January 31, 2024 • 51 mins
Season 5 - Episode 121
Imagine feeling the weight of a family legacy on your shoulders as you step into a career safeguarding your community. That's the journey Captain Bill Walsh of the Voorhees Police Department shares with us, offering an unvarnished look at his path from a young police dispatcher to a vanguard of law enforcement innovation. Throughout our conversation, we talk about the complexities of policing in the shadows of Philadelphia, unveiling the department's edge with advanced resources and the criticality of community bonds for law enforcement success.
Education has been a transformative force, and Bill Walsh is a testament to this, tracing his evolution from a college dropout to an ardent believer in academic rigor within the police force. This episode peels back the layers on how evidence-based policing can reshape careers, presenting Captain Walsh's own narrative of embracing leadership literature, earning advanced degrees, and advocating for comprehensive officer wellness programs. His reflections on the mentorship that shaped his career underscore the profound impact of nurturing leadership within the ranks.
As we talk about mental health and the integration of policing and academia, Bill highlights the often-unseen challenges faced by those behind the badge. The necessity for internal procedural justice, embracing open-mindedness, and adapting training to the adult learner model is just the tip of the iceberg.
We also explore the symbiotic relationship between criminal justice education and practical policing, paving the way for a future where academic insights are harmoniously woven into the fabric of law enforcement operations. Join us for this compelling exploration of leadership, mentorship, and the relentless pursuit of excellence in the field of policing.
Contact us: copdoc.podcast@gmail.com
Website: www.copdocpodcast.com
If you'd like to arrange for facilitated training, or consulting, or talk about steps you might take to improve your leadership and help in your quest for promotion, contact Steve at stephen.morreale@gmail.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Intro (00:02):
Welcome to The Cop Doc Podcast.
This podcast explores policeleadership issues and innovative
ideas.
The cop doc shares thoughts andideas as he talks with leaders
in policing communities,academia and other government
agencies.
And now please join Dr SteveMorreale an d industry thought
(00:25):
leaders as they share theirinsights and experience on the
cop doc podcast.
Steve Morreale (00:32):
Well, hello everybody.
This is Steve Morreale andwe're starting another episode
of The CopD oc Podcast.
I'm here in Boston today and Iam headed down to New Jersey,
near the shore, actually nearPhiladelphia, but we've got Bill
Walsh and he is a captain withthe Voorhees Police Department
in New Jersey, just adjacent tothe Philadelphia metropolitan
area.
Bill, good morning.
Bill Walsh (00:51):
Morning Steve.
Thanks for having me on thepodcast.
I have been a listener for awhile, so happy to be here.
Steve Morreale (00:55):
I'm glad I followed you.
You're not a shrinking violet.
You're not afraid to say whatyou're thinking.
You're not afraid to say whatyou're doing.
You're very active in yourpolice department with social
media.
You've been active in with theleads program.
Now you're a national policeinstitute fellow.
There's so many things that youhave done, so many, so many, so
(01:15):
many areas you have becomeinvolved in because you've
raised your hand.
You're curious, I presume, butlet's start by talking about
your department.
Remember, people are listeningworldwide.
They're sort of just placedwhere you are, near Philadelphia
.
But talk about Voorhees, whereit is what it's near, how big it
is.
Your job, your role as acaptain.
Bill Walsh (01:31):
Absolutely so, y eah , I'm a captain overseeing the
operations division, whichincludes the patrol bureau and
the criminal investigationsbureau.
So our patrol function and ourdetective function, Our
department's made up of about 54sworn officers.
I believe we have, at thispoint, about 15 special police
officers who protect our schoolsand provide assistance with
some other tasks.
We are, as you said, rightoutside Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania.
We're in Camden County.
Most people are probablyfamiliar with the city of Camden
(01:52):
.
That's the county seat.
Here in Camden County we have avast array of even though we'd
be considered, I'd say, smalleror mid-sized, compared to some
other agencies in the UnitedStates.
We have a vast array ofresources available in our
agency.
We have a drone unit, we have aSWAT team, we have a crime
scene investigation, firearmsfield training, holistic health
and wellness program, peersupport team.
So there's lots of differentavenues for officers at our
agency to pursue.
Steve Morreale (02:13):
Well being in the shadow of Philadelphia.
I presume that's a tough cityand it's a great city.
But it's a tough city.
You have spillover effect.
Bill Walsh (02:21):
Yeah, of course we have some transit stations right
in town, at bus stops andthings like that as well.
So we have the PATCO High SpeedLine and we also have the New
Jersey Transit Regional Railbetween Atlantic City and
Philadelphia.
Both have stops either in ornear our town within walking
distance.
There's one train station rightin our town and there's one
literally a stone's throw away,so we do get a lot of spillover
from Camden City and fromPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania as
(02:42):
well, coming through our townand our community.
Steve Morreale (02:44):
Great, t alk about your journey.
You've been at this for a long,long time.
You come from a family ofpolicing, so tell us about
yourself.
Bill Walsh (02:50):
Yeah, so I remember being a little kid.
Just, you know my dad's apolice, always retired now.
He retired as a chief of policein a town called Delmar, which
is about 15 minutes from where Iwork now in Voorhees.
He had been on the job for, Ithink, 45 years when he retired.
He was chief for almost 23 ofthose years.
So growing up as a kid of apolice officer, you know I
always looked up to and idolizedhim and all his coworkers.
You know I remember back in theday they would come in at shift
(03:12):
change.
They would pick each other up.
You know the officer coming offduty would come pick him up
because he was going on duty andthen he dropped that officer
off at his house.
So I'd get to go out and playwith the lights and sirens and
things like that if they weren'ttoo busy or, yeah, we'd go out
on a little bit of a ride aroundthe block.
Sometimes it was awesome.
So I always remember being akid, you know, looking up to my
dad.
My uncle's also a police chiefin a different town he's in
Somerdale.
He heard in their stories justkind of seeing the impact they
had on the community, seeing theimpact my dad had on the
(03:33):
community.
When we go to events in townwhether it be the Fourth of July
parade or whether it besomething at the reparation
center or the tree lightingceremony or something like that
Even church on Sundays peoplewould be coming up and talking
with him or asking him questionsor thanking him for things, and
that left the lasting impact onme.
You know, I decided in highschool that I wanted to get more
involved civically and I becamea junior firefighter and a
junior member of the Emeldesquad because they didn't have a
police explorer program yet.
(03:54):
And then a police explorerprogram started, became an
explorer, but I also came apart-time police dispatcher and
that was a learning opportunitythat I would never trade in for
anything.
I dispatch from the ages 16until 20.
Steve Morreale (04:06):
Whoa, whoa, whoa .
You were a dispatcher at 16?
.
Yeah, crazy, right, yeah, soyou're in high school and you're
coming to dispatch police calls.
Bill Walsh (04:14):
Yeah, so I would get done at part-time.
I would literally get doneGloucester Catholic High School.
I'd go to the police stationand then I would change from my
Gloucester Catholic uniform intomy police dispatch uniform.
Dispatch the 311 shift to the412 shift.
Steve Morreale (04:25):
That's a busy shift.
Bill Walsh (04:26):
Yeah, absolutely.
You learn a lot about triaging,multitasking, calming people
down, de-escalation before itwas really a buzzword.
When they're on the phone withyou with a 911 call, typically
they're pretty amped up andthey're pretty excitable and
it's something where you have tocalm them down and try to get
the details out so you get agood dispatch out to your
officers.
Steve Morreale (04:42):
It's really amazing and talk about a
preparatory for your policecareer coming forward.
So then what happened?
How long did you go back toschool?
Did you finish school, did yougo to college?
And then when did you get on PD?
Bill Walsh (04:54):
Continued after I graduated from Gloucester
Catholic but I took a job as afull-time dispatcher.
Actually it was his townshipwhere I work now and I worked a
midnight shift.
But I went to Rutgers-Camden soI'd go, I'd work 11p to 7a
dispatching and then I woulddrive right to Rutgers-Camden
campus.
I'd be in class till about oneo'clock in the afternoon for my
undergraduate.
Steve Morreale (05:09):
Half asleep, I'm sure.
Oh yeah, half asleep for sure,yeah, a couple times I've had to
do that too.
Bill Walsh (05:14):
Yes, coffee wasn't a thing for me either back then,
and I think fortunately wedidn't have any of these energy
drinks yet back then either.
So I would do that and it waskind of the grind, you know.
I'd go home and sleep and thenI would go back to work, but I
think it kept me out of trouble,which is a good thing as well,
you know that.
And having a bunch of officersin the town I grew up in a town
my dad was a chief in, soeverybody was kind of watching
me.
Steve Morreale (05:33):
Well, you had the Voorhees guys looking at you
and the Belmar, so you reallycouldn't sway too far from the
middle right.
Bill Walsh (05:38):
No doubt, no doubt.
So I took the exam for theCherry Hill Police Department.
As I said earlier, my careerambition has always been to be a
police officer.
Cherry Hill is a very bigdepartment comparatively have
had about 130, 140 officers.
So I took the exam almost aspractice, because I think back
then it's not like it is now.
We had like 2,500 people.
I think that the test yeah, Iwas fortunate I was one of the
group of the first three thatwas hired off that 2,500 people
(05:59):
examination became an officer ofa Cherry Hill PD.
So I started the.
I got hired in 2003, started thepolice academy, just turned 20
years old Before you know it.
I was in the field trainingprogram and right there after
the FTO program I was working311 chef permanent, just Keep
them busy.
You know calls were pretty muchstacked up as soon as you got
out of roll call.
How long did you last there?
I was there for about four anda half years and then what for
(06:19):
he's?
I left for he's.
I really felt like something wasmissing.
You know there was a connectionthere.
It truly did feel like a familyto me in a sense.
I did grow up with a lot ofthose people, if you think about
it, really started this passionthat there, at least when I was
17 People from the departmentor my high school graduation
party and everything else andcame to my academy graduation.
So it was truly a familyenvironment and I love the town.
I live here.
I'm so you know.
I took the civil service exam.
(06:39):
I did well and I was hired backin 2008 as a police officer
here.
So I left charry hill in 08 andcame back to where he's, where
I considered to be my home.
Steve Morreale (06:46):
What keeps the PD busy?
Bill Walsh (06:47):
I would say we do unfortunately do have a lot of
domestic violence in ourcommunity.
We also have, as most agenciesare experiencing, kind of a
noticeable uptake with retailtheft.
We had a lot of traffic in ourcommunity so we have a lot of
campuses in town, officecomplexes, medical offices and
things like that educationalinstitutions.
So our daytime traffic, ourpopulation at daytime really
spikes up.
We do get a lot of car crashesbecause of that.
Everything else is kind of whatyou'd expect in the suburban
(07:09):
community as far as some issueswith drugs and issues with
Property crimes and things likethat.
Fortunately we're blessed wedon't have a significant violent
crime problem, but that can popup anywhere based off anything.
I mean, that's something that'svery unpredictable at times.
Steve Morreale (07:20):
Of course mental health calls.
Bill Walsh (07:21):
Oh yeah, mental health calls people experiencing
homelessness, people withexperiencing substance use
disorders and things like that.
We do have a lot of mentalhealth group homes in town, so
we do respond to calls forservice at those from time to
time as well.
Steve Morreale (07:31):
Okay so now you've got operations and Yet
you're finding time to teach onthe side.
You're finding time to engage.
You were a lead scholar, whichdrew me to your writing on
LinkedIn and listening to youwith our colleague, jerry
Ratcliffe on reducing crime,that podcast.
And Tell me how you were drawnto do these things on the
(07:55):
outside and explore as you aresure, I've always been.
Bill Walsh (07:59):
It's funny, when I was in school I did not like
school, and when I was in schoolI did not like reading.
And then when I finallyfinished high school I don't
know what happened, but at somepoint this thing kind of this
switch flip.
You know, I had to take ahiatus from college when it
became a police officer.
Just I mentioned that wasworking three to 11 shift and we
did have a lot of forcedovertime back then.
So I kind of took a hiatus andended up going back to Fairleigh
Dickinson University where theyhad more of a program there's
more amicable for my schedules apolice officer than the
(08:20):
traditional university.
So there were in-person classes, there were some online stuff
kind of a hybrid thing before itbecame a thing and you already
started getting into readingabout leadership, public
administration and those things.
But also I was reading booksabout the profession of law
enforcement, and one that alwaysstands out to me and I was
fortunate and blessed recentlyto have spoken with Bill Bratton
in person and be able to sharethe story with him and his wife
Ricky that his book turnaroundreally inspired me to start
(08:42):
going back towards education andto recognize the importance of
higher education, to recognizethe importance of networking, to
recognize the importance offinding a mentor to mentoring
someone else.
How vital those things werethat book led me down to.
I started reading Jack Maplesbook the crime fighter, which
Jack Maples obviously was one ofthe architects of Comstad and
he worked with Bill Bratton.
And then we also had right herein Philadelphia, oh, timonnie.
(09:04):
Yes, I read Timonnie's book,john Timonnie.
He was a commissioner acrossthe river here in Philadelphia.
He was mentioned several timesin Bratton's book, before you
know it.
I started going out as a rabbithole of books about police
leadership and, oh wait, thisguy was mentioned in that book
or that woman Was mentioned inthis book.
Let me go over here.
Steve Morreale (09:16):
It all fits in, doesn't it?
Bill Walsh (09:17):
It all fits in.
So, you know, they startedlearning about the great work
Perf was doing and the greatwork the National Institute of
Justice and National PolicingInstitute, which back then was
the police foundation and thatwas talked about it pretty
extensively in Bratton's book.
So I started really going downthat rabbit hole and thinking,
wow, this is, this is somereally great information.
And then, before you know it, Ifound myself.
You know, I had my master'sdegree in administrative science
, which is great.
I learned a lot from it.
I developed a capstone projectthere on police suicides we can
(09:39):
talk about if you'd like at somepoint.
But as I finished that, Icontinued working as a police
officer and started ascendingthe ranks.
I became a sergeant in 14 andthen a lieutenant in 16.
I realized there was somethingmissing and this is something
where, if you're a listener andyou are considering a career in
law enforcement, I unfortunatelyeven though I had people who
should have given me differentadvice, probably I followed the
advice it's so often given topeople interested in criminal
justice Don't get a good degreein criminal justice.
(10:01):
I hear that so many times,unfortunately.
I've said that to people beforeand I kind of had this
realization of?
Why are we telling people thatwe should not be telling people
that we should say, yes, that'syour trade and that's your
passion.
That's when you what you wantto do.
Go to school for criminaljustice.
Like I said, I went for publicadministration.
So I found myself in 2016looking for something else right
?
So I attended Temple University, had a graduate certificate,
(10:21):
police leadership program, beer,headed by Dr Jerry Ratcliffe,
dr Jenwood I worked with her.
She was my capstone advisor.
She was fantastic.
Just know the joys was one ofthe instructors I mean all these
like powerhouses.
We had commissioner Ramsey comein and guest lecture our group.
We all had five or six in theclass, I mean.
So it was just this incredibleexperience.
I was introduced to the conceptof evidence-based policing,
which prior to that, I had noidea what it was.
I did a project on ourInstituting a holistic officer
(10:43):
health and wellness program atour agency, which eventually we
did.
You know, we out of thatcapstone project we implemented
at the department.
But I just met so many thoughtleaders.
I heard so many differentperspectives.
I was able to kind of see thingsnot just from the lens where I
work at right now and that kindof led to Conversations about
hey, there's a program calledthe National Institute of
Justice, law enforcement,advancing data and science
scholars program.
You should look into that.
You might want to considerjoining the American society for
(11:05):
evidence-based policing.
Hey, you might want to considermaybe researching these things
that you're working on.
So, before you know it, I havea PhD student from temple
helping me do a pre and postresearch at our community police
academy See if we're trulychanging perspectives of people
who are involved in that program, to see where we need to have.
Maybe there's some knowledgegaps we need to work on.
I'm joining the Americansociety for evidence-based
policing.
I'm applying for the leadscholars program and then it
kind of just I start doingsubject matter expert work for
(11:27):
national policing institute onseveral projects and peer
reviewing federal grants for thedepartment of justice and I
think I kind of started fallinginto place with all this stuff.
I recently graduated fromCambridge University's
evidence-based policingleadership course, which was an
eye-opening and enjoyableexperience.
It was online, it was.
It was really well done, reallyput together a lot of a lot of
information, and now I'm tryingto push that out to everyone
else and make kind of everyone achampion for that concept To do
(11:49):
a more smart policing,data-driven policing and kind of
seeing the value of that andhow, what we measure those
things and we look at thosethings.
We can improve them or we cancut things out.
We don't need to do and it'sjust a smarter way to do in
business, honestly All right.
Steve Morreale (12:00):
You can't tell me there aren't some cops who
are working for you saying bill,cut the shit.
Thrust stop throwing these newideas at us.
What the hell, stop goingplaces.
It's very admirable for you todo.
When we talk about leadershipand Setting a vision and
engaging others and you saidmentoring, find a mentor.
I believe find a mentor and bea mentor is a really important
(12:20):
job for people in your position.
But how do you overcome thatresistance?
How do you explain why?
What's in it for me?
Bill Walsh (12:29):
Yeah, that's a great question.
I mean, I think people probablycringe when I come back from
conferences.
Steve Morreale (12:32):
That's what I mean, because you got no ideas
yeah absolutely.
Bill Walsh (12:35):
It's really kind of just remembering and I talk
about this all the time theofficers I work with are
probably sitting here in thisbut we talk about transparency
all the time what we're talkingabout our public, right.
We don't really do a great jobof talking about that when we're
talking about internally, right.
So really kind of bringingofficers into the mix and our
professionals to have into themix of, hey, this is what the
science says, but let me put itin our jargon, but let me try
and remove it from this academicjargon that most people can't
(12:57):
understand.
Let me try and translate itinto police jargon so you have a
better idea of it, and I kindof just incorporating into
things we're putting out there,without being so like overt or
making them read a 16 page thingor attaching a research paper
to it.
We need to do a directivepatrol in a particular location
because we're experiencing aproblem or anticipating a
possible issue.
There's two lines in thereabout the effects of a directive
patrol having most impact.
(13:18):
When you're there for 10 to 15minutes, you know what you
should be doing while you're onthe directive patrol.
Just a little blurb that I'llput in the email getting
feedback from the officersthemselves.
Hey, this is what I heard atthis conference I went to.
I read about an agency that'sdoing this.
What are your thoughts on this?
What could be obstacles for ushere at the agency if we try to
implement something similar?
Would it work here?
Oftentimes just having thatconversation which goes to
another kind of drum I beatoften is not just internal
(13:40):
transparency but internalprocedural justice.
So we talk about proceduraljustice with our interactions
with the public often, but howcan we apply that concept also
to the conversations we'rehaving within our organizations?
You know, how do we make ouremployees feel like they have a
voice?
How do we explain, whateverinteraction it is or whatever
policy we're putting into place,what the science is behind it,
what the why and the purpose isbehind it, and then allowing our
(14:01):
officers to realize, and ourprofessionals to have to realize
, that we have altruisticmotives of what we're doing.
So I remember being a newer cop,you know, I guess said I'm a
second generation cop.
I pretty much was raised tolook at the sergeant as as if
I'm getting an order directlyfrom God.
Right, and not to question that.
I don't know that that'scorrect, right?
We saw so much of that,especially over the last few
years, where sometimes thatthat's not a sign of a healthy
(14:21):
organization, right, sometimesit is good for people to feel
comfortable enough to ask aquestion in a way that's not in
support or disrespectful, butmaybe just to get a better grasp
of the why behind it.
Like our school, we do schoolradar posts.
Well, what's the why behindthat?
Why are we so visible whenschool starts?
Because we're trying to makethe people feel safe, right,
we're trying to make parentsfeel safe when their kids are
getting dropped off.
Steve Morreale (14:38):
Well, you know, I'm hearing some of the stuff
that you're saying.
It goes back to cynics work,what's your why, but what's the
why?
And explaining the why and somuch resistance comes from the
top-down mentality which I knowyou've experienced in the past,
where somebody will say do it,and never explains why with our
own kids.
If we take the time to explainwhy, then maybe we want.
(14:59):
I mean, believe me, it's thefirst question they ask why, why
, why, why?
Well, cops do the same thing.
Bill Walsh (15:04):
Answer it when you can and you can't say because I
said so like you do with yourkids at home.
Steve Morreale (15:08):
Unfortunately, that's not an option.
Bill Walsh (15:09):
I didn't teach that in a leadership class.
Steve Morreale (15:11):
Agreed.
I think what you're talkingabout is about understanding and
accepting other perspectivesand you know, the idea is that
you set I use the term that weas leaders should be planting
seeds and you're gonna have tothrow a lot of seeds because not
all of them germinate.
But in order to throw the seedsyou've got to water them,
you've got to fertilize them andsome of the fertilizing in an
(15:32):
organization is asking what youthink.
But I also heard you say somethings that you may be doing on
purpose or inadvertently, thatyou're leading through questions
.
You're challenging people'sintellect curiosity.
By the way, we're talking tobill walch.
He is a captain with the war,he's police department and very
active with NIJ, with thenational police institute, a
(15:52):
teacher at Rutgers, camden andand so many other things that
he's involved in.
You're leading throughquestions, number one.
But I also know that we hirepeople, we train them,
supposedly pick the top rulethat has applied, and then very
often what we have donesystematically is to tell them
to shut up, do what they're toldand do their job and don't tell
us anything right, which is abig mistake because we're
(16:13):
underutilizing the care andintellect of the organization's
personnel, the key ingredient.
Bill Walsh (16:17):
Absolutely, and we really have to get out as a
profession of this cookie cuttermentality.
And I teach a class for fieldtraining officers and one of the
slides I have is a picture ofan academy class and then a
picture next to a cookie cuttera gingerbread cookie and I say,
why do we continue to do this?
You know, we hire people thatcome into our interviews.
They have these greatpersonalities, they have this
amazing life experience thatthey bring to the table.
They're passionate andaltruistic about joining and
(16:39):
they want to be part ofsomething bigger than themselves
, being and acting the same way.
And that's really that's notwho we hired and I think we
really need to figure out a wayto.
And this is where rigidity isnot a good trait to have.
As a law enforcement leader andI'll admit, there was times
where I was incredibly rigid onthings were finally to the point
now.
Or, like you said, I askquestions, I look at other
people's perspectives, Iquestion is this really the best
(17:01):
way to do things?
And I was never.
Early on in my career I didn'tthink that way, and now I'm glad
that I do it, I'm glad I hadthis awakening.
Is this the best methodologyfor us to train our officers.
You know, and there was times Iwas highly critical of
academies that weren't veryparamilitary, and now I'm kind
of seeing that that's was faultythinking on my part.
We really need to look at theadult learner.
There's a time and a place fora bootcamp mentality to make
(17:21):
sure that these individuals arecoming into our ranks, are able
to tolerate people on the streetyelling and screaming and
getting their face and thingslike that.
But also we can't sacrificelearning.
Are they truly learning?
I remember being a rookie orrecruit rather, I dreaded going
to PT because I mean, I feltlike it was just they were
braiding you for an hour and ahalf.
So by the end of the academy Ihad no interest in working out
because basically, theexperience has ruined for me.
(17:41):
So how do we find a way to makethings like that more team
oriented, more a team basedapproach, something where you're
truly impacting that individual?
So when they come out of theacademy, they're going to going
to want to continue learning,they're going to want to
continue working on theirfitness, they're going to want
to continue working out withtheir classmates and then coming
out and unfortunately, Iremember.
I remember time when I was abrand new cop.
I just got out of the academy,I'm in the field training
program and I'm speaking veryrobotically to a suspect because
(18:03):
for the last three months orwhatever it was 23 weeks I was
speaking like a robot becausethat's how I was programmed at
the academy and there was asenior officer, a canine handler
from the agency I started withand he pulled me aside.
He goes what the heck are youdoing?
Steve Morreale (18:14):
I said try and get a question.
I bet it wouldn't be what theheck, but that's a good one.
Bill Walsh (18:18):
I totally policed that up.
Steve Morreale (18:20):
Yes.
Bill Walsh (18:21):
He said all you're doing is making it obvious to
this guy that you're brand new.
You get more beans with honeythan you do with vinegar.
Drop the robotic attitude.
Drop the service.
Give me your pay, give me thisdocument.
Where's your license?
That blah, blah, blah.
He said go and have aconversation with him.
So the next interaction I had,I tried that approach.
I tried dropping all theacademy, sir ma'ams and the
military bearing and just havingconversations with individuals.
(18:41):
And that led me to one pointnot too long after graduating
from the field training program,I have a prisoner of the
vaccine in my car who I justarrested.
I'm driving back to the policeadministration building for
processing and I'm having aconversation with him like that
one older cop talked with meabout when I was a rookie and
you know I'm asking how are youin the backseat right now?
Like what's going on?
You know you seem like a niceguy.
What's going on with it?
What drives you?
What's your why?
Essentially is what I wasasking him.
(19:02):
He talked about his daughter,who he hadn't seen in years
because of his addiction, and itwas something where obviously I
struck a chord with him and Ihad a conversation.
I'm like listen, you know,maybe this is your turning point
.
Maybe this is the time for youto turn around and to get your
life in order and go see yourdaughter again.
Doesn't always have to be thisway.
So we probably haveconversations like that as cops
all the time, right, we neverreally get to see the outcome of
the conversations or whathappens.
(19:22):
And I remember, I guess not toolong after that, probably a year
or so after that, I'm sittingin a parking lot at one of our
shopping centers, over 38.
I'm typing a report up on myMDT, my local data computer, and
a gentleman and a woman comewalking up to my car and I'm
figured they're asking me fordirections or they're going to
tell me somebody broke intotheir car while they were
shopping, or something like that.
And he said I saw you and youlooked familiar and it was your
name, officer Walsh.
I said yes, it is, he goes.
Do you remember me?
I said no, I'm sorry, I don'tknow.
(19:43):
I interact with a lot of people.
I'm really bad with names, youknow, but how can I help you?
What was the interaction we hadbefore?
I hope it was a good one.
He goes.
Well, you're resting me?
Oh my God, sorry to hear that.
And he goes.
No, but it was a good one.
He said do you remember talkingwith a guy in your backseat
about wanting to see hisdaughter again, about his
addiction?
All I said, yeah, I do, Iremember.
Now he goes this is my daughter.
Oh yeah, and it was this momentand she was just being with
(20:04):
Pride and her father and he wasjust so happy I didn't know what
to say.
You know, I was.
I was choked up and that wasone instance where I got to see
an outcome, or return oninvestment, if you will how,
when we talk, treat people.
Steve Morreale (20:13):
Humanizing and being yeah, being compassionate,
and wow, Bill, that's a greatstory.
It's got me tingles becausethese are the things that we
want to accomplish.
We're really intending.
Police are there to help.
I know we've got a very dirtyjob sometimes and you have to
take people in and that's not aneasy thing.
If they don't want, resistancecomes and all that kind of stuff
.
It very, very, very important.
(20:35):
So humanizing is very, veryimportant.
Thank you for sharing thatstory.
Bill Walsh (20:39):
I think it's important we share stories like
that with our officers to sothey recognize that there's
there's going to be aha momentsand we have to really look for
them.
Steve Morreale (20:46):
Well, and these are the stories we should be
telling the public, and usingsocial media to our advantage to
tell the good stories, at leastto change some of the narrative
that is so negative againstpolicing.
It strikes me that we are notvery reflective.
You probably are as a leader,but we as police.
As we come up, we're not taughtto think about what we could
(21:08):
have done differently, how wehandled something, what did we
learn from that?
And certainly the Europeanmodel does exactly that and we
don't.
That doesn't mean we can't doit in American policing.
But how do you drive that withthe people who work for you?
So you're a captain, you musthave lieutenants and sergeants
working for you.
You regularly have meetings andsit-downs, one-on-ones, command
(21:30):
staff.
Let's talk about that.
You talk a mile a minute, whichI love.
I understand it from here, but.
Bill Walsh (21:36):
I always get that.
Oh my God, I'm from theNortheast.
Steve Morreale (21:38):
I'm sorry, I know, I know, I know we have a
lot to say in a little time.
So we're talking to Bill Walshand he is a captain in Voorhees,
New Jersey, and we're talkingabout leadership and his
approaches.
How would you answer thatquestion, Bill?
Bill Walsh (21:51):
I would say that you have to recognize the
individual right and I think, asI mentioned earlier with the
whole analogy of a cookie cutter, we can't have that mindset.
So you're supervisors in yourorganization, you're leaders,
whether it be formal or informal.
They bring with them uniqueskill sets.
They bring with them strengthsand weaknesses, just like we all
have, and really capitalizingon those strengths, I think, is
where the sweet spot is forleadership.
(22:12):
I have some supervisors in myagency who I know are really
passionate and outstanding whenit comes to training.
I know I have other officersthat are incredibly passionate
about proactive policing, goingout and making an impact on the
streets.
There's other officers who arethought leaders and who see the
value in changing the dynamicand see that the organization
has to evolve or will becomeextinct.
So it's really focusing in onthose strengths, capitalizing on
(22:33):
them and building thosestrengths up and then
encouraging those leaders in theorganization, informal or
formal, to trickle that down toother officers or other
professional staff in theiragency to build them up based on
their strengths.
So when I see an officer'sstrengths, I always try to
implore them to teach thosestrengths to others right, and
that's how the organizationreally evolves.
I know there's always the thingout there how people learn
things.
I know if you teach something,the percentage is incredibly
(22:55):
high that you're going to retainthat information.
So I'm a true believer inteaching being one of the best
methodologies to developyourself.
So, yeah, when I have officersin to my office or I meet them
out on the street, sometimes Igo out right around because I
still like to remind myself thatI am a police officer.
I will stop cars when thingsoccur in my presence.
I feel like I have theobligation to deal with those
things still.
So I try to still be out in thefield.
But having those conversationsafter we clear the call or after
(23:16):
we clear the stop with theofficers hey, what do you think
about this?
Or hey, how's that case?
All working out out here on theroad and just really kind of
hitting roll calls, speakingwith them, knowing about their
families, asking questions abouthow their kids are doing, being
involved, recognizing thatthey're a human first, they're
not just an employee of yourorganization.
I think that's important andI've had really great
supervisors who have showed mehow important that is in terms
(23:37):
of leadership capabilities andcompetencies, and I've had
really poor supervisors who havealso showed me how important
that is right to have thatknowledge and be able to have
that conversation and to showcare and compassion and to
recognize your humanity as apolice officer.
You know the story I toldearlier that we talked about how
that really showed humanity.
Oftentimes, again, we work onthat facing out, but we
oftentimes don't work on thatfacing inward.
(23:58):
I always challenge recruits atthe police academy You're all
going to walk out of here,you're going to have your
brotherhood and sisterhoodt-shirts on and things like that
, and you're going to be allamped up and you're going to put
bumper stickers on your car andloving the job and not get it.
I love it, but it's more thanthat.
It's more than just a slogan.
You know you really have totake care of one another and not
just when they're calling forbackup on the radio.
Whatever it is.
If you say that they'redifferent, we see there's
something going on with them.
(24:19):
It's more than just a radiocall backup.
Steve Morreale (24:21):
I agree with that and I think, having been
through it and having been amanager, leader and talking to
people who become onedimensional, this is the best
job.
Screw my family, their assholesEverybody's an asshole, right
as the old bit and their stuffright, and that's not true.
And what I have to take thetime to remind them is look, I'm
(24:41):
not getting involved in yourmarriage or the way you get
along with your wife, but I wantto tell you this that you just
got to remember, when this jobgoes, not a lot of people are
going to remember you.
Bill Walsh (24:51):
No.
Steve Morreale (24:51):
And family is very important.
So and I want to say this billI remember listening to a police
officer from a major city at atraining that I did.
He said something that sort ofstunted me and he said you know,
steve, what you're talkingabout is so important and I find
myself giving 100% to the joband the best that my family gets
(25:12):
are crumb.
Intro (25:13):
Yeah.
Steve Morreale (25:14):
I mean, that was one of those statements that I
didn't expect from this reallyrough and tumble, really capable
police sergeant.
And he said I realized that I'dbetter bring back more than
crumbs at the end of my shift,because my family is important.
And you talk about wellness.
You talk about suicide.
You've explored suicide, you'vedone some research on that?
(25:35):
Talk about that and howimportant it is to realize that
you have to be a whole person,not just the cop.
Bill Walsh (25:41):
Yeah, boundaries are huge, you know, and
unfortunately, the officers whoI've helped over the years with
their personal battles, they'vealways been our rock star police
officers.
There are people like you.
You said they're dedicated tothe job.
They bring crumbs home, but thejob gets everything out of them
.
And fortunately, the Paretoprinciple is a true thing.
Right, 80% gives you 20% and80% of their work to
organizations and that is true.
And burnout's a real thing.
(26:01):
Going for my degree in clinicalmental health counseling right
now and there isn't a semesterthat goes by that we don't talk
about how to not become burnout,how to not become they called
impaired and how to take anotherclinician offline If you notice
that they're impaired becausethey're not going to be helping,
they're going to be doing harmto their clients or their
patients.
And as I've gone through thatprogram, been doing research on
police suicides since 2009, Ihad two friends who died at
(26:25):
their own hands by suicidewithin less than three weeks of
one another, yeah, when.
I called my uncle.
He was from a department rightnext door to the town my dad
worked in.
It was at all my partiesgrowing up as a kid and he
wasn't my blood uncle, but hewas more than an uncle sometimes
.
And then also one of my formercoworkers, cheryl Peady, within
the same period, within a fewweeks, also took his own life by
suicide.
Steve Morreale (26:43):
Well, if I can comment for a moment.
I've got the benefit of seeingyou on camera, even though this
is an audio podcast, but I cansee that the box that you keep
this stuff in just open.
And I know that it happens tome too, because I've lost plenty
of people in my life to suicide.
You wonder why?
For sure, and most of them werelaw enforcement officers, and I
just watched that.
(27:03):
And I think that's so importantbecause we have a tendency to
put things in boxes and it leaksout at some rare times when you
don't expect it.
It certainly happens to me, but, you know, talk about that a
little bit, because I'm thinkingcompassion fatigue.
You know there are things thatpolice officers see that they
can never unsee.
They are called we are, theyare we in my past, but they're
called on to see things thatmost people watch on TV.
(27:26):
But you're there and you're,you're dealing with the pain and
the suffering, the blood andall of those kinds of things.
We have to pay attention towellness before it turns to
suicide.
You're sort of straddling twoimportant boxes that are
important to the well-being ofour officers so they can do the
job, and I didn't mean to go offon a rant there, but I'm just
(27:47):
watching what's happening, andso some of your emotions just
leaked out when you talked aboutyour colleagues.
Bill Walsh (27:52):
Yeah, absolutely.
It's a back, reflecting on someof the memories I have.
In the degree program fromclinical mental health
counseling.
We talk about all these thingsthat can happen.
It reminded me of a case lawright and privacy and security
of a judge's chambers.
That's what came to my mind asthey're teaching me this in
clinical mental healthcounseling school.
I'm thinking of the privacy,the comfort and the safety of a
therapy room.
So they're talking about allthese things that can bleed over
and get on to you as thetherapist and how you need to
(28:13):
process those things and how youneed to take good care of
yourself and how you can't takecare of others if you're not
taking care of yourself.
And they keep reinforcingthroughout this program you
can't be a good therapist unlessyou're in therapy yourself.
So I sit here and I think whyaren't we sending the same exact
message out to our cops, basedoff of just what you said, not
even just our cops, but ourcrime scene technicians and our
professional staff?
Why aren't we sending thismessage to them as well?
(28:34):
Because what was interesting tome and I wrote a paper on this,
on officer involved shootings.
I put this in there as a pointthat was kind of struck me was
exposure to trauma is in thediagnostic and statistical
manual DSM five, which is whatclinicians use to diagnose
people with mental healthdisorders.
Exposure to trauma is atriggering thing for almost
every single mental healthdisorder.
That's in there.
And I'm laughing about it, notbecause it's funny, I'm laughing
(28:56):
about it because it's right infront of us.
Like why are we not?
Steve Morreale (28:58):
doing it.
It should be so obvious,exactly, exactly, it should be
so blatantly obvious, soinstituting our agency.
Bill Walsh (29:04):
we have our annual wellness visits with our police
psychologists, for every officerin our department automatically
goes and sees the policepsychologist.
Steve Morreale (29:09):
That's a requirement, now Requirement.
I hear that some agency I wantto talk about that, because very
few of the people I talk to dothat we talk about a checkup
from the neck up as arequirement.
So when did that happen?
How did that happen?
Bill Walsh (29:21):
And how is that going?
Cool, we're in things like that.
The station officers take itseriously.
It came out of the strategicplan I developed, was a temple
university brought thatstrategic plan to my agency head
chief, lou Bordy, and we wereable to actually adopt the
program.
We got great buy-in.
I was expecting a lot ofkickback and all from our unions
and things like that.
These are horror stories youalways hear when you're trying
to put something new in.
Oh, what about the unions?
Often time I think that'soverdramatic size and what we
(29:43):
did was what I spoke to earlier.
We were openly transparent withit, with our cops.
This is not a gotcha.
This is not an evaluation.
You're not taking any tests.
There's no record come out ofthis that's going to impact you
in any way.
All we get is a letter it saysyou went and really the purpose
behind it for at least ourprogram is erasing some of the
mystery and some of maybe theadversarialness of a cop sitting
(30:05):
with a clinician and just toput them in the room together,
just to realize that it doesn'thave to be a fitness for duty
exam, it doesn't have to be apre-employment exam, it doesn't
have to be responsive to anofficer involved shooting or
some kind of traumatic incident.
It can literally just be youhaving a conversation about you
as a human being.
The other point to that, too,is having that comfortability
and having that relationshipestablished Pre-crisis,
(30:26):
pre-crisis.
It's incredibly important,whether it be something they
experience on the job or whetherit be something they experience
in their personal lives.
They have our policepsychologist, Dr Jen Kelly.
They have her cell phone number.
I mean they can reach out toher directly.
The agency doesn't even need toget involved.
So part of it was shroudingsome of the mystery and
hopefully eradicating some ofthat stigma behind officer
seeking mental health treatmentand also enabling them to
directly communicate with thepolice psychologists.
(30:47):
We had family seminars whereour psychologists came in and
spoke to our officers andsignificant others.
We had childcare at our policestation for the events.
We had food there for theevents.
Literally, we didn't want tocreate stress.
Well, when you put food, in.
Steve Morreale (30:58):
you know that that brings people in right.
I want to interrupt you becausesometimes what you're doing is
almost an emotion dump and Ithink that can be very value.
You know what's going on, whatare the things you did, but I
will say and I'm sure this isyour experience it's got to be
the right person, and what Imean by that, and for the
listeners, is it has to besomeone who understands policing
(31:19):
, because the first hour, thefirst couple of sessions,
shouldn't be explaining what youhave to do as a police officer.
Would you agree with that?
Bill Walsh (31:27):
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean there's one example in abook on officer involved
shootings where it speaks to Ithink it was Dr L Encouragement.
Actually on our books it talksabout how an officer went in
after an officer involvedshooting and the clinician
referred to the suspect as thevictim and that immediately
killed.
The relationship between thetherapeutic alliance between the
officer and the clinician wasruined and instantaneous.
Steve Morreale (31:45):
Listen to you.
The therapeutic alliance.
Bill Walsh (31:48):
I guess.
So Bashing into my brainWriting too many papers yeah, no
Words matter.
Cultural competency is morethan just something you put on
your LinkedIn or your resume.
It is something where theofficer should have an
opportunity to meet these peopleas well before you sign on the
dotted line with them as yourclinician.
It needs to be that your cops,your frontline people, would be
(32:11):
comfortable in talking withthem and that they're not going
to be somebody you're going toutilize later on for fitness or
duties or anything like that.
There has to be a cleardelineation between those two
things as being completelyseparate, one being risk
management, one being wellness.
Steve Morreale (32:22):
So we're talking to Bill Walsh and what I'm
hearing from him and I hope youare is that he's a lifelong
learner, he's a thought leaderand a change agent in a lot of
ways.
Been talking about suicide andI didn't mean to cut that off
and suicide and wellness andsuch.
But let's go back to that andyour assessment of maybe not why
it happens, but that it happensquite regularly, and what can
be done to watch for signals, totry to intercede beforehand.
Bill Walsh (32:46):
Yeah, so I mean, unfortunately it does happen
regularly and I would say ourprofession has turned a corner
and pretty rapidly consideringhow much of a lift this is, but
we've turned a corner and thatwe're actually recognizing that
this is a problem.
Steve Morreale (32:57):
But I'll also say we're also acknowledging
that it happened.
We're not calling it how manytimes in your career was it so?
And so died while cleaningtheir weapon.
We were embarrassed to say thatit was a suicide.
Bill Walsh (33:09):
Yeah, you look at some of these line of duty death
notifications and things likethat and you'd read them and
like that just sounds off andnobody really wanted to say it,
because there are going to beinstances where that truly does
happen, where it truly is anaccident.
There are also going to beinstances where they're not.
So seeing departments actuallypublicizing that we had this
officer who was a great memberof our community who took his
own life and here's the phonenumber for mental health
services and post-traumaticstress is a real thing, and
(33:29):
using his opportunity to educateour public it's huge and we
educated our public at ourcitizen police academy on police
stress and suicides and theywere blown away by it.
But to answer your question,how do we stop it?
If you look at the risk factorsfor suicides, I think that's
your starting point.
If you're a police leader, youshould have a good understanding
and a grasp on what are thefactors that make a person at
risk for suicide.
Unfortunately, one of them isaccess to lethal means.
So we automatically we allcheck that box because we all
(33:51):
have a firearm and I thinkalmost all agencies in our
country officer can bring thefirearm home with them.
Another common thread we seethere is recent use of a
substance, so alcohol ornarcotics or things like that
are in the system of the personwho died by suicide.
So, recognizing that we need tojust not treat the symptoms, we
need to treat the root causeright.
It's public health essentially.
So oftentimes I'll see officerswho are struggling and the
(34:13):
union's first move or theagency's first move is let's
send them off to rehab, right,and at times, yeah, that's
absolutely what's needed and attimes that is important or at
times that might be one of thethings that is needed.
It might be a part of thetreatment plan for that
individual.
But is it truly always andkeyword always, because
sometimes it does is it trulyalways addressing the root cause
of that?
Is it the officer using asubstance to escape reality?
(34:34):
Is the officer utilizing thatsubstance to numb the pain of
something?
It might not even be from thejob.
A lot of the officers I workwith through peer support or
just through informal coaching,what they experience is they are
in control when they are atwork and when they show up on a
job, no matter how chaotic it is, they're in charge and they run
things and they can get, theycan bring order to chaos within
15 minutes and move to the nextjob.
When it's their personal lives,it's not that easy, right, and
(34:55):
so they feel like they're out ofcontrol.
So I mean that's an area therewhere I think the focusing in on
the health and wellness of theofficer's family and the unique
stressors that family membersare under because of what their
loved ones go through every day,or the not knowing if they're
going to have a knock at thedoor in the middle of the night
with somebody who's not theretheir significant other, giving
them really bad news all thesethings spill over.
And then you have an officerwho's had a 12 hour shift, which
(35:17):
I don't want to go off in atiring there.
But 12 hour shifts are great,compressed schedules are great
because you get more time off,but I can tell you right now, it
burns you out.
Oh my God, I remember working,working night shifts, and by
that third night, four o'clockin the morning, you're toast.
You get a bit, get a majorincident at five or six o'clock
in the morning.
You know good luck.
But I think all these thingskind of factor in and if we're
not looking at again the officeras a human being first, all
right, and looking at thatofficer holistically and trying
(35:38):
to design things that recognizethe stressors, we're putting our
cops under and our professionalstaff under, exposing them to
trauma and having some kind ofpsycho educational, preventative
resiliency type of programminglike wellness visits, like being
able to work out things likethat, take care of their health,
encourage them to go to theirfamily physicians to get
checkups, encourage them to putas much thought into picking a
family physician as they do inany other major life decision.
(35:59):
And including the family in theconversation I think are
important.
But also important isrecognizing we have critical
incidents that our officersrespond to, getting them in
front of somebody to talk aboutit, whether they just receive
some psycho education and theydon't feel comfortable sharing,
that's fine.
The psychological first aidmodel is evidence based.
There's some other models thatare out there that are being
utilized.
Unfortunately, they're notevidence based.
Evidence based models like thepsychological first aid model
(36:20):
hey, you've been involved in atraumatic incident, sometimes
just telling the officers andthe dispatchers or wherever else
has been involved, hey, you'vebeen involved in something
traumatic.
That just affirms for them okay, yeah, I have been.
It's okay for me to recognizethat.
These are some common symptomspeople experience after being
involved in a traumatic incident.
Here's some ways to take careof yourself.
Here's some ways to look outfor warning signs, not just in
you, but in your fellow officers, your fellow dispatchers your
(36:40):
coworkers.
And then here are the resourcesavailable and here are the
confidentiality protectionsafforded to those resources and
here's how to access thoseresources.
Steve Morreale (36:47):
Well, you've said a mouthful and obviously
the experience that you'regaining in your present master's
program, counsel, are you oneof the only peace officers or
law enforcement officers inthere?
Bill Walsh (36:59):
No, actually there have been a few, just kind of,
I've noticed yeah, you do yourintroductory things with the
classes and things there's beenseveral people who are either
current law enforcement orretired from law enforcement or
in some way shape or form maybein the professional staff of law
enforcement, and a lot ofpeople from the military as well
.
My wife always says you allfind each other, like, no matter
where you're at, you all findeach other.
And it's the same way.
Whether I'm on vacation orwhether I'm in a college class,
we all tend to find one another.
(37:20):
Well, there's no question.
Steve Morreale (37:21):
Well, we're constantly looking for
commonalities and that's whatbrings us together, and
certainly understandingdifferences is an important
thing.
One of the things that I amseeing arise in the number of
people who are gravitatingtowards social work and in a lot
of ways it's exactly whatpolicing is is social work
without a credential.
You're looking for thatcredential.
So I wanna go back.
We're talking again to BillWalts and he is in Voorhees, new
(37:42):
Jersey, today and he is activein research.
I wanna talk a little bit aboutevidence-based policing and how
that's driven through theorganization.
How do you modify someone tosay I talked to Larry Sherman a
while ago and he was talkingabout avoiding opinion-based
policing and moving towardsevidence-based policing not
having somebody from who is nota professional police officer
(38:04):
weighing in on what we should bedoing and having some
operational independence.
And sometimes that's hard to doin the United States because
we're small organizations.
We've got elected officials,all of the kinds of things that
you deal with, but in terms ofevidence-based policing, where
do you see it going?
Why is it such a high hurdlefor organizations to understand
(38:25):
it and give it a try?
Bill Walsh (38:26):
I think a lot of it comes down to this unfortunate
adversarial relationship betweenpolicing and academia and I
think if we can kind of get ahandle on how to better deal
with that divide that weexperience, I think we might be
able to put some of these thingsinto practice a little bit more
.
So how do we do that?
And it kind of goes back to apoint I made earlier about
encouraging people who areinterested in becoming law
(38:47):
enforcement professionals toactually go through criminal
justice degree programs, butalso the practitioners, the
academics who are teaching thoseprograms, are developing the
curriculum or developing theactual program, whether it be
undergraduate or advanced degreeprogram.
Having in mind to how wouldthis benefit people who are
actually in the field aspractitioners?
And how can we make thisinformation that's from these
(39:07):
journals that are peer reviewedand that explains all the
processes?
And there's a lot of academicsout there who get this and who
do it really well.
But how can we make this moreoperational rather than just
worrying about how manycitations I've gotten or how
many publications I have?
And a lot of that isn't thefault of the actual professor, a
lot of that is the fault of theadministration of the
university.
So there we can see a parallelright Between law enforcement
(39:27):
and academia.
You'll hear officers oftentimessay it's not the public, it's
the administration.
I think that's a commonalitythat we can explore with
policing and with academia.
Is that relationship betweenthe administration and the
people who are actually out inthe field doing it, including
professors in the academicsetting.
So how do we do that?
So there's really greatprofessors that I work with
frequently, and especiallythrough my blessing of being in
the lead scholars program.
(39:48):
But like Jerry Ratcliffe isamazing.
I mean he goes out and doesride-alongs.
He posts about it.
Oscar one video he did wasamazing.
You have people like ReneeMitchell who are really moving
the needle in this space.
You have I work with JaneGollup a lot down at the
University of North Carolina atCharlotte.
She's doing some great work inpartnering with law enforcement
agencies.
Janice O'Wama she's a fellowlead scholar.
She's at American University.
Her and I are working on aproject right now for our peer
support team along with Dr Kelly.
(40:09):
So there's people out there whoreally want to get involved in
the space.
It's just a matter ofconnecting them.
So there's, I guess we kind ofown it right.
So our group chat for the leadscholars is called the nerd herd
, right.
So our, that's what it's called.
So I think there's more nerdcops out there than you might
realize and I think it's reallytrying to tap into them as a
resource.
And a lot of the students Ihave at the university too
Rutgers University they reallywant to get involved in our
(40:29):
mission, but they don'tnecessarily want to put on a gun
belt and get in a cruiser,right, but they really want to
help us with crime and disorderand with lowering risk of
anything that going on in thepublic, but maybe they just
don't want to get in a patrolcar.
So how do we capitalize on that?
How do we have these people whowant to support our mission,
who want to do good work, butthey don't necessarily feel that
they're cut out and they justdon't want to be a patrol cop?
Steve Morreale (40:48):
Well, if I can interrupt you what I'm finding,
and I'm sure you're finding ittoo, but as a full timer.
Now, right, a second careeracademic.
When I first walked in in 06, Iwould say 50% of the students
want to be cops.
That may be a 20, 25% now thatthey still want to be involved
but not necessarily be inuniform.
So I hear you with that.
Yes.
Bill Walsh (41:08):
I think it's part of the recruiting retention and
crisis that we're under rightnow.
I mean, we're seeing it, everydepartment's experiencing it.
I think civilianization mightbe something that you just need
to explore a little morethoughtfully, whereas there's
some areas where we could havecivilians, force mobile
suppliers for our organizationsto help us with our mission.
So I think that that isimportant.
But getting back to theresearch thing, I mean just
being able to work withresearchers.
(41:28):
Have them who are culturallyexam just like the clinician
right.
They're culturally confident todeal with your cops.
Whenever I try to bring aresearcher into the mix with
policing, one of the things I'mdoing is I'm open source
intelligence gathering right, soI'm seeing what they're
supposed on social media.
Steve Morreale (41:41):
We're vetting everybody.
I understand, I understand.
Bill Walsh (41:43):
What they're publishing.
You know what.
They have a slant one way orthe other, or are they truly
objective in their research?
What we want, we have to beobjective in our police reports
and should be the same standardfor them.
Steve Morreale (41:53):
I love what you're saying and I think you're
moving the needle and I sayover and over again I'm very
impressed with the leads programand the scholars that come out
of it and I understand that it'sboth practitioners and scholars
, academics generally, that areworking together and you do find
yourselves.
And I think the big deal isthat when we're writing for
(42:14):
talking with two hats on rightFormer cop, now an academic when
we're writing for the academicworld, it can be very dense.
There's an awful lot of stuffand that translational becomes
extremely important.
Who's gonna translate it?
Who's gonna take this 18 or 20page report, which is
synthesized as it is, to put itinto a one or two page so that
police can read it, police canunderstand it and police can try
(42:36):
it out and then hang their haton saying we're doing this
because the research says this?
Bill Walsh (42:42):
Exactly With the line of work that we're in.
Unfortunately, I think this isan area where research is gonna
kind of meet us in the middle onthis, and a lot of the ones
that I've worked with and a lotof ones I'm familiar with do
when they get it.
But we can't always have aperfectly designed experiment In
policing.
It's sometimes, yes, we can doit and there's great examples of
it out there, but other timesit's just not feasible for us to
do a perfectly designedrandomized control trial, as
much as we would love to, or tohave a sample size that you know
(43:04):
my agency's 54 office peopleare looking to try and get
published.
That sample size of the end'snot huge there.
So I mean, really, are youlooking for impact?
If you look at the programsthat are out there that all the
chiefs have designed over theyears, like Comstab, for
instance, or Broken Windowspolicing was one.
Obviously people discuss thatdifferently now.
Problem oriented policing, allthese different strategies
originated somewhere and if youlook at all these really
successful policing strategies,one of the common threads you'll
see is there was some kind ofacademic research component to
(43:27):
those to make sure that theywere doing what they're supposed
to do or causing harm, andwe're making matters worse.
Steve Morreale (43:33):
So, bill Walch, I'm a brand new promoted
lieutenant and I'm gonna workfor you and you're gonna have a
counseling session or aconversation with me.
What do you say?
How do you open thatconversation?
What are the questions that youask?
How do you help me understand,steve?
You're no longer a sergeantnear now, or a lieutenant.
Bill Walsh (43:49):
Yeah, I mean that's one of the biggest challenges
that jump, I think, intoadministration from frontline
supervision.
And frontline supervision isalso challenging, right?
Because when you're thesergeant you kind of have one
foot in the admin world and youhave one foot in the street cop
world and that's lieutenant,it's like all right, I need you
to pull both those feet out,unless you're like a street
watch commander, I need you topull both those feet out and
come right into the admin world.
And it is difficult.
Like I said, my dad's a retiredchief of police and when I
(44:10):
first got promoted into thecommand staff sure, this freak
with my coworkers, but he said,just remember, it's lonely at
the top I didn't really realizethat until I actually witnessed
it and experienced it.
Just like when people say yourkids grow up so fast, well,
watch out.
Until you actually live it, youdon't realize how true that
statement is.
And it is lonely at the top.
But it doesn't have to belonely in a sad way.
Or it's only at the top thatyou have to be able to have
boundaries, just like we talkedabout, with our family life and
(44:32):
our work life.
There has to be healthyboundaries there.
Do I go to department events,off duty, like you know,
functions and things like that.
Yeah, I do, but I don't staythe whole time.
I make an appearance, I talkwith people, I hang out for a
little bit, I would drink or two, eat some food and then I'm on
my way.
Steve Morreale (44:45):
I call that plausible deniability.
I don't want to see what thisparty is in three hours from now
.
Bill Walsh (44:50):
Tell the newer supervisors too, like sometimes
they just believe it or not.
It's good, it's healthy forthem to vent about whatever it
is going on with theorganization, and we expect our
supervisors to champion theorganization and to shut things
down and the troll rumors andthings like that.
But sometimes these officersjust need to get it off their
chest.
The other thing is, too,whether you agree with it or not
, you're carrying the message.
So if there's a policy thatcomes down that you don't agree
with, there's a time to discussthat before that policy is
(45:11):
issued and for us to iron outdifferences or to discuss it and
debate it.
But once that policy is goingout, you have to do it as if you
wrote it and you published ityourself, and sometimes that can
be challenging.
We saw a lot in the state of NewJersey, especially over the
last few years, with mandatorytraining programs and things
like that, especially in thewake of George Floyd's murder,
and you'll see a lot of kickbackon another training.
I gotta do this, I gotta dothat.
When am I gonna have the timeto do this?
(45:32):
And I get it because, guesswhat?
You know, I had to go to thesetrainings too.
There was work not getting done, but hey, deliver.
That message is important,right?
So, talking with our officers,hey listen, this is gonna put us
above the gold standard forthis.
Or if people are gonna come andask if we're doing X, y and Z,
we can say, yeah, we are, and wehave been for a while.
We take this seriously andit'll help If we ever do have a
high publicized incident in ourcommunity.
We could show that we have beendoing the things we're supposed
(45:53):
to be doing and to prepare ourofficers and to prepare you as
best as we can, to keep you outof situations like that as best
as we're able.
Steve Morreale (45:58):
Well, I think part of what your job is, too,
is to develop bench depth anddevelop others to replace you in
the future, and that it soundsto me like you're in an
organization, or striving for anorganization, that is in a
constant state of willingness toimprove their statement.
Bill Walsh (46:12):
Yeah, learning organizations are something
every police agency shouldaspire to become.
We should always be preparingthe person to take our job, and
that's something no matter whatrank, no matter what position
you are in the organization youshould be part of your work.
That should consist of how am Ipreparing the next person?
And with the goal of as afather of two, I want my kids to
do better than I did, and I tryto push that into my mindset.
(46:32):
Now, obviously, there's a lotgoing on in the world and
sometimes it's I'd like to bemore thoughtful with it, but I
try to be mindful of that whenI'm at work, that I want these
officers to take something,hopefully for me, but to do
better than I did, to exceedwhatever I accomplished here in
my career.
And truly, if you want to talkabout legacy, I mean that's the
greatest legacy of all.
When I talked to new fieldtraining officers, I tell them
that the vision statements along term period, right,
(46:53):
emission statements, moreoperational vision statements,
more extended out as to wherethe ship is heading, essentially
, and field training officershave the greatest impact on that
.
All right, because they aretruly molding a police officer
right out of the academy that'sgonna go in the direction,
whatever that direction is, forthe next 30, 25, 30 years of
their career.
So it's really important forour field training officers, for
our field training supervisors,but for everybody, to mold that
(47:14):
next generation of officers upand to recognize that, yeah,
policing was different when Istarted in 2003.
Good, bad or indifferent, itwas different.
We can't be overly nostalgic andreminiscent about those times
and often I find myself doingthis myself.
Sometimes man was so mucheasier back when I started.
Or this is BS, or that is BSbecause all we're doing is
creating this cycle.
(47:34):
Right Of now.
Everyone's like, oh, this job'snot the same anymore.
Why am I even gonna try?
It kind of becomes like aself-defeating attitude.
It's very difficult sometimesto pull yourself out of that as
a leader.
Sometimes you just jump intothe complaining session.
Cops are pretty good at that.
Yeah, we are.
Steve Morreale (47:48):
Unless you're busy.
We're complaining.
I understand that right.
Bill Walsh (47:51):
That's one of the things I try to part on our
supervisors and our formal andinformal editors that hey,
sometimes maybe a big betterjust go out in your car and ride
around for a little bit andjust leave the gossip session.
Steve Morreale (48:01):
Well, it's not surprising to me that Bill Walsh
was awarded one of the 40 under40 by the International
Association Chiefs of Police,because you're a very bright guy
, very innovative guy, and Iappreciate chatting with you.
As we get ready to wind down, acouple of parting questions.
What are you looking toaccomplish as you come into,
(48:21):
maybe the last quarter of yourcareer?
Do you want to accomplish?
Bill Walsh (48:24):
My advice to everybody I meet, especially
people who are coming into thisspace as criminal justice
professionals, is leaveeverything better than you found
it, no matter what that is.
When I teach the emergencyvehicle operations course down
at the academy, I'll tell themwhen those patrol cars go back
to your agency at the end ofthis week.
I expect those patrol cars tobe in better condition than you
got them in when you picked themup one day.
I try to apply that toeverything I do.
Obviously, I am not alwayswithout fault, just like every
(48:45):
other human being, but I try toaspire to that in everything
that I do.
I always try to leave thingsbetter.
There have been assignmentsI've had where they weren't
maybe the sexiest of units ormaybe it was the most
exhilarating portion of mycareer, but I always tried to
own it and to make it better andI hope that as I wind down my
career here I'll have 25 yearsand actually two years, believe
it or not.
It doesn't mean I'm definitelygonna leave, but I mean it's
(49:06):
nice to know it's there.
I just hope that I've broughtpeople up through the ranks and
have trained people to do betterthan I could ever possibly do,
and that they recognize howimportant this job is.
It is still the noblestprofession on earth as far as
I'm concerned, even when I doretire from this job.
I hope to remain active in lawenforcement in some way, shape
or form, whether it be advisingor counseling or consulting,
training, training.
(49:27):
But it is a noblest profession.
That's out there.
I absolutely love being apolice officer.
I still feel alive when I goout and do some car stops or I
go out and back people up oncalls for service.
If you're a leader, I recommendyou do that once in a while.
I think sometimes it'stherapeutic for me, honestly,
but it helps you remainconnected with your front line.
Steve Morreale (49:41):
Yeah, keeps your finger on the pulse.
Absolutely Right if you'redoing it.
I got you A last question foryou, bill Walt.
If you had an opportunity totalk to someone here or who has
passed that you have not had anopportunity to pick their brain,
who might that be?
Bill Walsh (49:53):
I would probably love to have a sit down
conversation with Bill Bratton.
As I mentioned earlier, hisbook really inspired the
trajectory, I think my careerand my academic pursuits have
taken, so I really like to justhave a conversation with him and
I've already thanked him inperson for it.
But it really elaborate on theimpact that his work had on me
and the great things he did aschief and so many different
organizations I mean the LosAngeles Police Department, you
(50:14):
know he's a big guy.
Steve Morreale (50:14):
He was a Boston guy when we started.
I've known him for many years.
Bill Walsh (50:16):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think that would be probably the
person I would like to talkwith about policing, at least
for sure.
Steve Morreale (50:20):
That's terrific.
Well, we had the pleasure oftalking to Bill Walsh, change
agent, a forward thinkingcaptain for the Voorhees Police
Department, so thank you forlistening.
That's the last of our episode,Bill.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Bill Walsh (50:33):
Come on.
Thank you, Steve.
I really appreciate theopportunity and it was great
chatting with you, and thanksfor all the work you're doing to
further the education base andthe knowledge base of law
enforcement officers andprofessionals around the world.
Steve Morreale (50:42):
I appreciate it, so stand by for another episode
.
Thanks for listening.
Steve Morialli from Boston,you've been listening to the Cop
Doc Podcast.
Intro (50:50):
Thanks for listening to the Cop Doc Podcast with Dr
Steve Morialli.
Steve is a retired lawenforcement practitioner and
manager, turned academic andscholar from Worcester State
University.
Please tune into The Cop DocPodcast for regular episodes of
interviews with thought leadersin policing.
Welcome to The Cop Doc Podcast.
This podcast explores policeleadership issues and innovative
ideas.
The cop doc shares thoughts andideas as he talks with leaders
in policing communities,academia and other government
agencies.
And now please join Dr SteveMorreale an d industry thought
(00:25):
leaders as they share theirinsights and experience on the
cop doc podcast.
Steve Morreale (00:32):
Well, hello everybody.
This is Steve Morreale andwe're starting another episode
of The CopD oc Podcast.
I'm here in Boston today and Iam headed down to New Jersey,
near the shore, actually nearPhiladelphia, but we've got Bill
Walsh and he is a captain withthe Voorhees Police Department
in New Jersey, just adjacent tothe Philadelphia metropolitan
area.
Bill, good morning.
Bill Walsh (00:51):
Morning Steve.
Thanks for having me on thepodcast.
I have been a listener for awhile, so happy to be here.
Steve Morreale (00:55):
I'm glad I followed you.
You're not a shrinking violet.
You're not afraid to say whatyou're thinking.
You're not afraid to say whatyou're doing.
You're very active in yourpolice department with social
media.
You've been active in with theleads program.
Now you're a national policeinstitute fellow.
There's so many things that youhave done, so many, so many, so
(01:15):
many areas you have becomeinvolved in because you've
raised your hand.
You're curious, I presume, butlet's start by talking about
your department.
Remember, people are listeningworldwide.
They're sort of just placedwhere you are, near Philadelphia
.
But talk about Voorhees, whereit is what it's near, how big it
is.
Your job, your role as acaptain.
Bill Walsh (01:31):
Absolutely so, y eah , I'm a captain overseeing the
operations division, whichincludes the patrol bureau and
the criminal investigationsbureau.
So our patrol function and ourdetective function, Our
department's made up of about 54sworn officers.
I believe we have, at thispoint, about 15 special police
officers who protect our schoolsand provide assistance with
some other tasks.
We are, as you said, rightoutside Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania.
We're in Camden County.
Most people are probablyfamiliar with the city of Camden
(01:52):
.
That's the county seat.
Here in Camden County we have avast array of even though we'd
be considered, I'd say, smalleror mid-sized, compared to some
other agencies in the UnitedStates.
We have a vast array ofresources available in our
agency.
We have a drone unit, we have aSWAT team, we have a crime
scene investigation, firearmsfield training, holistic health
and wellness program, peersupport team.
So there's lots of differentavenues for officers at our
agency to pursue.
Steve Morreale (02:13):
Well being in the shadow of Philadelphia.
I presume that's a tough cityand it's a great city.
But it's a tough city.
You have spillover effect.
Bill Walsh (02:21):
Yeah, of course we have some transit stations right
in town, at bus stops andthings like that as well.
So we have the PATCO High SpeedLine and we also have the New
Jersey Transit Regional Railbetween Atlantic City and
Philadelphia.
Both have stops either in ornear our town within walking
distance.
There's one train station rightin our town and there's one
literally a stone's throw away,so we do get a lot of spillover
from Camden City and fromPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania as
(02:42):
well, coming through our townand our community.
Steve Morreale (02:44):
Great, t alk about your journey.
You've been at this for a long,long time.
You come from a family ofpolicing, so tell us about
yourself.
Bill Walsh (02:50):
Yeah, so I remember being a little kid.
Just, you know my dad's apolice, always retired now.
He retired as a chief of policein a town called Delmar, which
is about 15 minutes from where Iwork now in Voorhees.
He had been on the job for, Ithink, 45 years when he retired.
He was chief for almost 23 ofthose years.
So growing up as a kid of apolice officer, you know I
always looked up to and idolizedhim and all his coworkers.
You know I remember back in theday they would come in at shift
(03:12):
change.
They would pick each other up.
You know the officer coming offduty would come pick him up
because he was going on duty andthen he dropped that officer
off at his house.
So I'd get to go out and playwith the lights and sirens and
things like that if they weren'ttoo busy or, yeah, we'd go out
on a little bit of a ride aroundthe block.
Sometimes it was awesome.
So I always remember being akid, you know, looking up to my
dad.
My uncle's also a police chiefin a different town he's in
Somerdale.
He heard in their stories justkind of seeing the impact they
had on the community, seeing theimpact my dad had on the
(03:33):
community.
When we go to events in townwhether it be the Fourth of July
parade or whether it besomething at the reparation
center or the tree lightingceremony or something like that
Even church on Sundays peoplewould be coming up and talking
with him or asking him questionsor thanking him for things, and
that left the lasting impact onme.
You know, I decided in highschool that I wanted to get more
involved civically and I becamea junior firefighter and a
junior member of the Emeldesquad because they didn't have a
police explorer program yet.
(03:54):
And then a police explorerprogram started, became an
explorer, but I also came apart-time police dispatcher and
that was a learning opportunitythat I would never trade in for
anything.
I dispatch from the ages 16until 20.
Steve Morreale (04:06):
Whoa, whoa, whoa .
You were a dispatcher at 16?
.
Yeah, crazy, right, yeah, soyou're in high school and you're
coming to dispatch police calls.
Bill Walsh (04:14):
Yeah, so I would get done at part-time.
I would literally get doneGloucester Catholic High School.
I'd go to the police stationand then I would change from my
Gloucester Catholic uniform intomy police dispatch uniform.
Dispatch the 311 shift to the412 shift.
Steve Morreale (04:25):
That's a busy shift.
Bill Walsh (04:26):
Yeah, absolutely.
You learn a lot about triaging,multitasking, calming people
down, de-escalation before itwas really a buzzword.
When they're on the phone withyou with a 911 call, typically
they're pretty amped up andthey're pretty excitable and
it's something where you have tocalm them down and try to get
the details out so you get agood dispatch out to your
officers.
Steve Morreale (04:42):
It's really amazing and talk about a
preparatory for your policecareer coming forward.
So then what happened?
How long did you go back toschool?
Did you finish school, did yougo to college?
And then when did you get on PD?
Bill Walsh (04:54):
Continued after I graduated from Gloucester
Catholic but I took a job as afull-time dispatcher.
Actually it was his townshipwhere I work now and I worked a
midnight shift.
But I went to Rutgers-Camden soI'd go, I'd work 11p to 7a
dispatching and then I woulddrive right to Rutgers-Camden
campus.
I'd be in class till about oneo'clock in the afternoon for my
undergraduate.
Steve Morreale (05:09):
Half asleep, I'm sure.
Oh yeah, half asleep for sure,yeah, a couple times I've had to
do that too.
Bill Walsh (05:14):
Yes, coffee wasn't a thing for me either back then,
and I think fortunately wedidn't have any of these energy
drinks yet back then either.
So I would do that and it waskind of the grind, you know.
I'd go home and sleep and thenI would go back to work, but I
think it kept me out of trouble,which is a good thing as well,
you know that.
And having a bunch of officersin the town I grew up in a town
my dad was a chief in, soeverybody was kind of watching
me.
Steve Morreale (05:33):
Well, you had the Voorhees guys looking at you
and the Belmar, so you reallycouldn't sway too far from the
middle right.
Bill Walsh (05:38):
No doubt, no doubt.
So I took the exam for theCherry Hill Police Department.
As I said earlier, my careerambition has always been to be a
police officer.
Cherry Hill is a very bigdepartment comparatively have
had about 130, 140 officers.
So I took the exam almost aspractice, because I think back
then it's not like it is now.
We had like 2,500 people.
I think that the test yeah, Iwas fortunate I was one of the
group of the first three thatwas hired off that 2,500 people
(05:59):
examination became an officer ofa Cherry Hill PD.
So I started the.
I got hired in 2003, started thepolice academy, just turned 20
years old Before you know it.
I was in the field trainingprogram and right there after
the FTO program I was working311 chef permanent, just Keep
them busy.
You know calls were pretty muchstacked up as soon as you got
out of roll call.
How long did you last there?
I was there for about four anda half years and then what for
(06:19):
he's?
I left for he's.
I really felt like something wasmissing.
You know there was a connectionthere.
It truly did feel like a familyto me in a sense.
I did grow up with a lot ofthose people, if you think about
it, really started this passionthat there, at least when I was
17 People from the departmentor my high school graduation
party and everything else andcame to my academy graduation.
So it was truly a familyenvironment and I love the town.
I live here.
I'm so you know.
I took the civil service exam.
(06:39):
I did well and I was hired backin 2008 as a police officer
here.
So I left charry hill in 08 andcame back to where he's, where
I considered to be my home.
Steve Morreale (06:46):
What keeps the PD busy?
Bill Walsh (06:47):
I would say we do unfortunately do have a lot of
domestic violence in ourcommunity.
We also have, as most agenciesare experiencing, kind of a
noticeable uptake with retailtheft.
We had a lot of traffic in ourcommunity so we have a lot of
campuses in town, officecomplexes, medical offices and
things like that educationalinstitutions.
So our daytime traffic, ourpopulation at daytime really
spikes up.
We do get a lot of car crashesbecause of that.
Everything else is kind of whatyou'd expect in the suburban
(07:09):
community as far as some issueswith drugs and issues with
Property crimes and things likethat.
Fortunately we're blessed wedon't have a significant violent
crime problem, but that can popup anywhere based off anything.
I mean, that's something that'svery unpredictable at times.
Steve Morreale (07:20):
Of course mental health calls.
Bill Walsh (07:21):
Oh yeah, mental health calls people experiencing
homelessness, people withexperiencing substance use
disorders and things like that.
We do have a lot of mentalhealth group homes in town, so
we do respond to calls forservice at those from time to
time as well.
Steve Morreale (07:31):
Okay so now you've got operations and Yet
you're finding time to teach onthe side.
You're finding time to engage.
You were a lead scholar, whichdrew me to your writing on
LinkedIn and listening to youwith our colleague, jerry
Ratcliffe on reducing crime,that podcast.
And Tell me how you were drawnto do these things on the
(07:55):
outside and explore as you aresure, I've always been.
Bill Walsh (07:59):
It's funny, when I was in school I did not like
school, and when I was in schoolI did not like reading.
And then when I finallyfinished high school I don't
know what happened, but at somepoint this thing kind of this
switch flip.
You know, I had to take ahiatus from college when it
became a police officer.
Just I mentioned that wasworking three to 11 shift and we
did have a lot of forcedovertime back then.
So I kind of took a hiatus andended up going back to Fairleigh
Dickinson University where theyhad more of a program there's
more amicable for my schedules apolice officer than the
(08:20):
traditional university.
So there were in-person classes, there were some online stuff
kind of a hybrid thing before itbecame a thing and you already
started getting into readingabout leadership, public
administration and those things.
But also I was reading booksabout the profession of law
enforcement, and one that alwaysstands out to me and I was
fortunate and blessed recentlyto have spoken with Bill Bratton
in person and be able to sharethe story with him and his wife
Ricky that his book turnaroundreally inspired me to start
(08:42):
going back towards education andto recognize the importance of
higher education, to recognizethe importance of networking, to
recognize the importance offinding a mentor to mentoring
someone else.
How vital those things werethat book led me down to.
I started reading Jack Maplesbook the crime fighter, which
Jack Maples obviously was one ofthe architects of Comstad and
he worked with Bill Bratton.
And then we also had right herein Philadelphia, oh, timonnie.
(09:04):
Yes, I read Timonnie's book,john Timonnie.
He was a commissioner acrossthe river here in Philadelphia.
He was mentioned several timesin Bratton's book, before you
know it.
I started going out as a rabbithole of books about police
leadership and, oh wait, thisguy was mentioned in that book
or that woman Was mentioned inthis book.
Let me go over here.
Steve Morreale (09:16):
It all fits in, doesn't it?
Bill Walsh (09:17):
It all fits in.
So, you know, they startedlearning about the great work
Perf was doing and the greatwork the National Institute of
Justice and National PolicingInstitute, which back then was
the police foundation and thatwas talked about it pretty
extensively in Bratton's book.
So I started really going downthat rabbit hole and thinking,
wow, this is, this is somereally great information.
And then, before you know it, Ifound myself.
You know, I had my master'sdegree in administrative science
, which is great.
I learned a lot from it.
I developed a capstone projectthere on police suicides we can
(09:39):
talk about if you'd like at somepoint.
But as I finished that, Icontinued working as a police
officer and started ascendingthe ranks.
I became a sergeant in 14 andthen a lieutenant in 16.
I realized there was somethingmissing and this is something
where, if you're a listener andyou are considering a career in
law enforcement, I unfortunatelyeven though I had people who
should have given me differentadvice, probably I followed the
advice it's so often given topeople interested in criminal
justice Don't get a good degreein criminal justice.
(10:01):
I hear that so many times,unfortunately.
I've said that to people beforeand I kind of had this
realization of?
Why are we telling people thatwe should not be telling people
that we should say, yes, that'syour trade and that's your
passion.
That's when you what you wantto do.
Go to school for criminaljustice.
Like I said, I went for publicadministration.
So I found myself in 2016looking for something else right
?
So I attended Temple University, had a graduate certificate,
(10:21):
police leadership program, beer,headed by Dr Jerry Ratcliffe,
dr Jenwood I worked with her.
She was my capstone advisor.
She was fantastic.
Just know the joys was one ofthe instructors I mean all these
like powerhouses.
We had commissioner Ramsey comein and guest lecture our group.
We all had five or six in theclass, I mean.
So it was just this incredibleexperience.
I was introduced to the conceptof evidence-based policing,
which prior to that, I had noidea what it was.
I did a project on ourInstituting a holistic officer
(10:43):
health and wellness program atour agency, which eventually we
did.
You know, we out of thatcapstone project we implemented
at the department.
But I just met so many thoughtleaders.
I heard so many differentperspectives.
I was able to kind of see thingsnot just from the lens where I
work at right now and that kindof led to Conversations about
hey, there's a program calledthe National Institute of
Justice, law enforcement,advancing data and science
scholars program.
You should look into that.
You might want to considerjoining the American society for
(11:05):
evidence-based policing.
Hey, you might want to considermaybe researching these things
that you're working on.
So, before you know it, I havea PhD student from temple
helping me do a pre and postresearch at our community police
academy See if we're trulychanging perspectives of people
who are involved in that program, to see where we need to have.
Maybe there's some knowledgegaps we need to work on.
I'm joining the Americansociety for evidence-based
policing.
I'm applying for the leadscholars program and then it
kind of just I start doingsubject matter expert work for
(11:27):
national policing institute onseveral projects and peer
reviewing federal grants for thedepartment of justice and I
think I kind of started fallinginto place with all this stuff.
I recently graduated fromCambridge University's
evidence-based policingleadership course, which was an
eye-opening and enjoyableexperience.
It was online, it was.
It was really well done, reallyput together a lot of a lot of
information, and now I'm tryingto push that out to everyone
else and make kind of everyone achampion for that concept To do
(11:49):
a more smart policing,data-driven policing and kind of
seeing the value of that andhow, what we measure those
things and we look at thosethings.
We can improve them or we cancut things out.
We don't need to do and it'sjust a smarter way to do in
business, honestly All right.
Steve Morreale (12:00):
You can't tell me there aren't some cops who
are working for you saying bill,cut the shit.
Thrust stop throwing these newideas at us.
What the hell, stop goingplaces.
It's very admirable for you todo.
When we talk about leadershipand Setting a vision and
engaging others and you saidmentoring, find a mentor.
I believe find a mentor and bea mentor is a really important
(12:20):
job for people in your position.
But how do you overcome thatresistance?
How do you explain why?
What's in it for me?
Bill Walsh (12:29):
Yeah, that's a great question.
I mean, I think people probablycringe when I come back from
conferences.
Steve Morreale (12:32):
That's what I mean, because you got no ideas
yeah absolutely.
Bill Walsh (12:35):
It's really kind of just remembering and I talk
about this all the time theofficers I work with are
probably sitting here in thisbut we talk about transparency
all the time what we're talkingabout our public, right.
We don't really do a great jobof talking about that when we're
talking about internally, right.
So really kind of bringingofficers into the mix and our
professionals to have into themix of, hey, this is what the
science says, but let me put itin our jargon, but let me try
and remove it from this academicjargon that most people can't
(12:57):
understand.
Let me try and translate itinto police jargon so you have a
better idea of it, and I kindof just incorporating into
things we're putting out there,without being so like overt or
making them read a 16 page thingor attaching a research paper
to it.
We need to do a directivepatrol in a particular location
because we're experiencing aproblem or anticipating a
possible issue.
There's two lines in thereabout the effects of a directive
patrol having most impact.
(13:18):
When you're there for 10 to 15minutes, you know what you
should be doing while you're onthe directive patrol.
Just a little blurb that I'llput in the email getting
feedback from the officersthemselves.
Hey, this is what I heard atthis conference I went to.
I read about an agency that'sdoing this.
What are your thoughts on this?
What could be obstacles for ushere at the agency if we try to
implement something similar?
Would it work here?
Oftentimes just having thatconversation which goes to
another kind of drum I beatoften is not just internal
(13:40):
transparency but internalprocedural justice.
So we talk about proceduraljustice with our interactions
with the public often, but howcan we apply that concept also
to the conversations we'rehaving within our organizations?
You know, how do we make ouremployees feel like they have a
voice?
How do we explain, whateverinteraction it is or whatever
policy we're putting into place,what the science is behind it,
what the why and the purpose isbehind it, and then allowing our
(14:01):
officers to realize, and ourprofessionals to have to realize
, that we have altruisticmotives of what we're doing.
So I remember being a newer cop,you know, I guess said I'm a
second generation cop.
I pretty much was raised tolook at the sergeant as as if
I'm getting an order directlyfrom God.
Right, and not to question that.
I don't know that that'scorrect, right?
We saw so much of that,especially over the last few
years, where sometimes thatthat's not a sign of a healthy
(14:21):
organization, right, sometimesit is good for people to feel
comfortable enough to ask aquestion in a way that's not in
support or disrespectful, butmaybe just to get a better grasp
of the why behind it.
Like our school, we do schoolradar posts.
Well, what's the why behindthat?
Why are we so visible whenschool starts?
Because we're trying to makethe people feel safe, right,
we're trying to make parentsfeel safe when their kids are
getting dropped off.
Steve Morreale (14:38):
Well, you know, I'm hearing some of the stuff
that you're saying.
It goes back to cynics work,what's your why, but what's the
why?
And explaining the why and somuch resistance comes from the
top-down mentality which I knowyou've experienced in the past,
where somebody will say do it,and never explains why with our
own kids.
If we take the time to explainwhy, then maybe we want.
(14:59):
I mean, believe me, it's thefirst question they ask why, why
, why, why?
Well, cops do the same thing.
Bill Walsh (15:04):
Answer it when you can and you can't say because I
said so like you do with yourkids at home.
Steve Morreale (15:08):
Unfortunately, that's not an option.
Bill Walsh (15:09):
I didn't teach that in a leadership class.
Steve Morreale (15:11):
Agreed.
I think what you're talkingabout is about understanding and
accepting other perspectivesand you know, the idea is that
you set I use the term that weas leaders should be planting
seeds and you're gonna have tothrow a lot of seeds because not
all of them germinate.
But in order to throw the seedsyou've got to water them,
you've got to fertilize them andsome of the fertilizing in an
(15:32):
organization is asking what youthink.
But I also heard you say somethings that you may be doing on
purpose or inadvertently, thatyou're leading through questions
.
You're challenging people'sintellect curiosity.
By the way, we're talking tobill walch.
He is a captain with the war,he's police department and very
active with NIJ, with thenational police institute, a
(15:52):
teacher at Rutgers, camden andand so many other things that
he's involved in.
You're leading throughquestions, number one.
But I also know that we hirepeople, we train them,
supposedly pick the top rulethat has applied, and then very
often what we have donesystematically is to tell them
to shut up, do what they're toldand do their job and don't tell
us anything right, which is abig mistake because we're
(16:13):
underutilizing the care andintellect of the organization's
personnel, the key ingredient.
Bill Walsh (16:17):
Absolutely, and we really have to get out as a
profession of this cookie cuttermentality.
And I teach a class for fieldtraining officers and one of the
slides I have is a picture ofan academy class and then a
picture next to a cookie cuttera gingerbread cookie and I say,
why do we continue to do this?
You know, we hire people thatcome into our interviews.
They have these greatpersonalities, they have this
amazing life experience thatthey bring to the table.
They're passionate andaltruistic about joining and
(16:39):
they want to be part ofsomething bigger than themselves
, being and acting the same way.
And that's really that's notwho we hired and I think we
really need to figure out a wayto.
And this is where rigidity isnot a good trait to have.
As a law enforcement leader andI'll admit, there was times
where I was incredibly rigid onthings were finally to the point
now.
Or, like you said, I askquestions, I look at other
people's perspectives, Iquestion is this really the best
(17:01):
way to do things?
And I was never.
Early on in my career I didn'tthink that way, and now I'm glad
that I do it, I'm glad I hadthis awakening.
Is this the best methodologyfor us to train our officers.
You know, and there was times Iwas highly critical of
academies that weren't veryparamilitary, and now I'm kind
of seeing that that's was faultythinking on my part.
We really need to look at theadult learner.
There's a time and a place fora bootcamp mentality to make
(17:21):
sure that these individuals arecoming into our ranks, are able
to tolerate people on the streetyelling and screaming and
getting their face and thingslike that.
But also we can't sacrificelearning.
Are they truly learning?
I remember being a rookie orrecruit rather, I dreaded going
to PT because I mean, I feltlike it was just they were
braiding you for an hour and ahalf.
So by the end of the academy Ihad no interest in working out
because basically, theexperience has ruined for me.
(17:41):
So how do we find a way to makethings like that more team
oriented, more a team basedapproach, something where you're
truly impacting that individual?
So when they come out of theacademy, they're going to going
to want to continue learning,they're going to want to
continue working on theirfitness, they're going to want
to continue working out withtheir classmates and then coming
out and unfortunately, Iremember.
I remember time when I was abrand new cop.
I just got out of the academy,I'm in the field training
program and I'm speaking veryrobotically to a suspect because
(18:03):
for the last three months orwhatever it was 23 weeks I was
speaking like a robot becausethat's how I was programmed at
the academy and there was asenior officer, a canine handler
from the agency I started withand he pulled me aside.
He goes what the heck are youdoing?
Steve Morreale (18:14):
I said try and get a question.
I bet it wouldn't be what theheck, but that's a good one.
Bill Walsh (18:18):
I totally policed that up.
Steve Morreale (18:20):
Yes.
Bill Walsh (18:21):
He said all you're doing is making it obvious to
this guy that you're brand new.
You get more beans with honeythan you do with vinegar.
Drop the robotic attitude.
Drop the service.
Give me your pay, give me thisdocument.
Where's your license?
That blah, blah, blah.
He said go and have aconversation with him.
So the next interaction I had,I tried that approach.
I tried dropping all theacademy, sir ma'ams and the
military bearing and just havingconversations with individuals.
(18:41):
And that led me to one pointnot too long after graduating
from the field training program,I have a prisoner of the
vaccine in my car who I justarrested.
I'm driving back to the policeadministration building for
processing and I'm having aconversation with him like that
one older cop talked with meabout when I was a rookie and
you know I'm asking how are youin the backseat right now?
Like what's going on?
You know you seem like a niceguy.
What's going on with it?
What drives you?
What's your why?
Essentially is what I wasasking him.
(19:02):
He talked about his daughter,who he hadn't seen in years
because of his addiction, and itwas something where obviously I
struck a chord with him and Ihad a conversation.
I'm like listen, you know,maybe this is your turning point
.
Maybe this is the time for youto turn around and to get your
life in order and go see yourdaughter again.
Doesn't always have to be thisway.
So we probably haveconversations like that as cops
all the time, right, we neverreally get to see the outcome of
the conversations or whathappens.
(19:22):
And I remember, I guess not toolong after that, probably a year
or so after that, I'm sittingin a parking lot at one of our
shopping centers, over 38.
I'm typing a report up on myMDT, my local data computer, and
a gentleman and a woman comewalking up to my car and I'm
figured they're asking me fordirections or they're going to
tell me somebody broke intotheir car while they were
shopping, or something like that.
And he said I saw you and youlooked familiar and it was your
name, officer Walsh.
I said yes, it is, he goes.
Do you remember me?
I said no, I'm sorry, I don'tknow.
(19:43):
I interact with a lot of people.
I'm really bad with names, youknow, but how can I help you?
What was the interaction we hadbefore?
I hope it was a good one.
He goes.
Well, you're resting me?
Oh my God, sorry to hear that.
And he goes.
No, but it was a good one.
He said do you remember talkingwith a guy in your backseat
about wanting to see hisdaughter again, about his
addiction?
All I said, yeah, I do, Iremember.
Now he goes this is my daughter.
Oh yeah, and it was this momentand she was just being with
(20:04):
Pride and her father and he wasjust so happy I didn't know what
to say.
You know, I was.
I was choked up and that wasone instance where I got to see
an outcome, or return oninvestment, if you will how,
when we talk, treat people.
Steve Morreale (20:13):
Humanizing and being yeah, being compassionate,
and wow, Bill, that's a greatstory.
It's got me tingles becausethese are the things that we
want to accomplish.
We're really intending.
Police are there to help.
I know we've got a very dirtyjob sometimes and you have to
take people in and that's not aneasy thing.
If they don't want, resistancecomes and all that kind of stuff
.
It very, very, very important.
(20:35):
So humanizing is very, veryimportant.
Thank you for sharing thatstory.
Bill Walsh (20:39):
I think it's important we share stories like
that with our officers to sothey recognize that there's
there's going to be aha momentsand we have to really look for
them.
Steve Morreale (20:46):
Well, and these are the stories we should be
telling the public, and usingsocial media to our advantage to
tell the good stories, at leastto change some of the narrative
that is so negative againstpolicing.
It strikes me that we are notvery reflective.
You probably are as a leader,but we as police.
As we come up, we're not taughtto think about what we could
(21:08):
have done differently, how wehandled something, what did we
learn from that?
And certainly the Europeanmodel does exactly that and we
don't.
That doesn't mean we can't doit in American policing.
But how do you drive that withthe people who work for you?
So you're a captain, you musthave lieutenants and sergeants
working for you.
You regularly have meetings andsit-downs, one-on-ones, command
(21:30):
staff.
Let's talk about that.
You talk a mile a minute, whichI love.
I understand it from here, but.
Bill Walsh (21:36):
I always get that.
Oh my God, I'm from theNortheast.
Steve Morreale (21:38):
I'm sorry, I know, I know, I know we have a
lot to say in a little time.
So we're talking to Bill Walshand he is a captain in Voorhees,
New Jersey, and we're talkingabout leadership and his
approaches.
How would you answer thatquestion, Bill?
Bill Walsh (21:51):
I would say that you have to recognize the
individual right and I think, asI mentioned earlier with the
whole analogy of a cookie cutter, we can't have that mindset.
So you're supervisors in yourorganization, you're leaders,
whether it be formal or informal.
They bring with them uniqueskill sets.
They bring with them strengthsand weaknesses, just like we all
have, and really capitalizingon those strengths, I think, is
where the sweet spot is forleadership.
(22:12):
I have some supervisors in myagency who I know are really
passionate and outstanding whenit comes to training.
I know I have other officersthat are incredibly passionate
about proactive policing, goingout and making an impact on the
streets.
There's other officers who arethought leaders and who see the
value in changing the dynamicand see that the organization
has to evolve or will becomeextinct.
So it's really focusing in onthose strengths, capitalizing on
(22:33):
them and building thosestrengths up and then
encouraging those leaders in theorganization, informal or
formal, to trickle that down toother officers or other
professional staff in theiragency to build them up based on
their strengths.
So when I see an officer'sstrengths, I always try to
implore them to teach thosestrengths to others right, and
that's how the organizationreally evolves.
I know there's always the thingout there how people learn
things.
I know if you teach something,the percentage is incredibly
(22:55):
high that you're going to retainthat information.
So I'm a true believer inteaching being one of the best
methodologies to developyourself.
So, yeah, when I have officersin to my office or I meet them
out on the street, sometimes Igo out right around because I
still like to remind myself thatI am a police officer.
I will stop cars when thingsoccur in my presence.
I feel like I have theobligation to deal with those
things still.
So I try to still be out in thefield.
But having those conversationsafter we clear the call or after
(23:16):
we clear the stop with theofficers hey, what do you think
about this?
Or hey, how's that case?
All working out out here on theroad and just really kind of
hitting roll calls, speakingwith them, knowing about their
families, asking questions abouthow their kids are doing, being
involved, recognizing thatthey're a human first, they're
not just an employee of yourorganization.
I think that's important andI've had really great
supervisors who have showed mehow important that is in terms
(23:37):
of leadership capabilities andcompetencies, and I've had
really poor supervisors who havealso showed me how important
that is right to have thatknowledge and be able to have
that conversation and to showcare and compassion and to
recognize your humanity as apolice officer.
You know the story I toldearlier that we talked about how
that really showed humanity.
Oftentimes, again, we work onthat facing out, but we
oftentimes don't work on thatfacing inward.
(23:58):
I always challenge recruits atthe police academy You're all
going to walk out of here,you're going to have your
brotherhood and sisterhoodt-shirts on and things like that
, and you're going to be allamped up and you're going to put
bumper stickers on your car andloving the job and not get it.
I love it, but it's more thanthat.
It's more than just a slogan.
You know you really have totake care of one another and not
just when they're calling forbackup on the radio.
Whatever it is.
If you say that they'redifferent, we see there's
something going on with them.
(24:19):
It's more than just a radiocall backup.
Steve Morreale (24:21):
I agree with that and I think, having been
through it and having been amanager, leader and talking to
people who become onedimensional, this is the best
job.
Screw my family, their assholesEverybody's an asshole, right
as the old bit and their stuffright, and that's not true.
And what I have to take thetime to remind them is look, I'm
(24:41):
not getting involved in yourmarriage or the way you get
along with your wife, but I wantto tell you this that you just
got to remember, when this jobgoes, not a lot of people are
going to remember you.
Bill Walsh (24:51):
No.
Steve Morreale (24:51):
And family is very important.
So and I want to say this billI remember listening to a police
officer from a major city at atraining that I did.
He said something that sort ofstunted me and he said you know,
steve, what you're talkingabout is so important and I find
myself giving 100% to the joband the best that my family gets
(25:12):
are crumb.
Intro (25:13):
Yeah.
Steve Morreale (25:14):
I mean, that was one of those statements that I
didn't expect from this reallyrough and tumble, really capable
police sergeant.
And he said I realized that I'dbetter bring back more than
crumbs at the end of my shift,because my family is important.
And you talk about wellness.
You talk about suicide.
You've explored suicide, you'vedone some research on that?
(25:35):
Talk about that and howimportant it is to realize that
you have to be a whole person,not just the cop.
Bill Walsh (25:41):
Yeah, boundaries are huge, you know, and
unfortunately, the officers whoI've helped over the years with
their personal battles, they'vealways been our rock star police
officers.
There are people like you.
You said they're dedicated tothe job.
They bring crumbs home, but thejob gets everything out of them
.
And fortunately, the Paretoprinciple is a true thing.
Right, 80% gives you 20% and80% of their work to
organizations and that is true.
And burnout's a real thing.
(26:01):
Going for my degree in clinicalmental health counseling right
now and there isn't a semesterthat goes by that we don't talk
about how to not become burnout,how to not become they called
impaired and how to take anotherclinician offline If you notice
that they're impaired becausethey're not going to be helping,
they're going to be doing harmto their clients or their
patients.
And as I've gone through thatprogram, been doing research on
police suicides since 2009, Ihad two friends who died at
(26:25):
their own hands by suicidewithin less than three weeks of
one another, yeah, when.
I called my uncle.
He was from a department rightnext door to the town my dad
worked in.
It was at all my partiesgrowing up as a kid and he
wasn't my blood uncle, but hewas more than an uncle sometimes
.
And then also one of my formercoworkers, cheryl Peady, within
the same period, within a fewweeks, also took his own life by
suicide.
Steve Morreale (26:43):
Well, if I can comment for a moment.
I've got the benefit of seeingyou on camera, even though this
is an audio podcast, but I cansee that the box that you keep
this stuff in just open.
And I know that it happens tome too, because I've lost plenty
of people in my life to suicide.
You wonder why?
For sure, and most of them werelaw enforcement officers, and I
just watched that.
(27:03):
And I think that's so importantbecause we have a tendency to
put things in boxes and it leaksout at some rare times when you
don't expect it.
It certainly happens to me, but, you know, talk about that a
little bit, because I'm thinkingcompassion fatigue.
You know there are things thatpolice officers see that they
can never unsee.
They are called we are, theyare we in my past, but they're
called on to see things thatmost people watch on TV.
(27:26):
But you're there and you're,you're dealing with the pain and
the suffering, the blood andall of those kinds of things.
We have to pay attention towellness before it turns to
suicide.
You're sort of straddling twoimportant boxes that are
important to the well-being ofour officers so they can do the
job, and I didn't mean to go offon a rant there, but I'm just
(27:47):
watching what's happening, andso some of your emotions just
leaked out when you talked aboutyour colleagues.
Bill Walsh (27:52):
Yeah, absolutely.
It's a back, reflecting on someof the memories I have.
In the degree program fromclinical mental health
counseling.
We talk about all these thingsthat can happen.
It reminded me of a case lawright and privacy and security
of a judge's chambers.
That's what came to my mind asthey're teaching me this in
clinical mental healthcounseling school.
I'm thinking of the privacy,the comfort and the safety of a
therapy room.
So they're talking about allthese things that can bleed over
and get on to you as thetherapist and how you need to
(28:13):
process those things and how youneed to take good care of
yourself and how you can't takecare of others if you're not
taking care of yourself.
And they keep reinforcingthroughout this program you
can't be a good therapist unlessyou're in therapy yourself.
So I sit here and I think whyaren't we sending the same exact
message out to our cops, basedoff of just what you said, not
even just our cops, but ourcrime scene technicians and our
professional staff?
Why aren't we sending thismessage to them as well?
(28:34):
Because what was interesting tome and I wrote a paper on this,
on officer involved shootings.
I put this in there as a pointthat was kind of struck me was
exposure to trauma is in thediagnostic and statistical
manual DSM five, which is whatclinicians use to diagnose
people with mental healthdisorders.
Exposure to trauma is atriggering thing for almost
every single mental healthdisorder.
That's in there.
And I'm laughing about it, notbecause it's funny, I'm laughing
(28:56):
about it because it's right infront of us.
Like why are we not?
Steve Morreale (28:58):
doing it.
It should be so obvious,exactly, exactly, it should be
so blatantly obvious, soinstituting our agency.
Bill Walsh (29:04):
we have our annual wellness visits with our police
psychologists, for every officerin our department automatically
goes and sees the policepsychologist.
Steve Morreale (29:09):
That's a requirement, now Requirement.
I hear that some agency I wantto talk about that, because very
few of the people I talk to dothat we talk about a checkup
from the neck up as arequirement.
So when did that happen?
How did that happen?
Bill Walsh (29:21):
And how is that going?
Cool, we're in things like that.
The station officers take itseriously.
It came out of the strategicplan I developed, was a temple
university brought thatstrategic plan to my agency head
chief, lou Bordy, and we wereable to actually adopt the
program.
We got great buy-in.
I was expecting a lot ofkickback and all from our unions
and things like that.
These are horror stories youalways hear when you're trying
to put something new in.
Oh, what about the unions?
Often time I think that'soverdramatic size and what we
(29:43):
did was what I spoke to earlier.
We were openly transparent withit, with our cops.
This is not a gotcha.
This is not an evaluation.
You're not taking any tests.
There's no record come out ofthis that's going to impact you
in any way.
All we get is a letter it saysyou went and really the purpose
behind it for at least ourprogram is erasing some of the
mystery and some of maybe theadversarialness of a cop sitting
(30:05):
with a clinician and just toput them in the room together,
just to realize that it doesn'thave to be a fitness for duty
exam, it doesn't have to be apre-employment exam, it doesn't
have to be responsive to anofficer involved shooting or
some kind of traumatic incident.
It can literally just be youhaving a conversation about you
as a human being.
The other point to that, too,is having that comfortability
and having that relationshipestablished Pre-crisis,
(30:26):
pre-crisis.
It's incredibly important,whether it be something they
experience on the job or whetherit be something they experience
in their personal lives.
They have our policepsychologist, Dr Jen Kelly.
They have her cell phone number.
I mean they can reach out toher directly.
The agency doesn't even need toget involved.
So part of it was shroudingsome of the mystery and
hopefully eradicating some ofthat stigma behind officer
seeking mental health treatmentand also enabling them to
directly communicate with thepolice psychologists.
(30:47):
We had family seminars whereour psychologists came in and
spoke to our officers andsignificant others.
We had childcare at our policestation for the events.
We had food there for theevents.
Literally, we didn't want tocreate stress.
Well, when you put food, in.
Steve Morreale (30:58):
you know that that brings people in right.
I want to interrupt you becausesometimes what you're doing is
almost an emotion dump and Ithink that can be very value.
You know what's going on, whatare the things you did, but I
will say and I'm sure this isyour experience it's got to be
the right person, and what Imean by that, and for the
listeners, is it has to besomeone who understands policing
(31:19):
, because the first hour, thefirst couple of sessions,
shouldn't be explaining what youhave to do as a police officer.
Would you agree with that?
Bill Walsh (31:27):
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean there's one example in abook on officer involved
shootings where it speaks to Ithink it was Dr L Encouragement.
Actually on our books it talksabout how an officer went in
after an officer involvedshooting and the clinician
referred to the suspect as thevictim and that immediately
killed.
The relationship between thetherapeutic alliance between the
officer and the clinician wasruined and instantaneous.
Steve Morreale (31:45):
Listen to you.
The therapeutic alliance.
Bill Walsh (31:48):
I guess.
So Bashing into my brainWriting too many papers yeah, no
Words matter.
Cultural competency is morethan just something you put on
your LinkedIn or your resume.
It is something where theofficer should have an
opportunity to meet these peopleas well before you sign on the
dotted line with them as yourclinician.
It needs to be that your cops,your frontline people, would be
(32:11):
comfortable in talking withthem and that they're not going
to be somebody you're going toutilize later on for fitness or
duties or anything like that.
There has to be a cleardelineation between those two
things as being completelyseparate, one being risk
management, one being wellness.
Steve Morreale (32:22):
So we're talking to Bill Walsh and what I'm
hearing from him and I hope youare is that he's a lifelong
learner, he's a thought leaderand a change agent in a lot of
ways.
Been talking about suicide andI didn't mean to cut that off
and suicide and wellness andsuch.
But let's go back to that andyour assessment of maybe not why
it happens, but that it happensquite regularly, and what can
be done to watch for signals, totry to intercede beforehand.
Bill Walsh (32:46):
Yeah, so I mean, unfortunately it does happen
regularly and I would say ourprofession has turned a corner
and pretty rapidly consideringhow much of a lift this is, but
we've turned a corner and thatwe're actually recognizing that
this is a problem.
Steve Morreale (32:57):
But I'll also say we're also acknowledging
that it happened.
We're not calling it how manytimes in your career was it so?
And so died while cleaningtheir weapon.
We were embarrassed to say thatit was a suicide.
Bill Walsh (33:09):
Yeah, you look at some of these line of duty death
notifications and things likethat and you'd read them and
like that just sounds off andnobody really wanted to say it,
because there are going to beinstances where that truly does
happen, where it truly is anaccident.
There are also going to beinstances where they're not.
So seeing departments actuallypublicizing that we had this
officer who was a great memberof our community who took his
own life and here's the phonenumber for mental health
services and post-traumaticstress is a real thing, and
(33:29):
using his opportunity to educateour public it's huge and we
educated our public at ourcitizen police academy on police
stress and suicides and theywere blown away by it.
But to answer your question,how do we stop it?
If you look at the risk factorsfor suicides, I think that's
your starting point.
If you're a police leader, youshould have a good understanding
and a grasp on what are thefactors that make a person at
risk for suicide.
Unfortunately, one of them isaccess to lethal means.
So we automatically we allcheck that box because we all
(33:51):
have a firearm and I thinkalmost all agencies in our
country officer can bring thefirearm home with them.
Another common thread we seethere is recent use of a
substance, so alcohol ornarcotics or things like that
are in the system of the personwho died by suicide.
So, recognizing that we need tojust not treat the symptoms, we
need to treat the root causeright.
It's public health essentially.
So oftentimes I'll see officerswho are struggling and the
(34:13):
union's first move or theagency's first move is let's
send them off to rehab, right,and at times, yeah, that's
absolutely what's needed and attimes that is important or at
times that might be one of thethings that is needed.
It might be a part of thetreatment plan for that
individual.
But is it truly always andkeyword always, because
sometimes it does is it trulyalways addressing the root cause
of that?
Is it the officer using asubstance to escape reality?
(34:34):
Is the officer utilizing thatsubstance to numb the pain of
something?
It might not even be from thejob.
A lot of the officers I workwith through peer support or
just through informal coaching,what they experience is they are
in control when they are atwork and when they show up on a
job, no matter how chaotic it is, they're in charge and they run
things and they can get, theycan bring order to chaos within
15 minutes and move to the nextjob.
When it's their personal lives,it's not that easy, right, and
(34:55):
so they feel like they're out ofcontrol.
So I mean that's an area therewhere I think the focusing in on
the health and wellness of theofficer's family and the unique
stressors that family membersare under because of what their
loved ones go through every day,or the not knowing if they're
going to have a knock at thedoor in the middle of the night
with somebody who's not theretheir significant other, giving
them really bad news all thesethings spill over.
And then you have an officerwho's had a 12 hour shift, which
(35:17):
I don't want to go off in atiring there.
But 12 hour shifts are great,compressed schedules are great
because you get more time off,but I can tell you right now, it
burns you out.
Oh my God, I remember working,working night shifts, and by
that third night, four o'clockin the morning, you're toast.
You get a bit, get a majorincident at five or six o'clock
in the morning.
You know good luck.
But I think all these thingskind of factor in and if we're
not looking at again the officeras a human being first, all
right, and looking at thatofficer holistically and trying
(35:38):
to design things that recognizethe stressors, we're putting our
cops under and our professionalstaff under, exposing them to
trauma and having some kind ofpsycho educational, preventative
resiliency type of programminglike wellness visits, like being
able to work out things likethat, take care of their health,
encourage them to go to theirfamily physicians to get
checkups, encourage them to putas much thought into picking a
family physician as they do inany other major life decision.
(35:59):
And including the family in theconversation I think are
important.
But also important isrecognizing we have critical
incidents that our officersrespond to, getting them in
front of somebody to talk aboutit, whether they just receive
some psycho education and theydon't feel comfortable sharing,
that's fine.
The psychological first aidmodel is evidence based.
There's some other models thatare out there that are being
utilized.
Unfortunately, they're notevidence based.
Evidence based models like thepsychological first aid model
(36:20):
hey, you've been involved in atraumatic incident, sometimes
just telling the officers andthe dispatchers or wherever else
has been involved, hey, you'vebeen involved in something
traumatic.
That just affirms for them okay, yeah, I have been.
It's okay for me to recognizethat.
These are some common symptomspeople experience after being
involved in a traumatic incident.
Here's some ways to take careof yourself.
Here's some ways to look outfor warning signs, not just in
you, but in your fellow officers, your fellow dispatchers your
(36:40):
coworkers.
And then here are the resourcesavailable and here are the
confidentiality protectionsafforded to those resources and
here's how to access thoseresources.
Steve Morreale (36:47):
Well, you've said a mouthful and obviously
the experience that you'regaining in your present master's
program, counsel, are you oneof the only peace officers or
law enforcement officers inthere?
Bill Walsh (36:59):
No, actually there have been a few, just kind of,
I've noticed yeah, you do yourintroductory things with the
classes and things there's beenseveral people who are either
current law enforcement orretired from law enforcement or
in some way shape or form maybein the professional staff of law
enforcement, and a lot ofpeople from the military as well
.
My wife always says you allfind each other, like, no matter
where you're at, you all findeach other.
And it's the same way.
Whether I'm on vacation orwhether I'm in a college class,
we all tend to find one another.
(37:20):
Well, there's no question.
Steve Morreale (37:21):
Well, we're constantly looking for
commonalities and that's whatbrings us together, and
certainly understandingdifferences is an important
thing.
One of the things that I amseeing arise in the number of
people who are gravitatingtowards social work and in a lot
of ways it's exactly whatpolicing is is social work
without a credential.
You're looking for thatcredential.
So I wanna go back.
We're talking again to BillWalts and he is in Voorhees, new
(37:42):
Jersey, today and he is activein research.
I wanna talk a little bit aboutevidence-based policing and how
that's driven through theorganization.
How do you modify someone tosay I talked to Larry Sherman a
while ago and he was talkingabout avoiding opinion-based
policing and moving towardsevidence-based policing not
having somebody from who is nota professional police officer
(38:04):
weighing in on what we should bedoing and having some
operational independence.
And sometimes that's hard to doin the United States because
we're small organizations.
We've got elected officials,all of the kinds of things that
you deal with, but in terms ofevidence-based policing, where
do you see it going?
Why is it such a high hurdlefor organizations to understand
(38:25):
it and give it a try?
Bill Walsh (38:26):
I think a lot of it comes down to this unfortunate
adversarial relationship betweenpolicing and academia and I
think if we can kind of get ahandle on how to better deal
with that divide that weexperience, I think we might be
able to put some of these thingsinto practice a little bit more
.
So how do we do that?
And it kind of goes back to apoint I made earlier about
encouraging people who areinterested in becoming law
(38:47):
enforcement professionals toactually go through criminal
justice degree programs, butalso the practitioners, the
academics who are teaching thoseprograms, are developing the
curriculum or developing theactual program, whether it be
undergraduate or advanced degreeprogram.
Having in mind to how wouldthis benefit people who are
actually in the field aspractitioners?
And how can we make thisinformation that's from these
(39:07):
journals that are peer reviewedand that explains all the
processes?
And there's a lot of academicsout there who get this and who
do it really well.
But how can we make this moreoperational rather than just
worrying about how manycitations I've gotten or how
many publications I have?
And a lot of that isn't thefault of the actual professor, a
lot of that is the fault of theadministration of the
university.
So there we can see a parallelright Between law enforcement
(39:27):
and academia.
You'll hear officers oftentimessay it's not the public, it's
the administration.
I think that's a commonalitythat we can explore with
policing and with academia.
Is that relationship betweenthe administration and the
people who are actually out inthe field doing it, including
professors in the academicsetting.
So how do we do that?
So there's really greatprofessors that I work with
frequently, and especiallythrough my blessing of being in
the lead scholars program.
(39:48):
But like Jerry Ratcliffe isamazing.
I mean he goes out and doesride-alongs.
He posts about it.
Oscar one video he did wasamazing.
You have people like ReneeMitchell who are really moving
the needle in this space.
You have I work with JaneGollup a lot down at the
University of North Carolina atCharlotte.
She's doing some great work inpartnering with law enforcement
agencies.
Janice O'Wama she's a fellowlead scholar.
She's at American University.
Her and I are working on aproject right now for our peer
support team along with Dr Kelly.
(40:09):
So there's people out there whoreally want to get involved in
the space.
It's just a matter ofconnecting them.
So there's, I guess we kind ofown it right.
So our group chat for the leadscholars is called the nerd herd
, right.
So our, that's what it's called.
So I think there's more nerdcops out there than you might
realize and I think it's reallytrying to tap into them as a
resource.
And a lot of the students Ihave at the university too
Rutgers University they reallywant to get involved in our
(40:29):
mission, but they don'tnecessarily want to put on a gun
belt and get in a cruiser,right, but they really want to
help us with crime and disorderand with lowering risk of
anything that going on in thepublic, but maybe they just
don't want to get in a patrolcar.
So how do we capitalize on that?
How do we have these people whowant to support our mission,
who want to do good work, butthey don't necessarily feel that
they're cut out and they justdon't want to be a patrol cop?
Steve Morreale (40:48):
Well, if I can interrupt you what I'm finding,
and I'm sure you're finding ittoo, but as a full timer.
Now, right, a second careeracademic.
When I first walked in in 06, Iwould say 50% of the students
want to be cops.
That may be a 20, 25% now thatthey still want to be involved
but not necessarily be inuniform.
So I hear you with that.
Yes.
Bill Walsh (41:08):
I think it's part of the recruiting retention and
crisis that we're under rightnow.
I mean, we're seeing it, everydepartment's experiencing it.
I think civilianization mightbe something that you just need
to explore a little morethoughtfully, whereas there's
some areas where we could havecivilians, force mobile
suppliers for our organizationsto help us with our mission.
So I think that that isimportant.
But getting back to theresearch thing, I mean just
being able to work withresearchers.
(41:28):
Have them who are culturallyexam just like the clinician
right.
They're culturally confident todeal with your cops.
Whenever I try to bring aresearcher into the mix with
policing, one of the things I'mdoing is I'm open source
intelligence gathering right, soI'm seeing what they're
supposed on social media.
Steve Morreale (41:41):
We're vetting everybody.
I understand, I understand.
Bill Walsh (41:43):
What they're publishing.
You know what.
They have a slant one way orthe other, or are they truly
objective in their research?
What we want, we have to beobjective in our police reports
and should be the same standardfor them.
Steve Morreale (41:53):
I love what you're saying and I think you're
moving the needle and I sayover and over again I'm very
impressed with the leads programand the scholars that come out
of it and I understand that it'sboth practitioners and scholars
, academics generally, that areworking together and you do find
yourselves.
And I think the big deal isthat when we're writing for
(42:14):
talking with two hats on rightFormer cop, now an academic when
we're writing for the academicworld, it can be very dense.
There's an awful lot of stuffand that translational becomes
extremely important.
Who's gonna translate it?
Who's gonna take this 18 or 20page report, which is
synthesized as it is, to put itinto a one or two page so that
police can read it, police canunderstand it and police can try
(42:36):
it out and then hang their haton saying we're doing this
because the research says this?
Bill Walsh (42:42):
Exactly With the line of work that we're in.
Unfortunately, I think this isan area where research is gonna
kind of meet us in the middle onthis, and a lot of the ones
that I've worked with and a lotof ones I'm familiar with do
when they get it.
But we can't always have aperfectly designed experiment In
policing.
It's sometimes, yes, we can doit and there's great examples of
it out there, but other timesit's just not feasible for us to
do a perfectly designedrandomized control trial, as
much as we would love to, or tohave a sample size that you know
(43:04):
my agency's 54 office peopleare looking to try and get
published.
That sample size of the end'snot huge there.
So I mean, really, are youlooking for impact?
If you look at the programsthat are out there that all the
chiefs have designed over theyears, like Comstab, for
instance, or Broken Windowspolicing was one.
Obviously people discuss thatdifferently now.
Problem oriented policing, allthese different strategies
originated somewhere and if youlook at all these really
successful policing strategies,one of the common threads you'll
see is there was some kind ofacademic research component to
(43:27):
those to make sure that theywere doing what they're supposed
to do or causing harm, andwe're making matters worse.
Steve Morreale (43:33):
So, bill Walch, I'm a brand new promoted
lieutenant and I'm gonna workfor you and you're gonna have a
counseling session or aconversation with me.
What do you say?
How do you open thatconversation?
What are the questions that youask?
How do you help me understand,steve?
You're no longer a sergeantnear now, or a lieutenant.
Bill Walsh (43:49):
Yeah, I mean that's one of the biggest challenges
that jump, I think, intoadministration from frontline
supervision.
And frontline supervision isalso challenging, right?
Because when you're thesergeant you kind of have one
foot in the admin world and youhave one foot in the street cop
world and that's lieutenant,it's like all right, I need you
to pull both those feet out,unless you're like a street
watch commander, I need you topull both those feet out and
come right into the admin world.
And it is difficult.
Like I said, my dad's a retiredchief of police and when I
(44:10):
first got promoted into thecommand staff sure, this freak
with my coworkers, but he said,just remember, it's lonely at
the top I didn't really realizethat until I actually witnessed
it and experienced it.
Just like when people say yourkids grow up so fast, well,
watch out.
Until you actually live it, youdon't realize how true that
statement is.
And it is lonely at the top.
But it doesn't have to belonely in a sad way.
Or it's only at the top thatyou have to be able to have
boundaries, just like we talkedabout, with our family life and
(44:32):
our work life.
There has to be healthyboundaries there.
Do I go to department events,off duty, like you know,
functions and things like that.
Yeah, I do, but I don't staythe whole time.
I make an appearance, I talkwith people, I hang out for a
little bit, I would drink or two, eat some food and then I'm on
my way.
Steve Morreale (44:45):
I call that plausible deniability.
I don't want to see what thisparty is in three hours from now
.
Bill Walsh (44:50):
Tell the newer supervisors too, like sometimes
they just believe it or not.
It's good, it's healthy forthem to vent about whatever it
is going on with theorganization, and we expect our
supervisors to champion theorganization and to shut things
down and the troll rumors andthings like that.
But sometimes these officersjust need to get it off their
chest.
The other thing is, too,whether you agree with it or not
, you're carrying the message.
So if there's a policy thatcomes down that you don't agree
with, there's a time to discussthat before that policy is
(45:11):
issued and for us to iron outdifferences or to discuss it and
debate it.
But once that policy is goingout, you have to do it as if you
wrote it and you published ityourself, and sometimes that can
be challenging.
We saw a lot in the state of NewJersey, especially over the
last few years, with mandatorytraining programs and things
like that, especially in thewake of George Floyd's murder,
and you'll see a lot of kickbackon another training.
I gotta do this, I gotta dothat.
When am I gonna have the timeto do this?
(45:32):
And I get it because, guesswhat?
You know, I had to go to thesetrainings too.
There was work not getting done, but hey, deliver.
That message is important,right?
So, talking with our officers,hey listen, this is gonna put us
above the gold standard forthis.
Or if people are gonna come andask if we're doing X, y and Z,
we can say, yeah, we are, and wehave been for a while.
We take this seriously andit'll help If we ever do have a
high publicized incident in ourcommunity.
We could show that we have beendoing the things we're supposed
(45:53):
to be doing and to prepare ourofficers and to prepare you as
best as we can, to keep you outof situations like that as best
as we're able.
Steve Morreale (45:58):
Well, I think part of what your job is, too,
is to develop bench depth anddevelop others to replace you in
the future, and that it soundsto me like you're in an
organization, or striving for anorganization, that is in a
constant state of willingness toimprove their statement.
Bill Walsh (46:12):
Yeah, learning organizations are something
every police agency shouldaspire to become.
We should always be preparingthe person to take our job, and
that's something no matter whatrank, no matter what position
you are in the organization youshould be part of your work.
That should consist of how am Ipreparing the next person?
And with the goal of as afather of two, I want my kids to
do better than I did, and I tryto push that into my mindset.
(46:32):
Now, obviously, there's a lotgoing on in the world and
sometimes it's I'd like to bemore thoughtful with it, but I
try to be mindful of that whenI'm at work, that I want these
officers to take something,hopefully for me, but to do
better than I did, to exceedwhatever I accomplished here in
my career.
And truly, if you want to talkabout legacy, I mean that's the
greatest legacy of all.
When I talked to new fieldtraining officers, I tell them
that the vision statements along term period, right,
(46:53):
emission statements, moreoperational vision statements,
more extended out as to wherethe ship is heading, essentially
, and field training officershave the greatest impact on that
.
All right, because they aretruly molding a police officer
right out of the academy that'sgonna go in the direction,
whatever that direction is, forthe next 30, 25, 30 years of
their career.
So it's really important forour field training officers, for
our field training supervisors,but for everybody, to mold that
(47:14):
next generation of officers upand to recognize that, yeah,
policing was different when Istarted in 2003.
Good, bad or indifferent, itwas different.
We can't be overly nostalgic andreminiscent about those times
and often I find myself doingthis myself.
Sometimes man was so mucheasier back when I started.
Or this is BS, or that is BSbecause all we're doing is
creating this cycle.
(47:34):
Right Of now.
Everyone's like, oh, this job'snot the same anymore.
Why am I even gonna try?
It kind of becomes like aself-defeating attitude.
It's very difficult sometimesto pull yourself out of that as
a leader.
Sometimes you just jump intothe complaining session.
Cops are pretty good at that.
Yeah, we are.
Steve Morreale (47:48):
Unless you're busy.
We're complaining.
I understand that right.
Bill Walsh (47:51):
That's one of the things I try to part on our
supervisors and our formal andinformal editors that hey,
sometimes maybe a big betterjust go out in your car and ride
around for a little bit andjust leave the gossip session.
Steve Morreale (48:01):
Well, it's not surprising to me that Bill Walsh
was awarded one of the 40 under40 by the International
Association Chiefs of Police,because you're a very bright guy
, very innovative guy, and Iappreciate chatting with you.
As we get ready to wind down, acouple of parting questions.
What are you looking toaccomplish as you come into,
(48:21):
maybe the last quarter of yourcareer?
Do you want to accomplish?
Bill Walsh (48:24):
My advice to everybody I meet, especially
people who are coming into thisspace as criminal justice
professionals, is leaveeverything better than you found
it, no matter what that is.
When I teach the emergencyvehicle operations course down
at the academy, I'll tell themwhen those patrol cars go back
to your agency at the end ofthis week.
I expect those patrol cars tobe in better condition than you
got them in when you picked themup one day.
I try to apply that toeverything I do.
Obviously, I am not alwayswithout fault, just like every
(48:45):
other human being, but I try toaspire to that in everything
that I do.
I always try to leave thingsbetter.
There have been assignmentsI've had where they weren't
maybe the sexiest of units ormaybe it was the most
exhilarating portion of mycareer, but I always tried to
own it and to make it better andI hope that as I wind down my
career here I'll have 25 yearsand actually two years, believe
it or not.
It doesn't mean I'm definitelygonna leave, but I mean it's
(49:06):
nice to know it's there.
I just hope that I've broughtpeople up through the ranks and
have trained people to do betterthan I could ever possibly do,
and that they recognize howimportant this job is.
It is still the noblestprofession on earth as far as
I'm concerned, even when I doretire from this job.
I hope to remain active in lawenforcement in some way, shape
or form, whether it be advisingor counseling or consulting,
training, training.
(49:27):
But it is a noblest profession.
That's out there.
I absolutely love being apolice officer.
I still feel alive when I goout and do some car stops or I
go out and back people up oncalls for service.
If you're a leader, I recommendyou do that once in a while.
I think sometimes it'stherapeutic for me, honestly,
but it helps you remainconnected with your front line.
Steve Morreale (49:41):
Yeah, keeps your finger on the pulse.
Absolutely Right if you'redoing it.
I got you A last question foryou, bill Walt.
If you had an opportunity totalk to someone here or who has
passed that you have not had anopportunity to pick their brain,
who might that be?
Bill Walsh (49:53):
I would probably love to have a sit down
conversation with Bill Bratton.
As I mentioned earlier, hisbook really inspired the
trajectory, I think my careerand my academic pursuits have
taken, so I really like to justhave a conversation with him and
I've already thanked him inperson for it.
But it really elaborate on theimpact that his work had on me
and the great things he did aschief and so many different
organizations I mean the LosAngeles Police Department, you
(50:14):
know he's a big guy.
Steve Morreale (50:14):
He was a Boston guy when we started.
I've known him for many years.
Bill Walsh (50:16):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think that would be probably the
person I would like to talkwith about policing, at least
for sure.
Steve Morreale (50:20):
That's terrific.
Well, we had the pleasure oftalking to Bill Walsh, change
agent, a forward thinkingcaptain for the Voorhees Police
Department, so thank you forlistening.
That's the last of our episode,Bill.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Bill Walsh (50:33):
Come on.
Thank you, Steve.
I really appreciate theopportunity and it was great
chatting with you, and thanksfor all the work you're doing to
further the education base andthe knowledge base of law
enforcement officers andprofessionals around the world.
Steve Morreale (50:42):
I appreciate it, so stand by for another episode
.
Thanks for listening.
Steve Morialli from Boston,you've been listening to the Cop
Doc Podcast.
Intro (50:50):
Thanks for listening to the Cop Doc Podcast with Dr
Steve Morialli.
Steve is a retired lawenforcement practitioner and
manager, turned academic andscholar from Worcester State
University.
Please tune into The Cop DocPodcast for regular episodes of
interviews with thought leadersin policing.
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