets inreal time with real threats and
having to make decisions underrapidly unfolding tactical
scenarios and the mindset andthe way that they perceive and
(14:38):
process what their experience onevery day as a field training
officer, I can impact thatsignificantly.
And then the next role is afield supervisor as a sergeant,
and I took those jobs both very,very seriously and made an
(14:59):
effort.
Not only did I see my job toensure that my partners or my
subordinates were safe, but thatthey did have a broader
understanding of what theirpurpose and what their function
in society really was, and thatthere needs to be empathy.
People always say you know thewarrior mentality, we absolutely
have to be warriors, but wecan't be warriors while
overlooking the responsibilityof being guardians.
(15:20):
So the reality is is you needto be a guardian with the
ability to turn it on and be awarrior if you have to, and you
know I saw that experience veryearly on.
I had an incident that I wasinvolved in the 77th division,
the LAPD, where my partner and Iwere shot at with an AK-47,
multiple rounds, and we werequite fortunate to survive it.
(15:42):
And you know, we made sometactical errors and that put us
in this bad position.
And if not for the courageousacts of the officers up in the
airship, which is the helicopterpolice helicopter you know, I
may not be here today.
No-transcript, a daily basis,it's across the board.
(16:34):
And so I carried the samepassion that I had for hockey
into my law enforcement careerand I really strive to excel,
excel.
Now, you know, and I think thatthat's a problem with law
enforcement, when I went throughthe academy, I, um, I graduated
.
I was the honor recruit, Igraduated number one.
We had 157 at the beginning ofthe academy and we graduated 107
(16:56):
, about a third of the peoplewere washed out.
And um, I graduated number one.
And I used to get a lot of heatfrom people because my goal
when I studied for a test was toget a hundred percent.
Yeah, and um, I graduated likeI'm nine, 98.7% or something
like that, and they used tolaugh at me because they're like
, oh, you need a 70% to pass,like that's enough.
(17:17):
You know it's it's not.
And so, um, it was thatexperience that underscored that
the importance of what Ialready was doing, but that you
know you continually need tostrive to improve, because every
new experience there's anopportunity to to grow and
develop and be even better, raceand things like that.
(17:46):
As you were speaking of, I havea really unique background.
Like I said, I was adopted.
Yeah, my parents were marriedfor 12 years trying to have kids
and their goal they wanted fourkids each one year apart.
And they had this 12 years andthey said let's go look into
adoption.
So they went through theadoption process and right about
the time they got approved, loand behold, my mother gets
pregnant with my sister and theyhave my sister, but they're
like let's go ahead and followthrough the adoption because
(18:08):
maybe another 12 years before weever get pregnant again.
So I was adopted and then theyadopted my brother he's half
Japanese and then they fosteredanother sister.
She's black and I grew up inthe sixties and seventies in
Kento, so I see race verydifferently.
I had experiences growing upthat you know, even with a smile
(18:31):
, the veneer of a smile, and youknow, supposed grace.
People were saying you knowthere's microaggressions in
regards to racist statementsthat were being said.
A perfect example we'd go tothe A&P grocery store in town
where I grew up and we would allbe hanging off my mom's grocery
cart and I remember a womanwalking up to her, smiling,
(18:51):
saying oh, your children lookall so much alike.
And it was a dig at my mom.
My mom had so much grace and Ilearned so much.
I didn't quite understand it atthe time what was going on.
But reflecting back I'm like,wow, my mom, what a strong woman
she was.
She didn't bite, she didn't gotake that bait, she just, you
(19:13):
know, stood proud, stood talland we continued on with our
daily activities and didn'tallow people's you know,
opinions or actions to influenceus.
So you know, I came from thatkind of a background and types
of experiences.
I came from that kind of abackground and types of
experiences and I talk aboutthat in my forthcoming book on
Thin Ice.
I talk about my personalbackground and my professional
(19:34):
experiences and I give practicalinsights in regards to what I
think law enforcement needs todo to be successful moving
forward in the 21st century.
But you know a lot of who I amand how I policed and how I
viewed my role in lawenforcement is a result of the
experiences I had growing up,with the type of family I grew
up in, as well as the the impactthat my my father and my mother
(19:57):
had.
Speaker 1 (19:58):
Yeah, I, lived experiences is valuable insight
and, um, not enough people growup and have the ability to
appreciate that and have thatwide scope.
That's why we have to work hard, Even if you're not law
enforcement.
Get outside of your livedexperience, be able to meet
people where they're at andlearn something.
That's the one thing that theywere so drawn into.
(20:19):
This world of going inward andsitting with our phones, living
on social media and we judgeeverything from that screen.
It's like, man, there's abroader world out there that you
can stand to learn somethingnew, and nobody wants to have an
engaging conversation.
These days, it's too difficultto find common ground,
(20:39):
especially when you hit thesehot topics of policing.
In America, the vast majorityof people have no idea what it
takes to be a police officer andthe amount of work, the dangers
that are involved, and we justwant to react instead of trying
to understand, trying to bridgethe gap and growing up and
working in that time period inthe nineties like how much
(21:02):
different was it?
Trying to get buy-in from thecommunity?
Because I have to imagine, eventhough you're educated, even
though you have thisunderstanding of what it is to
be able to grow up in a mixedhome, have siblings that are
minorities, having this livedexperience of understanding,
kindness, compassion.
You're very much still a whiteman going into predominantly
(21:26):
African-American communities,policing, and in the nineties I
couldn't think of a harder jobwe have.
We have the cultural hotbed ofgangster rap coming into its
prime and everything in themedia is this is enemy number
one.
This guy has to go down.
How did you survive?
(21:46):
How did you take the approach?
I mean, as a Green Beret, wehave this approach of by, with
and through Getting into thelocal.
Getting the buy-in from thelocal populace is key to our
approach to fighting the enemy,Becoming one with our partner
force.
How do you do that in America?
How do you bridge that gap andsay I know what's happening in
(22:10):
all over the news, but I am notthat guy?
Speaker 2 (22:14):
I know it's quite difficult because, like you said
, in the nineties there was alot of flashpoints.
Yeah, primarily you had theRodney King beating that was
early in my career and then, uh,then in 92, we had the riots.
Yeah, you know, working 77thDivision shortly after the riots
and stuff.
It was tough because you knowthe, yeah, I don't think, I
(22:37):
don't, I don't look at the riotsso narrowly that it was just
anger of the exoneration of theofficers being acquitted of, of
the charges and the Rodney Kingbeating.
I don't see it that narrowly.
This was decades in the making.
There was a huge divide betweenthe LAPD and the citizens in
(22:58):
which the police departmentserves.
It developed into a great levelof frustration and hatred
towards the men and women inblue and we saw that play out in
92.
And you know, unfortunately,you know I saw very little
change as a result of that.
(23:19):
You know I had I'll tell SharonSharon experience.
I had a partner.
I worked with him just one dayand the reason was is our
regular partners, both of us,our regular partners, were on
day off, so we ended up gettingpartnered up and we're driving
down the street and this is lessthan a year after the riots in
San Jose Commission and we see ablack woman and a white guy
walking hand in hand down thestreet and he says my parents
(23:43):
taught me better than that.
And I'm like what?
because my parents taught mebetter than that and I'm like
what do you mean?
And he goes my parents taughtme not to have sex with animals,
wow, wow, so so so this is.
And the reason I bring this upis because he assumed, because I
looked like him and I wore thisuniform, that I also viewed
(24:05):
society in the same way.
Listen, I had a black fostersister.
My girlfriend at the time wasblack.
I mean, I'd been dating a girlfor about two years at the time
and he didn't know that, but hejust assumed that I shared his
mindset or his views on society.
You know, at that time thatwasn't something.
You just dealt with it.
You just knew that that was anofficer I didn't necessarily
(24:27):
want to have to work with again,because the reality is that
your attitudes and your beliefsthey're manifested in your
actions and your behaviors.
It's unfortunate.
Majority of law enforcementofficers are wonderful people.
They have nothing but the bestintentions and they want to
(24:48):
serve the community.
The problem is there's thissmall subculture within law
enforcement that is allowed tocontinue to exist, and he was
reflective of that, but it makesit very challenging.
I always took the time tointeract with the public outside
of my official law enforcementactivities and when I mean that
(25:11):
I'd be on duty in uniform but Iwould go into the projects and I
would throw the football withthe kids and it was showing them
that one that I wasn't a badguy, that the guys in blue
aren't the bad guy, and it alsoshowed them that I didn't view
them as the bad guy.
And so it was those types ofsimple interactions and I was
(25:37):
very fortunate when I was goingthrough training, my field
training officers wereoutstanding and I had a number
of them that actually grew up inthese communities that I was
policing and they gave me anunbelievable amount of insight
into understanding the cultureand being even able to
(25:57):
understand what's being said.
I remember that we had this oneradio call and we have contact
in cover and I was a contactofficer, so I'm the one that's
going to make the initialcontact with whoever we're going
to be interacting with.
We respond to this radio call.
It's all with a deadly weapon.
And we get there and we'rewalking up the driveway and this
guy he's got blood flowing outof his forehead from a big gash
(26:21):
that he has.
I said okay, there's our victim.
And I asked you know what'sgoing on?
And his answer was I came hereto get some stank on the hang
low and I got hit upside thehead with a smoothie.
I'm like what?
Because at the time you know ofthe projects, he just starts
laughing at me and he goes herelet me translate and he goes.
(26:49):
He came here to get some sexand he got hit upside the head
with a clothing iron because itsmooths out the clothes.
That's why he calls it a smooth.
So I mean just simple stufflike that.
And I laughed at that incident,not at the individual I was
interacting with, but at myself,for having no idea what he was
saying, and if not for mypartner, I would.
(27:11):
I don't know what's going onhere, you know.
So you know, and that's justkind of a humor.
You know an incident that had alittle bit of humor behind it.
I was fortunate enough to havethese training officers that
really gave me some insight intothe culture and how the
community members really viewthings and actually viewed law
(27:31):
enforcement and how we canbetter bridge that and it's just
really meeting them at thelevel that you know they're
interacting with you at and it's, you know it was important, but
you know it's unfortunate, likeI said.
Just like my partner, when hemade that comment to me, he made
an assumption about how Iviewed things.
Oftentimes there were people inthe community that made
(27:53):
assumptions because of theuniform I wore and how I looked.
Now, even even after I was aLieutenant working on a police
headquarters, I was the officerin charge of the detective
entity that investigated allofficers involved, shootings and
lethal force cases.
And I walk out of policeheadquarters to get get a bite
to eat on on a Tuesday andthat's when they have the open
session, police commissionmeetings on the first floor of
(28:16):
police headquarters.
And I walk out and there's someunhappy community members and
they're like, oh, there's a KKKhood wearing, you know, blah,
blah, blah and it's like youknow.
So you get it from both sides.
You know, yeah, not only dopeople make make assumptions
that also wear the uniform alongthe side of you, but the
community makes assumptionsabout you and that's difficult.
(28:37):
So you just have.
You can't take it personallyand you, you just continue to be
the person that that you knowyou can be and conduct yourself
from and conduct yourself withempathy and compassion and treat
people with respect, becausethe reality is all people are
looking for is to feel safe andvalued and respected.
(29:02):
That's the recipe.
If you can do that, you'regoing to be successful, because
it's not what you say, it's notwhat you do, it's how you make
people feel.
That's going to be the legacy,that's what actually matters.
So if you focus on that in lawenforcement, when you're that
type of a service oriented typeprofession, those are the things
that you really need to focuson.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Yeah, absolutely, and I have to imagine that after 30
years, consulting pretty muchseemed like the most logical
avenue of approach.
I think instinctively did youfeel like, okay, I can't do this
job anymore, I'm not the guythat's going to be on the beat.
How do I make better and moreinformed police officers?
(29:44):
How do I give people the Jeffexperience?
Was that your initial approachfor that time after service of
just wanting to give back,wanting to be able to still be
part of the tribe but be able togive the next generation of
police officers sort of likethat manual of how to be better,
how to be more kind, empatheticand just understand, like the
human approach?
Speaker 2 (30:03):
Well, to best answer that question, to give a little
bit of context of my backgroundexperience on the job, I worked
in the Metropolitan Divisionwith the LAPD, which is like the
K-9 and the SWAT it's theSpecial Forces, essentially
organization and during thattime was when we had the Rafael
Perez Rampart crash scandal thatwas going on.
(30:24):
This was in the late 90s andthere were LAPD officers
committing bank robberies offduty.
Rafael Perez was stealingpounds of cocaine out of
evidence lockup and selling iton the streets for personal
financial gain.
They were involved in officerinvolved shootings, planning
guns to justify the shootings.
(30:45):
Some of the most egregiouscorruption you'll ever find in
law enforcement was going on inthe LAPD at Rampart Station.
So I get promoted to sergeant.
When you get promoted you givea wishlist.
I'll be honest with you.
At the time there were 18geographic divisions in the city
(31:05):
of Los Angeles.
Rampart would have been number18 for me and that's where I
ended up going Becauseessentially what had happened
was they were creating an entirenew leadership team at Rampart
and I was selected to be asergeant there to help change
the culture and try to navigatethis very critical time in the
(31:29):
history of the LAPD.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
That's never easy, that is never easy.
Whether it's military or anyprofession, when there's a
leadership change out and theywant you, as part of the new
generation, the new force, to goin there and straighten things
out, I can't even imagine whendid you start?
Where did you guys, you and thenew breed what was the day one
(31:51):
initiative?
How did you go about changingit?
Because that was a pivotalmoment.
I mean, I was a kid but Iremember these things happening
and it's almost out of like acomic movie or something out of
a cartoon show or TV show.
The good guys end up being thebad guys.
How do you change the culture?
Speaker 2 (32:11):
Well, a lot of it was imposed on us because, like I
said, where I was in theMetropolitan Division just
before I was promoted, eoj wasinvestigating us and we ended up
(32:33):
going under a federal consentdecree and that started in 2001,
a consent decree.
It took us 10 years to get outfrom under it.
And while I was at Rampart,what happened?
Because of the crash scandal,they ended up abolishing crash,
but the department still neededto address the violent gang
crime that was occurring acrossthe city.
So they created a new entity.
It was called the GangEnforcement Detail and they had
(32:55):
a new structure and framework inregards to accountability and
the chain of command.
And I was selected while asergeant at Rampart to be the
officer in charge of the gangenforcement detail.
I had to change the entireculture of that and the mindset
of that unit and fortunately Iworked directly for Charlie Beck
at the time.
(33:15):
He became chief of police downthe road.
He was the chief after WilliamBratton, but I worked directly
for him and I reported directlyto him and I was able to
handpick my personnel.
I was looking forcharacteristics that were very
different than what were beingused as the standard and the
selection of personnel prior to.
My measures of effectivenessfor the officers in the unit
(33:38):
were significantly different Inthe past.
They were looking at arrestrates what's your felony arrest
rates?
Arrest rates what's your felonyarrest rates?
That's mildly interesting In anenvironment like Rampart, which
is the most heavily denselypopulated area within the city
and arguably, perhaps evenanywhere in the United States.
It has a population that'sprimarily Central and South
(34:01):
American MS-13 Street.
It's just a very, very violentdivision.
Actually, rampart was alwayscompeting with 77th for the
highest number of homicidesevery year, but and they would
kind of alternate back and forth.
But so I changed the wholeparadigm in which we looked at
our success and I went away fromthe felony arrests to.
(34:22):
You know what are yourconviction rates, filing rates,
those sorts of things, and Iwanted my officers to.
I made their.
The biggest tool I would arguethe strongest tool that any law
enforcement officer has is thegray matter between their ears.
So whenever we did, wheneveryou made an arrest, in your
arrest report I wanted you toarticulate what you did but also
(34:44):
cite the case law that gave youthe authority to do that.
So everything we did wasgrounded in law.
My officers to this day,wardlow versus Illinois.
They can recite and tell youeverything.
So it wasn't just the tactics,firearms proficiency, the
tactical prowess that wasimportant.
(35:05):
The tactical prowess that wasimportant, the team concept of
how to be disciplined andcoordinated in dealing with a
rapidly unfolding tacticalscenario.
But I wanted you to beunbelievably knowledgeable of
your job and the laws thatregulate what you have the
authority to do and yourunderstanding of the gangs.
Believe it or not, prior to mebecoming the officer in charge,
(35:29):
there was no requirement thatthe officers be experts,
court-recognized experts ingangs.
What Well?
I gave my personnel one year.
If you weren't certified withthe court as a gang expert
within a year of being assignedto the division or assigned to
the unit, you were gone.
Speaker 1 (35:48):
That's a no brainer, that's just wow.
Speaker 2 (35:51):
But I was the.
I was the first unit.
First, we were the first unitthat required that standard to
me to be able to remain, and wewere very successful.
Now, listen, I gotta be honestwith you.
Any good leader, I'll tell you,their success has very little
to do with the ideas they comeup with.
It's about building a teamwhere you, collaboratively, can
(36:15):
come up with ideas, andessentially what I was doing is
I was building the successionplan, the new leaders of the
organization, and that'sultimately what happened.
Everybody in my unit, I had like24 people assigned to that unit
.
You know they all went on tohave very flourishing careers,
but it was because, you know, I,I I believed in in a leadership
(36:37):
style where I gave them theaccountability and to be, you
know, let them be innovative andcreative and held them
accountable to it, but I allowedthem to drive our missions and
come up with the ideas how tobest address these, these crime
trends that we were being heldresponsible for impacting and
reducing.
You know, it really was just amindset.
(36:57):
It had nothing it was all about.
It's about choosing the people,supporting them, and they'll
make you look good.
And at the end of the day webecame, we were awarded the
meritorious unit citation and webecame the model for all LAPD
gang enforcement details toemulate, moving forward.
But, like I said, that hadnothing to do with me.
It really didn't.
(37:17):
I just surrounded myself byofficers that were very, very
insightful and just came up withsome amazing ideas on how to
address the crisis.
Speaker 1 (37:29):
Yeah, Empowering your leaders, giving them all the
tools and giving them space tomake decisions.
It's a, it's a no brainer.
And what was it like today?
Are you still in touch?
How have the things that youand your team implemented?
Are they still in or have theychanged and gone by the wayside?
Speaker 2 (37:48):
I say that because you probably have experience.
It's unfortunate, but weoftentimes don't learn from our
successes, right?
People come in and they don'tunderstand any historical
perspective on why things are acertain way, and really that's
what's motivating me to do whatI'm doing today.
The consent decree that we wereunder, and a primary portion of
(38:14):
that consent decree was themanagement and oversight of
specialized units, ie the gangenforcement detail.
These were mistakes that theLAPD had made decades ago and
(38:40):
learned from, but nobody elsehad learned from them.
And then, unfortunately, justlike you said, even within the
same organization, they'remaking the same mistakes again
and it's very frustrating.
So, law enforcement consultants,which I'm the founder and CEO
of the consultation emphasisthat we have is trying to get
(39:01):
law enforcement agencies torecognize and acknowledge what
the management best practicesare and implementing those,
because unfortunately, we don'thave a national standard for
policing.
Each state regulates and hasthe authority to oversee that
and it's very drasticallydifferent depending on what
state you're in.
And unfortunately we lawenforcement is so siloed that we
(39:25):
oftentimes don't even lookoutside of our own organization
to find a better way of doingthings and and you know, the
LAPD was kind of like the LAPDdidn't come up with it.
We're not interested and it'sjust a horrible mindset to have.
But, um, you know that's that'sa large part of why I'm doing
what I'm doing.
(39:45):
You know, you look at Memphis.
You know that Tyree Nicholsbeating and the death of Tyree
Nichols you know everything Isaw there.
That's just a toxic culture,and things I was seeing play out
were things that we were heldto account to and to change,
because deploying people in theScorpion unit in Memphis in
(40:05):
hooded sweatshirts that they canpull up over their head and
become more anonymous is goingto manifest itself in behaviors
that people generally, undernormal circumstances, perhaps
wouldn't engage in, and you sawthat play out on the video.
There was an officer thatpulled the hoodie up over his
head before he went up andkicked Tyree Nichols right in
the head as he laid defenselesson the ground.
(40:28):
So I'm just sitting there going.
How is it that law enforcementwere allowing this to happen?
We can do better and it's aboutgetting the conversation going
and having these difficultconversations, and that's what
my fourth committee book's about.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
Tell us about the book real quick.
Speaker 2 (40:47):
Well, you know, during my 33-year career I saw a
number of failures in lawenforcement that just never were
addressed in moving forward.
And I didn't just look at theLAPD, but I look at law
enforcement nationwide and I'veeven done some research.
I went overseas where I wentand observed the Metropolitan
(41:09):
London Police, and I went overto Paris, france, and watched
them and a number of differentoperations that they were
performing and saw how they dothings a little differently than
we do, because there can besomething learned from the
success of law enforcement notonly in this country but
worldwide, and you know.
So I talk about all of thatstuff in the book.
(41:30):
And the book talks, like I said, it gives you an understanding
of my personal backgroundbecause it's unique and it does
impact how I viewed lawenforcement.
So the reader needs to havesome context and understanding
to that.
And then my personalexperiences that really molded
me on the job and many of themare instances where I nearly
lost my life, but there's alesson to be learned from that.
(41:52):
And then you know my practicalinsights Because you know, when
I was with the LAPD later in mycareer I was William Bratton who
became our chief while I wasrunning the Rampart Gang Unit
when I was done, because thatassignment is a term limit
assignment.
So when I was done with my threeyears I actually went to go
(42:13):
work for William Bratton and Ibriefed him on all
officer-involved shootings andlethal force cases and I wrote
his adjudication recommendationsthat submitted to the honorable
order of police commissionersfor all lethal force and
officer-involved shooting cases,and then from there I went in
to become the officer in chargeof the detective entity that
investigates all officer-in-lawshooting and police force cases.
(42:35):
So I saw a lot of good, the badand the ugly and I saw the
opportunity for improvement, notonly within Los Angeles.
But the lessons that can belearned from the mistakes of Los
Angeles are lessons that can belearned throughout the country
and make policing better acrossthe board.
I mean, the reality is onlyabout 30% of people have direct
(42:57):
contact with law enforcementfrom the age of 16 until the end
of their life, and so what doesthat mean?
That the vast majority ofpeople are forming their
opinions based on what they seeon TV or what they hear other
people say.
So the reality is we can do abetter job and change the optics
of law enforcement and tobetter close that gap and bridge
(43:18):
this relationship that needs tobe nurtured between law
enforcement and the communities.
Speaker 1 (43:24):
Absolutely, jeff.
I got to ask you as we'rewrapping up.
You know 30 years, you know westarted this conversation.
30 years is a long time to doanything and it takes a lot of
heart and commitment and passionto do something, especially law
enforcement.
What are you doing now to giveback to yourself?
(43:45):
You know this.
This profession took a lot fromyou.
Even if you, you know, scrapeby with no injuries, it still
took a lot.
There's there's a toll thatgoes into these professions of
being of service to others, foryour fellow man.
How are you giving back toyourself these days?
What are some things that youdid to give yourself that
ability to kind of reclaim yoursanity after 30 years of being
(44:08):
there?
Speaker 2 (44:08):
for others.
Really, the reason I left whenI did was because I'm a single
father of a son and it's justthe two of us and I literally
got tired of hearing him say hey, dad, we need to spend more
father-son time together.
And I was in a positionfinancially that I could retire
Now.
Had I accomplished my careergoals, not even close?
(44:31):
I had the desire to expand myscope and influence within the
organization and to promote andwhatnot you know.
At the end of the day, my sonwas my priority.
So I made the decision to goahead and retire much younger
than I anticipated I would, andmove back to Ohio where I was
born and raised, and I focusedsolely on my son and he's.
(44:54):
He'll be 14 actually tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (44:57):
Happy birthday to him .
Speaker 2 (44:59):
Yeah.
So the reality is is that I'veI put my family first and that's
why I could leave the job, butyou know it's it's the practices
that I always engaged in.
You know, throughout my career,I always made physical fitness
a high priority, made sure thatI had influences outside of law
enforcement, that I interactedwith people on a daily basis
(45:21):
that didn't have a similarbackground, said, it's not about
being right, it's about gettingit right.
And you have to be willing tolisten to all the diverse
opinions, even those thatconflict significantly with what
your thoughts may be, becausethere's always something to be
(45:41):
learned and you know, there's attimes where I thought I was, I
was rock solid in my belief insomething and and people have
been able to influence my achange in my opinion.
So, um, I just kind ofcontinued that.
And now that my son's gotten alittle older and he doesn't need
me a hundred percent of thetime, cause he's a dad and he
doesn't want me around a hundredpercent of the time, um, it's
(46:01):
given me the opportunity to todo what I'm doing today, to try
to try to give back because I do.
I'm doing what I'm doingbecause I love law enforcement.
I bleed blue.
I want law enforcement.
I bleed blue.
I want law enforcement to besuccessful, moving forward, and
not only as an organization butindividually as officers.
And so how can we do that?
(46:25):
And, like I said in my book, Igive some actual solutions on
how I think that can be achieved.
Are they the answers?
No, not necessarily.
But it's about starting thedifficult conversations and,
through those conversations, andbringing in diverse opinions.
That's, that's the roadmap tosuccess.
Speaker 1 (46:43):
Heck, yeah and uh.
Where can we get that?
Speaker 2 (46:46):
book.
Well, it's uh, it hasn't beenreleased yet, but if you can go
to jeff100.com, it'll take youto a landing page.
And if you can't spell my lastname or don't want to have to
worry about spelling it, you canjust go to onthinicebookcom.
When you get there, you youactually there's a landing page.
You can put in your your emailaddress and get put on the
mailing list and you can alsoread the prologue for free.
Speaker 1 (47:08):
You can also have that downloaded for free well,
if you do me a favor right now,guys just go, just go ahead and
pause this YouTube episode.
Or if you're listening onSpotify or Apple podcasts, go
ahead and pause.
Go to episode description.
I'll wait.
Click on those links.
Get yourself signed up for thatbook release.
And do me another favor.
If you have an interactionpolice officer today, be kind.
(47:29):
You don't know the stressorsthese individuals are under.
It takes a lot to police acommunity and I am so damn sick
and tired of seeing these oneminute sound bites of how the
police are so bad.
Look, it's not an easy job andthese individuals deserve grace
too.
So if you've learned anythingfrom the conversation we've had
today with Jeff, just know thatinside that uniform, inside that
(47:51):
cop car, is living, breathinghuman being that is doing their
absolute best to do their job.
So please, please, have somegrace, be a human, be kind and
do me one more favor.
Head on over to YouTube orSpotify or Apple Podcasts.
Give us a like, a share, afollow and share this episode
with your friend or somebodythat needs to learn more about
how to be a better human beingand a good cop.
(48:11):
Jeff, I can't thank you enoughfor being here today, learn more
about how to be a better humanbeing and a good cop.
Jeff, I can't thank you enoughfor being here today Absolute
blast.
I can't wait to have you backon, because there's so much more
to dig into this story.
We'd love to have you back onwhen they actually launched the
book, that way we can talk morein depth about some of the
things in there.
And if you're a police officerin Okaloosa County or anywhere
in Northwest Florida and youwant to bring in a consultant to
help you out, I got a guy foryou.
His name is Jeff and his linkwill be in the bio.
(48:33):
Jeff, thank you for being heretoday and we'll see you all next
time.
Until then, take care.
Thanks for tuning in and don'tforget to like, follow, share,
subscribe and review us on yourfavorite podcast platform.
If you want to support us, headon over to buymeacoffeecom,
forward slash setcoffpodcast andbuy us a coffee.
Connect with us on Instagram Xor TikTok and share, and
(48:55):
remember we get through thistogether.
If you're still listening, theepisode's over.
Yeah, there's no more Tune intomorrow or next week, thank you
.
Security Odd Podcast.
Let's go the only podcastthat's purpose-built from the
ground up to support you Notjust you, but the wider audience
, everybody.
Authentic, impactful andinsightful conversations that
serve a purpose to help you.
And the quality has gone up.
It's decent and it's hosted byme, danny Caballero, jeff
(00:26):
Winninger how are you doing, man?
Speaker 2 (00:28):
I'm doing.
Great thanks.
How are you?
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Doing well, man.
Welcome to Security Out Podcast.
I am excited to have a brotherof our law enforcement
background today.
The Warrior Tribe is large andincludes so many of us, not just
military folks, and what I loveexploring is that call to
service.
You and I both know that beinga law enforcement officer is one
of the toughest professions outthere.
(00:50):
When I deploy, I have theability to finish my mission
overseas and come back home andredeploy is re-engage and
redeploy each and every day.
What was your calling toservice?
Why did you find yourself goinginto this career?
That has historically been onethat doesn't have a lot of
(01:13):
celebration.
You don't get lifted up.
Everybody loves you when theypick up the phone and have that
emergency moment, but they areso quick to forget about all the
great things you do for us whenthe political climate shifts.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
Well, you know, I had an experience, personal
experience that prior to I wouldhave never thought I would want
to pursue a career in lawenforcement.
Essentially, it was a Fridaynight, I was 20 years old and I
was division one collegiatehockey player, and I went out
with one of my teammates um, myteammates and we closed the bar
(01:47):
as we, as we often would do.
Everybody that was in the barwas flown out onto the sidewalk,
which wasn't large enough toaccommodate everybody.
So a number of us were flowingout into the street and my, my
buddy, who I was out with,thought it'd be kind of cute to
to prop himself up on the hoodof this car that was trying to
(02:07):
get through.
I think his motivation was forvery attractive women in the car
and they didn't really care forit and they sped up and slammed
on the brakes and when he wentrolling off the hood he grabbed
the antenna and snapped it off.
And that kind of ages me alittle bit back when you had
antennas on the hoods of cars.
But, um, so as a result of that, or as a police officer right
(02:28):
up the street that saw this alloccur and came down, grabbed my
buddies, slapped the handcuffson them and threw them in the
backseat of the police car.
So you know, when we go out, wego out with a buddy system.
You know we're not.
We gotta gotta get get our, ourpartners out of trouble.
So I need to.
I thought I needed to inquireabout where they were taking
them, how long it was going totake to process them.
(02:49):
Would he be being released?
And if so, you know, what wasit going to cost me to bail them
out?
And so I approached the policeofficer and he was really
belligerent and made it veryclear that if I didn't get back
up on the sidewalk, I was goingto jail as well.
So I'm like I understand that.
So I got back up on thesidewalk and he had called for
backup and two more officersarrived and they confronted me
(03:12):
and they walk up to me and saidlet me see your expletive
identification.
And so, as I was reaching forit, they began to beat me and
before I knew it, I was inhandcuffs, being taken down to
the police station and I wasbooked for disorderly conduct,
resisting arrest and interferingin official business.
And when I'm down there, I'mlike where's my buddy?
(03:35):
And they're like we let him go.
I'm like the ridiculousness ofthis.
I'm like you've got to bekidding me.
So I ended up staying.
It was a long weekend.
It was a Labor Day weekend andI stayed in jail through the
weekend.
It was a Friday night and theydidn't have court, because
courts close on Monday.
So they didn't have court untilTuesday and I went to court and
then the judge let me out on myown recognizance and I'm like,
(03:57):
ah, I didn't do anything wronghere.
I said you know, I'm going tofight this thing.
So I got an attorney.
I spent my entire summer'searnings I worked as a laborer,
um, that entire summer but I hadto spend all my earnings on an
attorney and I refused to takeany of the plea deals and I went
all the way to jury trial.
And prior to the jury trialI'll be starting.
They offered me something Icouldn't refuse.
(04:20):
Everybody said if you sign thisticket it's a $60 ticket we'll
drop all the charges, and Ithought that was reasonable.
So that's what I did.
The ridiculousness of thisdoesn't even uh, doesn't end
there.
About a year and a half later,um, I saw an advertisement for
(04:44):
correction officers in the veryjail that I sat in that weekend
and, kind of out of a joke, Iapplied, they hired me.
So I mean, that's how seriousthey took.
You know the offense that theyarrested me for.
You couldn't have had a moreclear exoneration of any
wrongdoing than to have theagency that actually arrested
you.
And you know the jail that yousat in for an entire weekend to
(05:04):
be the place that you worked in.
So that was that.
You sat in for an entireweekend to be the place that you
worked in.
So that was the beginning of mylaw enforcement career.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
I gotta tell you, Jeff, I've heard a lot of origin
stories, but never one likethis.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
So so you know, really what happened was I was a
finance major, you know, I Ididn't really think I would go
into law enforcement and so Istarted taking some criminal
justice classes and thingsbecause of this experience and I
really enjoyed it, it resonatedwith me.
So my father well, he was asociology professor and I
thought about academia,following my footsteps, my
(05:38):
father's footsteps in academiaand perhaps being a criminal
justice professor.
So when I finished my schooling, I was looking at going to get
my PhD and my father encouragedme to go get five years of
practical experience working ina large law enforcement agency
and I thought what better placethan Los Angeles?
And that's where I went, withthe intention of staying five
years and then going back andgetting my PhD.
(05:59):
I stayed 33 years.
I can't tell time.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Yeah, the same problem that a lot of my
military friends have.
That's not a short period oftime, man, that is a commitment,
that is a life.
That is you wake up, you liveit, you breathe it, you sweat it
.
And in LA, yeah, chances are,chances are you might bleed out
(06:27):
and go out in a blaze of glorytrying to serve the people of
that community, because it's nota safe place.
There are a lot of bad peopleand it's hyper aware, like every
police officer in that area ishyper aware, that every movement
, everything they do, is beingrecorded, being watched, every
single second.
Ila was just like you had tofigure out the hardest place to
(06:51):
go to.
You know, los.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Angeles.
If you would have asked me whenI was in high school, I
actually had a high schoolgirlfriend that had an older
brother and he had moved outthere after he graduated.
So she went out to visit himone summer and I thought who
would ever want to live in LosAngeles?
No-transcript, I would have hada fairly formidable
(07:37):
professional career if I hadn'tsustained some of the injuries,
that I hadn't made the decisionto move on rather than beat my
body up any further.
I hadn't made the decision tomove on rather than beat my body
up any further, but it justresonated with me.
You know LAPD, you know theywere the originators of SWAT,
you know the tactical prowess ofthe organization, the
opportunities available to youin an agency that large, how you
(07:59):
can diversify and get all kindsof different specializations
and things.
It just appealed to me and,like I said, I went out there
initially for five years.
I thought, well, I'll get alittle taste of the different
things.
But that's really why I wentout there.
I just thought, I thought itwas cool.
You know I was.
I was full of wind, piss andexcitement, as they say.
You know, back when I was in myearly twenties and I just
(08:20):
really I feel bad for my dad.
No-transcript.
(08:48):
So you know it was.
It was something that I notonly wanted to be part of the
LAPD, but I wanted to work themost difficult and challenging
assignments in the LAPD.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
Yeah, and I have to imagine you're going there.
I mean there's still an aspectof humanity.
I mean you're going there toprotect and serve.
We often say it's a war zonedown there or it's like man, I
don't want to live there, Iwouldn't want to work there as a
police officer or EMT.
It's just too violent.
But at the end of the day,people live there, people make
their homes there.
(09:19):
How do you balance that?
How do you balance that?
Speaker 2 (09:40):
How do you go there knowing that you will be facing
some of the toughest individuals, hardened criminals out there,
but at the end of the day you'rethere to protect and the truth,
the vast majority of peoplethat live in these communities
that we would identify as beingthe most violent, vast majority
of them are are hard-working,well-intentioned, god-fearing
people.
You know, at the end of the dayit really is a challenge
because as a police officer,you're handling the worst within
(10:02):
that environment and it's veryeasy to believe that this
applies to everybody, that youpaint everybody in that
community with the same broadbrush.
And I was fortunate.
You know, my father was asociology professor at Kent
State and he actually did hisPhD dissertation on the
professionalism of lawenforcement, and so he was kind
(10:24):
of aware of what time it was andwhat kind of experiences I was
going through.
And he was a very learnedindividual, very wise, and he
didn't speak unless there wassomething worth saying.
And I'll tell you, as a youngman growing up, when he spoke I
listened because there was amessage and a lesson to be
learned and something tocontemplate.
He never told me what to do orhow to think, he would just
(10:47):
suggest.
You know it used to come out ofhis mouth all the time.
Well, it seems to me you mightwant to consider, and then he'd
lay out and you know, then he'dlet me go.
The kept my eyes open to thesociological issues that play
(11:08):
into everyday criminality in oursociety and that you know
there's a lot of factors thatare involved and it's not
necessarily.
You know these peopleoftentimes are a product of
their environment, not so muchyou know evil people and
themselves.
He used to always tell me.
(11:28):
He said, son, you know you were, I was adopted by my folks.
He says you were quite fortunate.
We were able to financiallyprovide you with opportunities
where you had, you know, diverseexperiences.
You had the ability to get ahigher education on your
horizons through some travel andthings like that.
(11:49):
And, um, you know, you focusedon your energies, on on
athletics and sport, and a lotof people don't have that
opportunity.
And it goes, quite frankly, ifyou were born and raised in some
of these communities that youwork in, your natural
personality tendencies may havedriven you to be the leader of
the game, to be honest.
So when he put it in that kindof context, basically I had a
(12:10):
sounding board and somebody tokind of.
You know, it's kind of likebowling with the rails he kept
me on the lane, you know, andthen I really did make a
concerted effort to, outside ofwork, have friends that had
nothing to do with lawenforcement.
So I had experiences with themand I saw insights from them
(12:32):
that were very different,because, you know, if you can
say anything about lawenforcement, at times it can be
a little too insular and webegin to have this group think
and we go down these rabbitholes and we begin to believe
some of the nonsense that wespeak.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
It becomes an echo chamber.
We see it in any profession,military as well.
You pointed out something Iwant to touch on and kind of
dive into a little bit.
It seems from the verybeginning you had a broader
understanding of humanity, thatcommon humanity Like.
If we just look at everythingthrough that narrow scope, we're
just going to see nothing butan episode of cops when we go to
the streets.
(13:07):
And I would argue that honestlyit's made things worse for the
way we police, because now thegeneral public has seen good and
bad, Just the stereotypes thatwe see on TV shows like cops.
And then our police officersoftentimes are also consuming
the same media.
So if they're visualizing theirworld as being just black and
(13:28):
white, bad people, they're goingto be in this area.
It's going to be hyperawareness of everything that I'm
surrounded by.
It's nothing but low.
Life degenerates.
It's like, wait a second.
How do we change the narrative?
More importantly, how do wechange the idea of what it means
to be a police officer, what itmeans to be a serviced?
(13:49):
You had a great individual inyour life to help you understand
that.
A lot of us don't get that.
We develop that so late in lifeand I think that's something
that we need to explore.
And I think that's somethingthat we need to explore.
Is that something that youdeveloped and understood and
were able to give to your fellowpolice officers and sort of
(14:10):
like mentor while you were stillin, or was that?
Speaker 2 (14:15):
something that had to be developed on the outside.
I've always said I think thatone of the most influential
positions you can ever have onthe job is that as a field
training officer.
That as a field trainingofficer, because you're getting
a police officer straight out ofthe academy who is now learning
how to police on the streets inreal time with real threats and
having to make decisions underrapidly unfolding tactical
scenarios and the mindset andthe way that they perceive and
(14:38):
process what their experience onevery day as a field training
officer, I can impact thatsignificantly.
And then the next role is afield supervisor as a sergeant,
and I took those jobs both very,very seriously and made an
(14:59):
effort.
Not only did I see my job toensure that my partners or my
subordinates were safe, but thatthey did have a broader
understanding of what theirpurpose and what their function
in society really was, and thatthere needs to be empathy.
People always say you know thewarrior mentality, we absolutely
have to be warriors, but wecan't be warriors while
overlooking the responsibilityof being guardians.
(15:20):
So the reality is is you needto be a guardian with the
ability to turn it on and be awarrior if you have to, and you
know I saw that experience veryearly on.
I had an incident that I wasinvolved in the 77th division,
the LAPD, where my partner and Iwere shot at with an AK-47,
multiple rounds, and we werequite fortunate to survive it.
(15:42):
And you know, we made sometactical errors and that put us
in this bad position.
And if not for the courageousacts of the officers up in the
airship, which is the helicopterpolice helicopter you know, I
may not be here today.
No-transcript, a daily basis,it's across the board.
(16:34):
And so I carried the samepassion that I had for hockey
into my law enforcement careerand I really strive to excel,
excel.
Now, you know, and I think thatthat's a problem with law
enforcement, when I went throughthe academy, I, um, I graduated
.
I was the honor recruit, Igraduated number one.
We had 157 at the beginning ofthe academy and we graduated 107
(16:56):
, about a third of the peoplewere washed out.
And um, I graduated number one.
And I used to get a lot of heatfrom people because my goal
when I studied for a test was toget a hundred percent.
Yeah, and um, I graduated likeI'm nine, 98.7% or something
like that, and they used tolaugh at me because they're like
, oh, you need a 70% to pass,like that's enough.
(17:17):
You know it's it's not.
And so, um, it was thatexperience that underscored that
the importance of what Ialready was doing, but that you
know you continually need tostrive to improve, because every
new experience there's anopportunity to to grow and
develop and be even better, raceand things like that.
(17:46):
As you were speaking of, I havea really unique background.
Like I said, I was adopted.
Yeah, my parents were marriedfor 12 years trying to have kids
and their goal they wanted fourkids each one year apart.
And they had this 12 years andthey said let's go look into
adoption.
So they went through theadoption process and right about
the time they got approved, loand behold, my mother gets
pregnant with my sister and theyhave my sister, but they're
like let's go ahead and followthrough the adoption because
(18:08):
maybe another 12 years before weever get pregnant again.
So I was adopted and then theyadopted my brother he's half
Japanese and then they fosteredanother sister.
She's black and I grew up inthe sixties and seventies in
Kento, so I see race verydifferently.
I had experiences growing upthat you know, even with a smile
(18:31):
, the veneer of a smile, and youknow, supposed grace.
People were saying you knowthere's microaggressions in
regards to racist statementsthat were being said.
A perfect example we'd go tothe A&P grocery store in town
where I grew up and we would allbe hanging off my mom's grocery
cart and I remember a womanwalking up to her, smiling,
(18:51):
saying oh, your children lookall so much alike.
And it was a dig at my mom.
My mom had so much grace and Ilearned so much.
I didn't quite understand it atthe time what was going on.
But reflecting back I'm like,wow, my mom, what a strong woman
she was.
She didn't bite, she didn't gotake that bait, she just, you
(19:13):
know, stood proud, stood talland we continued on with our
daily activities and didn'tallow people's you know,
opinions or actions to influenceus.
So you know, I came from thatkind of a background and types
of experiences.
I came from that kind of abackground and types of
experiences and I talk aboutthat in my forthcoming book on
Thin Ice.
I talk about my personalbackground and my professional
(19:34):
experiences and I give practicalinsights in regards to what I
think law enforcement needs todo to be successful moving
forward in the 21st century.
But you know a lot of who I amand how I policed and how I
viewed my role in lawenforcement is a result of the
experiences I had growing up,with the type of family I grew
up in, as well as the the impactthat my my father and my mother
(19:57):
had.
Speaker 1 (19:58):
Yeah, I, lived experiences is valuable insight
and, um, not enough people growup and have the ability to
appreciate that and have thatwide scope.
That's why we have to work hard, Even if you're not law
enforcement.
Get outside of your livedexperience, be able to meet
people where they're at andlearn something.
That's the one thing that theywere so drawn into.
(20:19):
This world of going inward andsitting with our phones, living
on social media and we judgeeverything from that screen.
It's like, man, there's abroader world out there that you
can stand to learn somethingnew, and nobody wants to have an
engaging conversation.
These days, it's too difficultto find common ground,
(20:39):
especially when you hit thesehot topics of policing.
In America, the vast majorityof people have no idea what it
takes to be a police officer andthe amount of work, the dangers
that are involved, and we justwant to react instead of trying
to understand, trying to bridgethe gap and growing up and
working in that time period inthe nineties like how much
(21:02):
different was it?
Trying to get buy-in from thecommunity?
Because I have to imagine, eventhough you're educated, even
though you have thisunderstanding of what it is to
be able to grow up in a mixedhome, have siblings that are
minorities, having this livedexperience of understanding,
kindness, compassion.
You're very much still a whiteman going into predominantly
(21:26):
African-American communities,policing, and in the nineties I
couldn't think of a harder jobwe have.
We have the cultural hotbed ofgangster rap coming into its
prime and everything in themedia is this is enemy number
one.
This guy has to go down.
How did you survive?
(21:46):
How did you take the approach?
I mean, as a Green Beret, wehave this approach of by, with
and through Getting into thelocal.
Getting the buy-in from thelocal populace is key to our
approach to fighting the enemy,Becoming one with our partner
force.
How do you do that in America?
How do you bridge that gap andsay I know what's happening in
(22:10):
all over the news, but I am notthat guy?
Speaker 2 (22:14):
I know it's quite difficult because, like you said
, in the nineties there was alot of flashpoints.
Yeah, primarily you had theRodney King beating that was
early in my career and then, uh,then in 92, we had the riots.
Yeah, you know, working 77thDivision shortly after the riots
and stuff.
It was tough because you knowthe, yeah, I don't think, I
(22:37):
don't, I don't look at the riotsso narrowly that it was just
anger of the exoneration of theofficers being acquitted of, of
the charges and the Rodney Kingbeating.
I don't see it that narrowly.
This was decades in the making.
There was a huge divide betweenthe LAPD and the citizens in
(22:58):
which the police departmentserves.
It developed into a great levelof frustration and hatred
towards the men and women inblue and we saw that play out in
92.
And you know, unfortunately,you know I saw very little
change as a result of that.
(23:19):
You know I had I'll tell SharonSharon experience.
I had a partner.
I worked with him just one dayand the reason was is our
regular partners, both of us,our regular partners, were on
day off, so we ended up gettingpartnered up and we're driving
down the street and this is lessthan a year after the riots in
San Jose Commission and we see ablack woman and a white guy
walking hand in hand down thestreet and he says my parents
(23:43):
taught me better than that.
And I'm like what?
because my parents taught mebetter than that and I'm like
what do you mean?
And he goes my parents taughtme not to have sex with animals,
wow, wow, so so so this is.
And the reason I bring this upis because he assumed, because I
looked like him and I wore thisuniform, that I also viewed
(24:05):
society in the same way.
Listen, I had a black fostersister.
My girlfriend at the time wasblack.
I mean, I'd been dating a girlfor about two years at the time
and he didn't know that, but hejust assumed that I shared his
mindset or his views on society.
You know, at that time thatwasn't something.
You just dealt with it.
You just knew that that was anofficer I didn't necessarily
(24:27):
want to have to work with again,because the reality is that
your attitudes and your beliefsthey're manifested in your
actions and your behaviors.
It's unfortunate.
Majority of law enforcementofficers are wonderful people.
They have nothing but the bestintentions and they want to
(24:48):
serve the community.
The problem is there's thissmall subculture within law
enforcement that is allowed tocontinue to exist, and he was
reflective of that, but it makesit very challenging.
I always took the time tointeract with the public outside
of my official law enforcementactivities and when I mean that
(25:11):
I'd be on duty in uniform but Iwould go into the projects and I
would throw the football withthe kids and it was showing them
that one that I wasn't a badguy, that the guys in blue
aren't the bad guy, and it alsoshowed them that I didn't view
them as the bad guy.
And so it was those types ofsimple interactions and I was
(25:37):
very fortunate when I was goingthrough training, my field
training officers wereoutstanding and I had a number
of them that actually grew up inthese communities that I was
policing and they gave me anunbelievable amount of insight
into understanding the cultureand being even able to
(25:57):
understand what's being said.
I remember that we had this oneradio call and we have contact
in cover and I was a contactofficer, so I'm the one that's
going to make the initialcontact with whoever we're going
to be interacting with.
We respond to this radio call.
It's all with a deadly weapon.
And we get there and we'rewalking up the driveway and this
guy he's got blood flowing outof his forehead from a big gash
(26:21):
that he has.
I said okay, there's our victim.
And I asked you know what'sgoing on?
And his answer was I came hereto get some stank on the hang
low and I got hit upside thehead with a smoothie.
I'm like what?
Because at the time you know ofthe projects, he just starts
laughing at me and he goes herelet me translate and he goes.
(26:49):
He came here to get some sexand he got hit upside the head
with a clothing iron because itsmooths out the clothes.
That's why he calls it a smooth.
So I mean just simple stufflike that.
And I laughed at that incident,not at the individual I was
interacting with, but at myself,for having no idea what he was
saying, and if not for mypartner, I would.
(27:11):
I don't know what's going onhere, you know.
So you know, and that's justkind of a humor.
You know an incident that had alittle bit of humor behind it.
I was fortunate enough to havethese training officers that
really gave me some insight intothe culture and how the
community members really viewthings and actually viewed law
(27:31):
enforcement and how we canbetter bridge that and it's just
really meeting them at thelevel that you know they're
interacting with you at and it's, you know it was important, but
you know it's unfortunate, likeI said.
Just like my partner, when hemade that comment to me, he made
an assumption about how Iviewed things.
Oftentimes there were people inthe community that made
(27:53):
assumptions because of theuniform I wore and how I looked.
Now, even even after I was aLieutenant working on a police
headquarters, I was the officerin charge of the detective
entity that investigated allofficers involved, shootings and
lethal force cases.
And I walk out of policeheadquarters to get get a bite
to eat on on a Tuesday andthat's when they have the open
session, police commissionmeetings on the first floor of
(28:16):
police headquarters.
And I walk out and there's someunhappy community members and
they're like, oh, there's a KKKhood wearing, you know, blah,
blah, blah and it's like youknow.
So you get it from both sides.
You know, yeah, not only dopeople make make assumptions
that also wear the uniform alongthe side of you, but the
community makes assumptionsabout you and that's difficult.
(28:37):
So you just have.
You can't take it personallyand you, you just continue to be
the person that that you knowyou can be and conduct yourself
from and conduct yourself withempathy and compassion and treat
people with respect, becausethe reality is all people are
looking for is to feel safe andvalued and respected.
(29:02):
That's the recipe.
If you can do that, you'regoing to be successful, because
it's not what you say, it's notwhat you do, it's how you make
people feel.
That's going to be the legacy,that's what actually matters.
So if you focus on that in lawenforcement, when you're that
type of a service oriented typeprofession, those are the things
that you really need to focuson.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Yeah, absolutely, and I have to imagine that after 30
years, consulting pretty muchseemed like the most logical
avenue of approach.
I think instinctively did youfeel like, okay, I can't do this
job anymore, I'm not the guythat's going to be on the beat.
How do I make better and moreinformed police officers?
(29:44):
How do I give people the Jeffexperience?
Was that your initial approachfor that time after service of
just wanting to give back,wanting to be able to still be
part of the tribe but be able togive the next generation of
police officers sort of likethat manual of how to be better,
how to be more kind, empatheticand just understand, like the
human approach?
Speaker 2 (30:03):
Well, to best answer that question, to give a little
bit of context of my backgroundexperience on the job, I worked
in the Metropolitan Divisionwith the LAPD, which is like the
K-9 and the SWAT it's theSpecial Forces, essentially
organization and during thattime was when we had the Rafael
Perez Rampart crash scandal thatwas going on.
(30:24):
This was in the late 90s andthere were LAPD officers
committing bank robberies offduty.
Rafael Perez was stealingpounds of cocaine out of
evidence lockup and selling iton the streets for personal
financial gain.
They were involved in officerinvolved shootings, planning
guns to justify the shootings.
(30:45):
Some of the most egregiouscorruption you'll ever find in
law enforcement was going on inthe LAPD at Rampart Station.
So I get promoted to sergeant.
When you get promoted you givea wishlist.
I'll be honest with you.
At the time there were 18geographic divisions in the city
(31:05):
of Los Angeles.
Rampart would have been number18 for me and that's where I
ended up going Becauseessentially what had happened
was they were creating an entirenew leadership team at Rampart
and I was selected to be asergeant there to help change
the culture and try to navigatethis very critical time in the
(31:29):
history of the LAPD.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
That's never easy, that is never easy.
Whether it's military or anyprofession, when there's a
leadership change out and theywant you, as part of the new
generation, the new force, to goin there and straighten things
out, I can't even imagine whendid you start?
Where did you guys, you and thenew breed what was the day one
(31:51):
initiative?
How did you go about changingit?
Because that was a pivotalmoment.
I mean, I was a kid but Iremember these things happening
and it's almost out of like acomic movie or something out of
a cartoon show or TV show.
The good guys end up being thebad guys.
How do you change the culture?
Speaker 2 (32:11):
Well, a lot of it was imposed on us because, like I
said, where I was in theMetropolitan Division just
before I was promoted, eoj wasinvestigating us and we ended up
(32:33):
going under a federal consentdecree and that started in 2001,
a consent decree.
It took us 10 years to get outfrom under it.
And while I was at Rampart,what happened?
Because of the crash scandal,they ended up abolishing crash,
but the department still neededto address the violent gang
crime that was occurring acrossthe city.
So they created a new entity.
It was called the GangEnforcement Detail and they had
(32:55):
a new structure and framework inregards to accountability and
the chain of command.
And I was selected while asergeant at Rampart to be the
officer in charge of the gangenforcement detail.
I had to change the entireculture of that and the mindset
of that unit and fortunately Iworked directly for Charlie Beck
at the time.
(33:15):
He became chief of police downthe road.
He was the chief after WilliamBratton, but I worked directly
for him and I reported directlyto him and I was able to
handpick my personnel.
I was looking forcharacteristics that were very
different than what were beingused as the standard and the
selection of personnel prior to.
My measures of effectivenessfor the officers in the unit
(33:38):
were significantly different Inthe past.
They were looking at arrestrates what's your felony arrest
rates?
Arrest rates what's your felonyarrest rates?
That's mildly interesting In anenvironment like Rampart, which
is the most heavily denselypopulated area within the city
and arguably, perhaps evenanywhere in the United States.
It has a population that'sprimarily Central and South
(34:01):
American MS-13 Street.
It's just a very, very violentdivision.
Actually, rampart was alwayscompeting with 77th for the
highest number of homicidesevery year, but and they would
kind of alternate back and forth.
But so I changed the wholeparadigm in which we looked at
our success and I went away fromthe felony arrests to.
(34:22):
You know what are yourconviction rates, filing rates,
those sorts of things, and Iwanted my officers to.
I made their.
The biggest tool I would arguethe strongest tool that any law
enforcement officer has is thegray matter between their ears.
So whenever we did, wheneveryou made an arrest, in your
arrest report I wanted you toarticulate what you did but also
(34:44):
cite the case law that gave youthe authority to do that.
So everything we did wasgrounded in law.
My officers to this day,wardlow versus Illinois.
They can recite and tell youeverything.
So it wasn't just the tactics,firearms proficiency, the
tactical prowess that wasimportant.
(35:05):
The tactical prowess that wasimportant, the team concept of
how to be disciplined andcoordinated in dealing with a
rapidly unfolding tacticalscenario.
But I wanted you to beunbelievably knowledgeable of
your job and the laws thatregulate what you have the
authority to do and yourunderstanding of the gangs.
Believe it or not, prior to mebecoming the officer in charge,
(35:29):
there was no requirement thatthe officers be experts,
court-recognized experts ingangs.
What Well?
I gave my personnel one year.
If you weren't certified withthe court as a gang expert
within a year of being assignedto the division or assigned to
the unit, you were gone.
Speaker 1 (35:48):
That's a no brainer, that's just wow.
Speaker 2 (35:51):
But I was the.
I was the first unit.
First, we were the first unitthat required that standard to
me to be able to remain, and wewere very successful.
Now, listen, I gotta be honestwith you.
Any good leader, I'll tell you,their success has very little
to do with the ideas they comeup with.
It's about building a teamwhere you, collaboratively, can
(36:15):
come up with ideas, andessentially what I was doing is
I was building the successionplan, the new leaders of the
organization, and that'sultimately what happened.
Everybody in my unit, I had like24 people assigned to that unit
.
You know they all went on tohave very flourishing careers,
but it was because, you know, I,I I believed in in a leadership
(36:37):
style where I gave them theaccountability and to be, you
know, let them be innovative andcreative and held them
accountable to it, but I allowedthem to drive our missions and
come up with the ideas how tobest address these, these crime
trends that we were being heldresponsible for impacting and
reducing.
You know, it really was just amindset.
(36:57):
It had nothing it was all about.
It's about choosing the people,supporting them, and they'll
make you look good.
And at the end of the day webecame, we were awarded the
meritorious unit citation and webecame the model for all LAPD
gang enforcement details toemulate, moving forward.
But, like I said, that hadnothing to do with me.
It really didn't.
(37:17):
I just surrounded myself byofficers that were very, very
insightful and just came up withsome amazing ideas on how to
address the crisis.
Speaker 1 (37:29):
Yeah, Empowering your leaders, giving them all the
tools and giving them space tomake decisions.
It's a, it's a no brainer.
And what was it like today?
Are you still in touch?
How have the things that youand your team implemented?
Are they still in or have theychanged and gone by the wayside?
Speaker 2 (37:48):
I say that because you probably have experience.
It's unfortunate, but weoftentimes don't learn from our
successes, right?
People come in and they don'tunderstand any historical
perspective on why things are acertain way, and really that's
what's motivating me to do whatI'm doing today.
The consent decree that we wereunder, and a primary portion of
(38:14):
that consent decree was themanagement and oversight of
specialized units, ie the gangenforcement detail.
These were mistakes that theLAPD had made decades ago and
(38:40):
learned from, but nobody elsehad learned from them.
And then, unfortunately, justlike you said, even within the
same organization, they'remaking the same mistakes again
and it's very frustrating.
So, law enforcement consultants,which I'm the founder and CEO
of the consultation emphasisthat we have is trying to get
(39:01):
law enforcement agencies torecognize and acknowledge what
the management best practicesare and implementing those,
because unfortunately, we don'thave a national standard for
policing.
Each state regulates and hasthe authority to oversee that
and it's very drasticallydifferent depending on what
state you're in.
And unfortunately we lawenforcement is so siloed that we
(39:25):
oftentimes don't even lookoutside of our own organization
to find a better way of doingthings and and you know, the
LAPD was kind of like the LAPDdidn't come up with it.
We're not interested and it'sjust a horrible mindset to have.
But, um, you know that's that'sa large part of why I'm doing
what I'm doing.
(39:45):
You know, you look at Memphis.
You know that Tyree Nicholsbeating and the death of Tyree
Nichols you know everything Isaw there.
That's just a toxic culture,and things I was seeing play out
were things that we were heldto account to and to change,
because deploying people in theScorpion unit in Memphis in
(40:05):
hooded sweatshirts that they canpull up over their head and
become more anonymous is goingto manifest itself in behaviors
that people generally, undernormal circumstances, perhaps
wouldn't engage in, and you sawthat play out on the video.
There was an officer thatpulled the hoodie up over his
head before he went up andkicked Tyree Nichols right in
the head as he laid defenselesson the ground.
(40:28):
So I'm just sitting there going.
How is it that law enforcementwere allowing this to happen?
We can do better and it's aboutgetting the conversation going
and having these difficultconversations, and that's what
my fourth committee book's about.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
Tell us about the book real quick.
Speaker 2 (40:47):
Well, you know, during my 33-year career I saw a
number of failures in lawenforcement that just never were
addressed in moving forward.
And I didn't just look at theLAPD, but I look at law
enforcement nationwide and I'veeven done some research.
I went overseas where I wentand observed the Metropolitan
(41:09):
London Police, and I went overto Paris, france, and watched
them and a number of differentoperations that they were
performing and saw how they dothings a little differently than
we do, because there can besomething learned from the
success of law enforcement notonly in this country but
worldwide, and you know.
So I talk about all of thatstuff in the book.
(41:30):
And the book talks, like I said, it gives you an understanding
of my personal backgroundbecause it's unique and it does
impact how I viewed lawenforcement.
So the reader needs to havesome context and understanding
to that.
And then my personalexperiences that really molded
me on the job and many of themare instances where I nearly
lost my life, but there's alesson to be learned from that.
(41:52):
And then you know my practicalinsights Because you know, when
I was with the LAPD later in mycareer I was William Bratton who
became our chief while I wasrunning the Rampart Gang Unit
when I was done, because thatassignment is a term limit
assignment.
So when I was done with my threeyears I actually went to go
(42:13):
work for William Bratton and Ibriefed him on all
officer-involved shootings andlethal force cases and I wrote
his adjudication recommendationsthat submitted to the honorable
order of police commissionersfor all lethal force and
officer-involved shooting cases,and then from there I went in
to become the officer in chargeof the detective entity that
investigates all officer-in-lawshooting and police force cases.
(42:35):
So I saw a lot of good, the badand the ugly and I saw the
opportunity for improvement, notonly within Los Angeles.
But the lessons that can belearned from the mistakes of Los
Angeles are lessons that can belearned throughout the country
and make policing better acrossthe board.
I mean, the reality is onlyabout 30% of people have direct
(42:57):
contact with law enforcementfrom the age of 16 until the end
of their life, and so what doesthat mean?
That the vast majority ofpeople are forming their
opinions based on what they seeon TV or what they hear other
people say.
So the reality is we can do abetter job and change the optics
of law enforcement and tobetter close that gap and bridge
(43:18):
this relationship that needs tobe nurtured between law
enforcement and the communities.
Speaker 1 (43:24):
Absolutely, jeff.
I got to ask you as we'rewrapping up.
You know 30 years, you know westarted this conversation.
30 years is a long time to doanything and it takes a lot of
heart and commitment and passionto do something, especially law
enforcement.
What are you doing now to giveback to yourself?
(43:45):
You know this.
This profession took a lot fromyou.
Even if you, you know, scrapeby with no injuries, it still
took a lot.
There's there's a toll thatgoes into these professions of
being of service to others, foryour fellow man.
How are you giving back toyourself these days?
What are some things that youdid to give yourself that
ability to kind of reclaim yoursanity after 30 years of being
(44:08):
there?
Speaker 2 (44:08):
for others.
Really, the reason I left whenI did was because I'm a single
father of a son and it's justthe two of us and I literally
got tired of hearing him say hey, dad, we need to spend more
father-son time together.
And I was in a positionfinancially that I could retire
Now.
Had I accomplished my careergoals, not even close?
(44:31):
I had the desire to expand myscope and influence within the
organization and to promote andwhatnot you know.
At the end of the day, my sonwas my priority.
So I made the decision to goahead and retire much younger
than I anticipated I would, andmove back to Ohio where I was
born and raised, and I focusedsolely on my son and he's.
(44:54):
He'll be 14 actually tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (44:57):
Happy birthday to him .
Speaker 2 (44:59):
Yeah.
So the reality is is that I'veI put my family first and that's
why I could leave the job, butyou know it's it's the practices
that I always engaged in.
You know, throughout my career,I always made physical fitness
a high priority, made sure thatI had influences outside of law
enforcement, that I interactedwith people on a daily basis
(45:21):
that didn't have a similarbackground, said, it's not about
being right, it's about gettingit right.
And you have to be willing tolisten to all the diverse
opinions, even those thatconflict significantly with what
your thoughts may be, becausethere's always something to be
(45:41):
learned and you know, there's attimes where I thought I was, I
was rock solid in my belief insomething and and people have
been able to influence my achange in my opinion.
So, um, I just kind ofcontinued that.
And now that my son's gotten alittle older and he doesn't need
me a hundred percent of thetime, cause he's a dad and he
doesn't want me around a hundredpercent of the time, um, it's
(46:01):
given me the opportunity to todo what I'm doing today, to try
to try to give back because I do.
I'm doing what I'm doingbecause I love law enforcement.
I bleed blue.
I want law enforcement.
I bleed blue.
I want law enforcement to besuccessful, moving forward, and
not only as an organization butindividually as officers.
And so how can we do that?
(46:25):
And, like I said in my book, Igive some actual solutions on
how I think that can be achieved.
Are they the answers?
No, not necessarily.
But it's about starting thedifficult conversations and,
through those conversations, andbringing in diverse opinions.
That's, that's the roadmap tosuccess.
Speaker 1 (46:43):
Heck, yeah and uh.
Where can we get that?
Speaker 2 (46:46):
book.
Well, it's uh, it hasn't beenreleased yet, but if you can go
to jeff100.com, it'll take youto a landing page.
And if you can't spell my lastname or don't want to have to
worry about spelling it, you canjust go to onthinicebookcom.
When you get there, you youactually there's a landing page.
You can put in your your emailaddress and get put on the
mailing list and you can alsoread the prologue for free.
Speaker 1 (47:08):
You can also have that downloaded for free well,
if you do me a favor right now,guys just go, just go ahead and
pause this YouTube episode.
Or if you're listening onSpotify or Apple podcasts, go
ahead and pause.
Go to episode description.
I'll wait.
Click on those links.
Get yourself signed up for thatbook release.
And do me another favor.
If you have an interactionpolice officer today, be kind.
(47:29):
You don't know the stressorsthese individuals are under.
It takes a lot to police acommunity and I am so damn sick
and tired of seeing these oneminute sound bites of how the
police are so bad.
Look, it's not an easy job andthese individuals deserve grace
too.
So if you've learned anythingfrom the conversation we've had
today with Jeff, just know thatinside that uniform, inside that
(47:51):
cop car, is living, breathinghuman being that is doing their
absolute best to do their job.
So please, please, have somegrace, be a human, be kind and
do me one more favor.
Head on over to YouTube orSpotify or Apple Podcasts.
Give us a like, a share, afollow and share this episode
with your friend or somebodythat needs to learn more about
how to be a better human beingand a good cop.
(48:11):
Jeff, I can't thank you enoughfor being here today, learn more
about how to be a better humanbeing and a good cop.
Jeff, I can't thank you enoughfor being here today Absolute
blast.
I can't wait to have you backon, because there's so much more
to dig into this story.
We'd love to have you back onwhen they actually launched the
book, that way we can talk morein depth about some of the
things in there.
And if you're a police officerin Okaloosa County or anywhere
in Northwest Florida and youwant to bring in a consultant to
help you out, I got a guy foryou.
His name is Jeff and his linkwill be in the bio.
(48:33):
Jeff, thank you for being heretoday and we'll see you all next
time.
Until then, take care.
Thanks for tuning in and don'tforget to like, follow, share,
subscribe and review us on yourfavorite podcast platform.
If you want to support us, headon over to buymeacoffeecom,
forward slash setcoffpodcast andbuy us a coffee.
Connect with us on Instagram Xor TikTok and share, and
(48:55):
remember we get through thistogether.
If you're still listening, theepisode's over.
Yeah, there's no more Tune intomorrow or next week, thank you
.
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