From Beat Cop to Congress: Brian Stahl's Journey

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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(00:20):
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All right, Welcome back to CopsOne Donut.

(00:49):
I'm your host, Eric Levine.
Today with me I got the one,the only, my firearms friend,
Brian Stahl.

Speaker 2 (00:55):
How's it going, brother?
It's good man.
I appreciate you having me onthis.
Finally, I know Finally,finally.

Speaker 1 (01:01):
It's been a while.
It's been almost a year and ahalf that.

Speaker 2 (01:08):
I've asked you to do this.
Yes, at least, at least yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:10):
But every time I asked you, there just happened
to be a recruit, firearmstraining going on or something.
Yeah, we were out of townteaching or something.
Yes, Exactly so.
Well, brother, glad to finallyhave you on here.
You got a lot of stuff going onin your life.
I do Exciting stuff, fun stuff,yeah, but I want people that
are listening.
If you're listening to this,you guys know my format.

(01:32):
We're going to talk about Brian.
I want you guys to know hisbackground a little bit, where
he came from, what drew him tohis life of service Because, as
we know, everybody's gotdifferent reasons, but for the
most part there's always likethese collective similarities of
why people got into service,and I think it's fun to hear
that stuff.
And then we'll get into yourlaw enforcement specialty which,

(01:54):
if you didn't get the hint atthe beginning, it involves
firearms.
That's why I wore my retrorifle shirt today.

Speaker 2 (02:00):
I was just commenting on that.
Yeah, it's a very, very sexyshirt.

Speaker 1 (02:04):
It is.
I like it.
It it's loud and boisterous,just like a barrett 50, that is
that is.
That is an accurate depictionof a barrett yes, and they're
one of my sponsors, so it waskind of a trick statement I love
it.
I wear a retro rifle shirt onevery show, so I love it.
And then, um, we're gonna get,uh, into the.
The educational side that Ilike to point out is, uh, where
is firearms going?
Because we're going to get into.
The educational side that Ilike to point out is where is

(02:27):
firearms going?
Because we're going to talkabout your specialty there and
the training and all that.
And then what's the future holdfor Brian Stahl?

Speaker 2 (02:33):
Yeah, sounds good, man, All right guys.

Speaker 1 (02:35):
Settle up, let's go First off.
Brian, where are you from?

Speaker 2 (02:40):
Man, I'm kind of from all over.
I was actually born in Nevada,okay yeah, man, I'm kind of from
all over.
I was actually born in nevada,okay yeah, but uh, vegas, no,
reno sparks nevada.
Um, my dad did a lot of thingswith the airline industry, so we
traveled around a lot okay uh,we lived in nevada and utah and
california and back to utah andcal to Utah and California and

(03:02):
so we kind of just moved allover the place growing up, moved
out to Texas 22 years ago, cameout here to to.
I attempted to play collegefootball out here, okay.

Speaker 1 (03:21):
Actually different breed.

Speaker 2 (03:22):
But yeah, yeah, so no , I read out of high school.
I got a scholarship to playfootball Okay At Weber State
University.
What position, strong safety,all right, yeah.
So you had some speed A littlebit, all right, yeah, a little
bit.
Not like speed, you see,nowadays it was different back
then.
But you know a 4.5, 4.40 is myfastest, so you know it was a

(03:48):
different world back then.
You have linemen running fasterthan that now, which is crazy
to me.
But no, so I did the wholesport thing growing up all
through, you know, elementaryschool, middle school, high
school, played all the sports,fell in love with football, got

(04:08):
a scholarship to play out there,did a year out there,
redshirted for a year.
My mom's cancer came back so Idecided to move back to
California to help out with thatand I was planning on
transferring to Fresno StateUniversity to play.
I had a couple friends thatwere on the team already that I
played high school ball with Inthe offseason.

(04:30):
I completely blew my knee outso I tore my ACL, mcl, pcl and
meniscus.

Speaker 1 (04:36):
All the fun.

Speaker 2 (04:37):
All of it.
It was a good time.
I rehabbed for a year at homeat a junior college, played
there a year at home at a juniorcollege, played there, and then
, um, you know, I wanted to tryto pursue, to go back to
division one football, and umcame out to the university of
north texas and tried to walk on, you know, sent some highlight

(04:58):
tapes and they realized, and Irealized real quick, that I
wasn't the guy in the highlighttapes anymore.
So hard pill to swallow, I betyeah, but I'd already made the
move Right.
So I'd already alreadycommitted, like I just up and

(05:20):
left, like I pulled all routesand moved to to North Texas.
And once that didn't work outthe way I hoped it would have.
You know, got as a plan foreverybody kind of thing.
Yeah, it didn't work.
So I started looking around andI applied at several different
agencies in North Texas and, youknow, eventually got hired on

(05:41):
at Irving.

Speaker 1 (05:43):
Oh, you started at Irving I did.
I didn't know that did okay.
I did slumming it a little bit,that's okay, yeah.
I did too.

Speaker 2 (05:51):
I slummed it up in Saginaw Michigan yeah, so no,
irving was great man, it was it.
It was actually the thirdagency I tested for, but the
first agency that called me back, right, they called me on a
Monday and offered me a job, andthen Tuesday that another
agency called, and Wednesdayanother agency called and, um,
I'd already committed to herpingat that point so I think it,

(06:11):
you know it.
Everything happens for a reason.
Yeah, I met my wife that way.
You know, um, you know I still,I still love you know a bunch
of guys over there herping.
I've been obviously gone for 10years now.

Speaker 1 (06:25):
How long were you there?

Speaker 2 (06:26):
10 and a half years you did 10 and a half.

Speaker 1 (06:28):
Oh man, that's a.
That is ballsy to leave adepartment after 10 and a half.

Speaker 2 (06:33):
Yeah, we could talk about why.
You know there's a couplereasons.
I was, you know you're not theonly person that said that.
There's a lot of guys that arelike man that took nuts it does,
it does.

Speaker 1 (06:47):
Okay.
So for me separated from activeduty Air Force four years yeah,
common Like the shit or get offthe pot time is about eight to
ten years, because you're eithergoing to be a lifer or you're
getting out.
So you got to kind of make thatdecision quick.
I knew I wanted to be a copoutside, so it was not hard for
me, that was an easy decision.

(07:08):
Then became a cop up in Saginaw.
I was there for a while andthen I was like not getting paid
enough.
I hadn't had any real committedtime.
But when you combine the yearsnow we're talking eight years
it's like I got to make adecision here.
I got to find a final place.
I got to do that.
So I get kind of where you'recoming from, but yours is more

(07:29):
gutsy than mine.

Speaker 2 (07:31):
Yeah, especially because none of my time rolled
over Right.
You start from scratch yeah.
You dedicate 10 years plus ofyour life to service and then
you start over and it's like,yeah, that's cool, yeah, those
10 years don't count.
You know, which is fine.
You know, everything happensfor a reason.

(07:52):
So, no, I, I did 10 years inIrving and then, uh, well, while
I was there, my a guy that Iwent to the Academy with Andrew
Esparza.
He, him and I hit it off Like wewere like brothers.
You know him, and I hit it offlike we were like brothers, you
know.
And, uh, I met his sister, justby happenstance, one day, we
were going to pick up his boatand met his sister and and uh,

(08:15):
um, you know, we, short timelater, we started talking.
And who's my wife now, zoe?
Um, you know, andrew and I werepartners.
We went to the academy together, we trained.
On every, every shift that wetrained, we were together.
And then, after we, you know,kind of got cut loose, we were
always together, riding two mans, or whatever the case may be.

(08:37):
And uh, two years into ourcareer, uh, I had a little bit
of seniority on him.
I had five badge numbers on him,you know so I was able to take
time off, go down to san antoniofor some vacation time and um,
that's when andrew died in theline of duty.
So, uh, you know, again,everything happens for a reason.

(09:01):
I got to meet andrew and spendthe last two years of his life
literally seven days a weektogether with him, and then I
got to meet his sister, which isnow my beautiful wife and we
have three amazing kids.
And you know, it's one of thosethings where, you know,
football didn't work out andIrving did.
At the end of my time in Irving, it kind of uh was time for a

(09:26):
change.
So I went to to uh Fort Worth,obviously, and you know, uh
started building a career there.
But I've been very blessed man,very blessed what made you pick
.

Speaker 1 (09:40):
Well, I mean football to policing.
It's not the craziest jump.
I see a lot of former athletesthat's.
That's actually kind of prettycommon.
Um yeah, why did you choose?
Why not firefighter?
Why not?

Speaker 2 (09:53):
you know, um looking back, I probably should have
been a firefighter, right that'swhat we all say that yeah, we
all should have went.
No so, uh, you know, my, mygrandfather had a 30 year career
in firefighting.
My uncle is a captain on theWest Coast right now in
California as a firefighter.
I have a couple uncles thatwere in law enforcement growing

(10:15):
up, so I always knew that that'skind of the road I was going to
go down if football didn't workout.
And you know, I was a senior inhigh school when 9-11 happened,
and so I had one of thosemoments and I'll never forget it
Actually, it was I was.

(10:46):
I was talking from colleges- asa high school athlete, you know,
depending on where you're fromor skill set or whatever the
case may be happened.
I went into his office becausethat school was kind of like a.
That day nobody cared aboutgoing to class, everybody was

(11:08):
focused on.

Speaker 1 (11:09):
You know the tragedy that happened my instructor
because I was my first year ofcollege tried to make us stay in
class, not because he wasfearful of our safety, he's like
it's just the news.
It'll be there when the classis over, not understanding what
was going on.

Speaker 2 (11:24):
Yeah, no, knowing that nobody is focused on what
he's saying right now, right,yeah, so it was kind of the same
thing in high school, right,which was pretty cool.
So I went to the gym and then Iwent to the coach's office and
we were talking and I havefamily members that were, you
know, prior military.
My dad's side, my grandfather,served in, you know, several

(11:46):
different wars.
Um, my mom's side, my, mygrandfather, served in several
different wars.
One was Navy, one was Marines.
I was leaning towards Marinesand I walked in and I said I'm
going to the Marines Like thatday.
I said I'm out Like I.

Speaker 1 (12:00):
Yeah, yeah, I think a lot of people did.

Speaker 2 (12:03):
Yeah, exactly, you know like, you see what's
happening to your country andyou realize real quick the
things that you think matter toyou are so small out of it.
But he, he, he brought thingsup and opportunities that I

(12:28):
potentially have in the comingmonths or year that a lot of
people don't have, withscholarships and everything
right, you know.
so ultimately I ended up, uh,not going to the military and
and decided to go the collegefootball route and yeah you know
, tried to make that work and itand it didn't, but it led me to

(12:49):
a different life of service,where I am right now.
Yeah, a different life.

Speaker 1 (12:52):
You know what's crazy is?
I hear in my own, my own dad,which I just did a podcast with
him here yesterday.
Um, he'll tell me one of hisbiggest regrets is not joining
the military.
And I'm like, as somebody who'sin the military still, yeah, I,
I, I and and in law enforcement, and in law enforcement, as a
military member, I understandwhat you're saying because you

(13:17):
feel like there's some level ofservice that you didn't get to
do for your country.
But I promise you, more thanlikely, 99% of people that join
the military don't get you getto serve more as a cop and a
firefighter to your communityand to people that probably
means more than as a servicemember.

(13:40):
And when I talk to other servicemembers about their service,
I'm like, what'm like?
What do you remember helping?
And they always say the samething my brothers and sisters
next to me.
It's not that you were servingcountry, necessarily.
It's just some badasses theyhave.
Don't get me wrong, it's thatthey were over there serving
each other.
That sounds really dirty.
No, I get it, yeah totally.

Speaker 2 (14:02):
Yeah, but you get what I'm saying when you're in,
you know, when you're in themiddle of a, a sandpit, yeah,
somewhere in in on the otherside of the world, like the only
people that matter to you rightnow are the people standing
next to you right americans yeahlike we were wearing the same
uniform.
We're fighting the same fight,you know, and it's so.
Yeah, that level of service is,um, obviously, you know, a

(14:23):
thankless level of service forsure.
Yeah, um, but serving, beingable to serve the communities
that I live in and that I'm apart of, yeah, is a different
level of service.
Yeah, it's so satisfying.

Speaker 1 (14:37):
Yeah, it is very satisfying yeah, and it's, you
know, just like with thispodcast, like I felt I always
wanted to be NPO.
I put in for it several times,never got it, always got beat
and, like you said things, it'skind of the theme for this
episode Things happen for areason.
So I never got it.
And so COVID hit and I'm like Iknow there's more ways that I

(15:00):
could be helping and I wanted tofeel I kind of figured out how
I wanted to help.
I wanted to use social media ina way, just didn't wasn't sure
how.
And COVID was a good time tostart the podcast, just to try
to start figuring it out Right.
And I didn't necessarily startout.
You know, you're figuring,you're trying to try stuff and
I'm like, eh, I don't want to bea dancing TikTok cop, I don't

(15:21):
want to do this.
I don't want to be a dancingTikTok cop, I don't want to do
this.

Speaker 2 (15:23):
I don't do that.
Yeah, please don't.

Speaker 1 (15:24):
Yeah, yeah, I was like, how do I do it?
I was like, well, I like humor,so if I could make things funny
and educational, I'll try to dothat.
Share perspective and educateLike just educate is the big
thing.
I think that's how we bridgethat gap with people and 100
percent this started and itevolved and now obviously you're
a part of the process and so,yeah, I like this level of

(15:48):
service, what I'm doing now, andyou always feel like you could
do more.
But I promise you guys, foranybody out there listening, if
you have regrets about notserving your country but you're
out there as an EMT or adispatcher or firefighter,
police officer, I promise youyou are serving in a much more
meaningful way than you probablywould have got from the
military.

Speaker 2 (16:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (16:11):
It's okay.
So you choose policing and youwent right when you should have
probably went left.

Speaker 2 (16:17):
Yes.

Speaker 1 (16:17):
Old school joke.
For those wondering, like whydo people say left instead of
right or whatever at theacademies?
At a lot of the big policedepartments the firefighter
academy is right next to it andit's usually to the left and the
police department is to theright especially in our case.
But you know you did it right.
You went to an agency and thenyou went to, you know, probably

(16:39):
the best agency that's out therethat I've ever heard of yeah,
for sure.
And that's where there thatI've ever heard of.
Yeah, and for sure, that'sthat's where you went.
And how many years have youbeen an officer?
Total, total, 20, a little over20, okay.
So you're over 20, yeah, and inthat 20 years we all get
specialties.
You guys have heard mine uh,property crimes, mobile field

(16:59):
force, use of force, controltactics those are those are the
big four, and now it's real-timecrime center stuff.
So those are my.
You're over that right now.

Speaker 2 (17:08):
Yeah, buddy, oh really yeah, oh man.

Speaker 1 (17:11):
That's my dream, yeah .
I didn't know that I did notknow that.
Yeah, Good for you.
Yep Got off the street and nowI'm over there and living the
dream baby.
So, yeah, that's been my goal.
I've been trying to get theresince I was a corporal.
As a detective, I was trying tocreate a spot for a corporal
there.

Speaker 2 (17:27):
That's such a cool position it is.
It's so fun.
It is Like the real-time crimecenter.
To me is like next world stuff.
It is it changes policing.
The stuff that they are doing iscrazy.
When I fly with Air One one youknow, and, and when I whenever,

(17:48):
because I'm a part of like 20different you know signal
threads and one of them is thethe air one thread and all you
know all the other ones butthere's a real-time crime center
one, yep, and like the amountof information like you get,
like this call came out and likewithin two minutes, like
real-time crime center hasliterally painted this entire
guy's life picture and vehiclesand addresses and I mean every

(18:14):
like it's.
I'm like how are they doingthat?
Like it is wild and it's onlygetting better.
Yeah, it's, yeah, it's good foryou, man, that's awesome.

Speaker 1 (18:24):
And what's unique with where we're at?
Because I'm a.
I'm an executive board memberfor the national real-time crime
center association which is abig mouthful, but uh, I get to
see real-time crime centersthroughout the nation.
Yeah, I've been on that for thelast four years, okay, so I've
seen all these developingreal-time crime centers where
we're at.

Speaker 2 (18:44):
We're one of a kind yeah, it's wild like one of a
you know and I don't haveanything to compare it to like
you do, but I just know whatI've seen.
Yeah, working air one andflying around the city in a
helicopter and the informationthat just gets dumped on me
while I'm up in the air and I'mlike, yeah, you know, you tell
the pilot like take a right dude.
Yeah, why?

(19:04):
Because they're over at thisintersection right now.

Speaker 1 (19:07):
Yeah, well, they said they're over here, listen, yeah
yeah, and it's funny that youbring up um the threads.
You know it's something thatconcerns me in policing is, uh,
those threads in the sharing ofinformation.
That is not a controlled method, right, and I think we need to

(19:27):
abandon it really into somethinglike, uh, evertel.
Have you ever seen that app?
so it used to be just likesignal yeah which is and for
those listening officers, a wayto listen.
Cities aren't going to giveevery officer a cell phone and
all that stuff.
So the way that they shareinformation to try to catch bad
guys in the act and stuff likethat is um, through app services

(19:48):
, well, you can't.
There's certain information youcan't share, right, it's all
see, just yeah, protected andstuff like that.
So officers are sharing whatlimited info they can in any
method they can, and thattypically is a signal app.
Well, it's.
I think that it's gotlitigations going on right now
and then it's not going tosurvive.
Uh, the departments aren't youknow because you don't know

(20:09):
until you know yeah one of thosethings you're just trying to
use.
The latest and greatest signalis one of those.
Evertel was another version ofthat.
Well, evertel got bought outand the company that bought them
out like just flipped it on itshead.
So it's a because of theassociation I check out all the
latest and greatest tech yeahand I checked that tech out and,

(20:31):
holy cow, I actually hadspencer sitting on a demo.
Uh, jason spencer, yeah, fellin love with he's making his
team use it.
Um, really yeah immediately.

Speaker 2 (20:40):
I would contact air support for sure.
Yes, cause they are huge.
I bet if I pull my phone outright now, in all of these
signal threads I have over 400messages.

Speaker 1 (20:51):
This will clean that up.

Speaker 2 (20:52):
That are.
You know, I mute them all.
Right, Like I'm on 30 of them,like I mute them and guys are
like oh, I sent you a message onsignal and I'm like yeah, yeah,
and I'm like, yeah, yeah, checkout, you know, yeah, get, get
with me after I'll show youEverTel I think it's great and I
think it's another one of thoseapps that's going to kind of
change law enforcement.

Speaker 1 (21:11):
It's just you have to you know how it is.
When somebody told you aboutWhatsApp you know and you're
using, you know nothing you'relike, okay, this is cool.
And then somebody told you aboutSignal, you're like, well, I
already have WhatsApp, I don'tneed to look at that, and then
you realize WhatsApp's wide open, yeah, and you're like, eh, and
then you get Signal and you'relike, well, this isn't CJIS
compliant and that could be anissue down the road, right, and

(21:33):
so I think that's where we'vecome to now.
I think Signal's going to be aCJIS issue.
Well, E like next level, yeah,and they're not a sponsor or
anything like that.
I'm just I think they're one ofthose things that can change
policing.

Speaker 2 (21:46):
So that's awesome, man, yeah it's very cool, I
think, I think you'll dig that,but um, how did we get down this
fucking?
I don't, you know.
That's the beauty of this,though I know, yes, so yeah, no,
let me talk about irving alittle bit.
So, um, let's back up.
So okay, I was.
I was very fortunate and veryblessed in my career.
I got to work with a lot ofreally great people.

(22:08):
I got to do a lot of reallycool things.
I did almost four years deepundercover narcotics and what a
blast man.

Speaker 1 (22:20):
Four years undercover narcotics yeah A white boy.

Speaker 2 (22:22):
Yeah, it was fun.
Yeah, I had the long hair, longbeard.

Speaker 1 (22:26):
So you need something , because you look country.

Speaker 2 (22:28):
Yeah, so I had my ears pierced, I had this pierced
, whatever this is called.

Speaker 1 (22:31):
Okay, were you going like for a Fred Durst type?
Look, no, that's what I'mpicturing.

Speaker 2 (22:51):
Yeah, man, it was just one of those times where,
like, there was a group of usthat came over together and,
like some guys would, some guyswould, like you know, go like
crazy with uh, trying to changetheir appearance.
I didn't go too wild, I, I, youknow, I got a my ears pierced
or whatever, but, um, that was ablast man.
I always thought that that wasthe greatest job in law
enforcement, like by far.
Like you get to wear whateveryou want, you don't have to
shave because you know beforeyou could wear beards.
We're talking about 2008, yeah,2007, 2008.

Speaker 1 (23:13):
Like there's no agencies that allowed beards, no
, shit, we didn't get beardsuntil like 2017, yeah, so like
you know.

Speaker 2 (23:19):
Now it's like what do you mean?
I don't have to shave?
Like, yeah, sign me up, youknow, yeah, I can talk however I
want.
I don't have to be professionalexactly.

Speaker 1 (23:23):
Actually, it's encouraged.
What do you mean?
I don't have to shave.
Yeah, Sign me up.
I can talk however I want.
I don't have to be professional.

Speaker 2 (23:27):
Exactly Actually it's encouraged, and you got to use
different props and you kind ofjust had free reign to go out
there and go forth and try tocombat these cartels and
different entities that werebringing drugs in.
What was your favorite bust?
Oh man, I got a couple.

(23:50):
So I've been, I've been a partof a of a few different things.
Uh, you know, motorcycle gangstuff was really interesting to
me.
I I got to be a part of that,obviously because of of you know
the way I looked.
Um, I was able to a part ofthat, obviously because of you
know the way I looked, um, I wasable to to kind of fit in with
them that's racial profiling,sir yeah, it is, it is that,

(24:12):
that's exactly it.
But no, you know.
So you know it was.
I don't I don't necessarilyhave like a favorite bust.
Um, there's a lot of timeswhere you were able to do
something and take down aneyesore of a neighborhood.
You know, be it a drug house,and you know, as me, as the

(24:34):
undercover wearing the mask andall the stuff, because we can't
give up our identity.
But you're standing next to theSWAT guys who were, you were
there, kicking doors andthrowing flashbangs and and when
the kind of the, the, the dustsettles, having neighbors come
up and like just wrap their armsaround you.
Thanking you, yeah, thank youLike, finally, finally, you know

(24:56):
like cause.

Speaker 1 (24:58):
They're secondhand victims of the violence that the
drug houses bring.

Speaker 2 (25:03):
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, you know I it's uh,it's one of those things where
I've I've experienced itfirsthand as an undercover
narcotics investigator I had, um, you know I've had some
problems with informants and um,you know, I've been shot at
several times.
Um, going to neighborhoods thatI don't necessarily maybe fit

(25:25):
into it, you, you stick out andit's almost like when you roll
up to a location they are,they're hidden away, like they,
they're so fearful of evencoming outside and then, once
the flashbangs go off and theshotgun breaching goes off, and
there's guys, you know,handcuffed in the front yard.

(25:47):
You could, I've seen it severaltimes where, as a collective,
the community's like, yeah, likethey just sigh, like it's a
sigh of relief, and then theycome up and the burden's been
lifted.

Speaker 1 (25:59):
Yeah, they start thanking you.

Speaker 2 (26:00):
So I mean that was super cool to be a part of, you
know start thanking you.

Speaker 1 (26:07):
So I mean, that was super cool to be a part of you
know.
Um, so question on that,because it's going to be people
listening in law enforcement.
They're going to be like howdid you get into it?
I've always wanted to get intothat.
Was there a training coursethat you took to learn how to be
undercover?
Was there how?
Did you step your career intothat because you got to take
steps to get there.

Speaker 2 (26:21):
You do.
So you have to obviously showan interest and you have to.
For me, the path was umnetworking with the narcotics
officers at the time before Iwas over there and, believe it
or not, like the narcoticsdivision, especially where I
came from, they get so manycomplaints that they don't have

(26:44):
the manpower or the time to todeal with them.

Speaker 1 (26:47):
Yeah, not complaints on the narcotics unit.
They're dealing with complaintsin the community.
Yeah, like, so a citizen willcall it yeah.

Speaker 2 (26:54):
Yeah, thank you.
A citizen will call in and say,hey, I think my neighbor is
dealing whatever, like whatever.
You know Well, if the narcoticsdivision is, they're busy for
the next three weeks withwarrants and by-bus and whatever
.
They don't have the manpower tofield that complaint.

(27:17):
Right, a citizen?
You know they will pickofficers within the department
that they know can go out andkind of investigate that on
their free time in betweenanswering calls or whatever the
case may be.
So that's what I, that's what Ireally did is I networked with

(27:38):
the narcotics officers that werebefore my time and then started
making, um, some big narcoticsarrests and then helping them
out with traffic stops andidentifying people.
And there's, there's really anart to that, right.
So, like when you get a phonecall from a, from a narc, and
they tell you listen, I need youto stop this car and I need you

(28:01):
to just identify them, but Idon't need you to tip them off
to anything.
You know just as well as I doOur generation of officers and
our ability to talk to people isdifferent than the current
generation of officers, right,right.
So they would tell me hey, Ineed this car knocked off Now.
It's my job to find a violation.

(28:21):
Like I can't just stop this carbecause a narc told me to,
that's against the law.
Right, you have to have areason to stop this car.
So then I would, I would surveythis car and then I would make a
stop, a legal stop, whetherit's a wide right turn or, you
know, fellow signal a hundredfeet, whatever the case may be,

(28:43):
and go up there and just play itcool, get everybody's
identification.
I get to be the good cop.
I let them all go with awarning.
Yeah, they have no idea thatI'm winning.
Yeah, my job was just toidentify you guys.
Like I have zero interest onanything you have in the car, I
don't care if you have warrants,I'm not even going to run your

(29:03):
name.
I don't care if you havewarrants, I'm not even going to
run your name, I don't care?
Yeah, because we're, we're,we're moving towards something
bigger, yeah, bigger, right,right.
So you know you knock, you knowyou knock this car off, you get
that identification, you callthe narcotics investigator, you
let them know and then you knowtwo weeks later there's
something big that happens or orwhatever the case may be.
So that was kind of the routethat I, that I, that I took

(29:24):
Right and I and I really enjoyeddoing those investigations.
I enjoyed the surveillance sideof things, I enjoyed, uh, the
Intel, the investigative side ofthings.

Speaker 1 (29:36):
Um, cause you're learning the whole time.
You're learning the language,you're learning how they talk to
each other.
There's a, there's a lot of keycomponents.
It is, in its sense, trainingfor that position that you're
eventually, you eventually getto.
So the point that I want peopleto take away from the
discussion we're having on this,where I'm trying to get to, is
you don't go to a class for thisstuff.

(29:56):
No, are there classes?
Sure, but nothing is going toprepare you, like on the job.
On the job, training is goingto prepare you, yeah, and I
don't know that we do that asmuch anymore.
I don't know.
I I haven't been in that worldin a while.
Uh, because when I started out,narc was really something I was
trying to get into, um, and then, like you said, everything
happens for a reason my pathstarted diverting and uh ended

(30:19):
up getting more into the, the,the big think, the, the brain
side of catching bad guys, rightwith the real-time crime center
stuff and the tech behind that.

Speaker 2 (30:28):
But yeah, yeah.
So I mean, it's just one ofthose things where you, you
network with people and and youtalk to people, you, you, you
offer assistance when you canbecause you know that they need
the help you kiss their ass sothey remember you.

Speaker 1 (30:43):
Yeah, yeah, I guess, if you want to call it that for
sure, you know brown nose babyall day.
Um, hey, I did it.
Yeah, we all do it.

Speaker 2 (30:51):
Sure, exactly, you got to show you're dedicated,
you have to yeah and andsometimes, um, it doesn't work
out.
Because I remember the firsttime I put in for narcotics, I I
didn't get it and I'd had allthese arrests and I'd I'd
knocked off a ton of it's a hugeego hit man.
Oh, I knocked off so muchnarcotics and and, and you know,

(31:13):
I put in and interviewed and Ididn't get it.
I'll never forget um, I won'tsay his name.
He was one of my sergeants atthe time, one of my mentors, a
great godfearing christian manof faith right he called me to
the office and he's like, hey,here's the deal.
Like it didn't work out and I'llremember, I'll never forget.

(31:33):
I was like man, I'm not doinganything anymore.
Oh, like I'm gonna go.
Like I'm just gonna go, youknow what, just send me calls.
I'm just gonna answer calls,like whatever.
Like I'm done, like I, yeahknow, for almost a year I've
done everything I could and I'veknocked off and I had all the
stats at the time, like this,many of this dope and like

(31:54):
whatever you know.
And and he goes, okay, allright, well, I'm going to pray
for you and I need you to go towork.
And I was like, yeah, whatever,like I was just, I was a young,
yep, young thundercat, likeready to go like no and I
remember I went and sat in aparking lot for about 30 minutes

(32:17):
and I was just like I took 30minutes to to just basically
drink my own tears like I wasjust right.
Oh, I was so irritated the pitytrain was there, and then I see
a car pass and I was like Iknow that car, I gotta go stop
that car, it's too fun.
Oh yeah, so you know you'rebasically denying yourself the

(32:37):
fun.
Yeah, I stopped this car and endup getting like four or five
ounces of meth or whatever outof it and he rolls up and he's
like well, I didn't last longand I was like I can't I can't
do it, yeah, so I just I justyeah, I mean I felt sorry for
myself for about a minute andand then I went and continued to
do what I was doing and itworked out on that well, that's
a good message for officers tohear out there.

Speaker 1 (32:58):
Like, listen, when you don't get the job because
it's happened to me I told you Ididn't put him for an npl spot
three times, didn't get it,ended up promoting and then I
put him for an intel spot as acorporal and I thought I had
done everything that you couldpossibly do, uh, to get that
spot and put in.
Even my own sergeant was like,yeah, you got it.

(33:18):
Like I've talked to people, yougot it.
I'm like, oh shit, cool, sodidn't get it.
Yeah, and that was a shitsandwich to eat.
You just sit there and you'relike, just think, you know, you
just reflect inward.
What did I do?

Speaker 2 (33:32):
wrong, I didn't do anything wrong?

Speaker 1 (33:34):
yeah, like, and you just you do, you eat it for a
little bit, and then what do youdo?

Speaker 2 (33:39):
you go right back out and keep doing the same thing
yeah, just keep grinding man,just keep working and serving
like it's especially if it's fun, if it's a passion like.

Speaker 1 (33:49):
That's why you should be going towards it yeah,
exactly, you know the.

Speaker 2 (33:54):
To serve with law enforcement or ems or fire, you
have to have a passion and it'sit's hard for young officers or
people new to experience theroad, the road bumps and the
nose and the closed doors andand find it within themselves.
To, you know, uh, continue toserve.

(34:17):
But okay, now I need to call anaudible here, like what I did
didn't work.
That's fine, let's figuresomething else out.
While continuing to serve ourpeople, yeah, you know, um,
because giving up is not anoption right you know, not
serving is not an option.

Speaker 1 (34:34):
If that's the case, then just go find something else
to do, kind of thing you know,and that's kind of a tough pill
to to swallow, yeah, for somepeople, right well, we need
supervisors to step up andactually lead, and not just sit
there and collect a paycheck andhope they don't have to do much
in their job.
Yeah, I'll let you speak on that, because you outrank me by a
couple of ranks, so I have myown opinions, but right but a

(34:58):
guy like, okay, if I had seen anofficer like you.
I know you're grinding, I knowthis is a position.
I should know this as yoursupervisor.
This is what you're goingtowards and it's my job to help
you get there.
So when you don't get there,the next thing I need to do is
pull you aside.
All right, tell me how.
What do you think?
What are you thinking right now?
see if I can get you to open up.

(35:19):
And you know, let it out.
You know this is bullshit.
I did all these things, this,that person didn't.
You know, let it out.
You know this is bullshit.
I did all these things, thatperson didn't.
You know, whatever it is howeveryou took it and then help you
swing around to the right way.
Okay, take a week, have yourpity party for yourself.
Everybody needs it, yeah, butyou got to get back out there.

(35:40):
You got to do the job.
And what is it that you want todo?
If you tell me now that youstill want to do narcotics,
that's still like if I were tooffer you it tomorrow.
Is that something you want todo?
And you say yes, well then, themission hasn't changed.

Speaker 2 (35:52):
Yeah, you're still passionate about it.

Speaker 1 (35:54):
Yeah, so you're going to have to step up.
This is going to show them morethan ever that you got denied
the position and you still keptgoing after it.
That speaks more than all thosestats that you just did.

Speaker 2 (36:07):
So yeah, a hundred percent and having a supervisor
that does that nowadays, fromwhat I've gathered, you know,
I've been off the streets for alittle bit, but it's super rare
right, like it's.
It is it's super rare and it'sreally unfortunate.
You know, like I said, the, the, the, the sergeant.
You know what I'm gonna say?
his name is his sergeant rickcutler okay um, he was one of

(36:31):
the guys that not only uhassisted me with my uh drive to
get to narcotics, but once Ieventually made it to swat he
was he was uh big in that too,um, because he was a swat
sergeant at the time.
So, you know, he having havinga supervisor that believes in

(36:56):
you and has your back and wantsto continue to um assist you and
enable you into achieving yourcareer goals, yes, huge, yeah.

Speaker 1 (37:07):
And and I think that that, unfortunately, may be a
little bit of a lost art with uhsome supervisors- oh, I'll go
out and say even more, 80 ofthem, yeah, um, I am very harsh
and critical on supervisorssimply because the military this

(37:28):
is the one thing that I reallydid take away from them they
train leadership from day one.
When do we train leadership inpolicing?
Once you become a leader, onceyou become a leader, once you
pass the test, it's insane.
So are we getting better at it?
Yeah, but we're light yearsbehind on a model that's been
working because in the militaryand for those listening, yes,

(37:50):
I'll say the jokes on myself,self-deprecating air force, I'm
air force.
So, yeah, yeah, it might not bethis, the same exact military
as the marine no, hold on.

Speaker 2 (37:59):
There's some bad dudes in the air force there are
.
Pjs are bad.
Yeah, yeah, come on, I get it,hold on.

Speaker 1 (38:06):
They are A-10 pilots definitely bad.

Speaker 2 (38:08):
I've trained with some of those dudes and you're
like okay, they're bad.

Speaker 1 (38:12):
They're there, but I'm a gatekeeper.
You come to the gate.
I take your ID, thank, you forcoming to the gates, I'll act
like.
Point being is from day one.
Military structure across theboard is leadership.
If you're an airman, basic, aprivate, whatever it is, your
job is to fill in the guy that'sahead of you if he falls in

(38:34):
combat or whatever.
Right, I'm not trying to becryptic.

Speaker 2 (38:37):
If they can't do their job.
That's reality, though, rightyeah.

Speaker 1 (38:40):
So that person's job the one that's above you is to
train you to do their spot, andthe same for the guy that's
above him.
So that is how policing shouldbe.
I should be training you how todo my job.
Now in policing there is kindof a degree of separation, at
least at our department, becausea sergeant could just be over

(39:02):
officers and not have thatmiddle, that corporal position
or detective position.
But I've just taken that stepto kind of show them that
detective spot and leadershipskills.
So I always tell my officersthe same thing I'll have, sit
down, come in the office.
Hey, here's my expectations doyour job, make sure that you

(39:23):
don't leave your people hangingyeah and be professional and
everything else is good to go.
yeah, my job and expectationsfor me, for you, is to give you
everything you need and that youtell me you need to be
successful out there right.
Other than that, I don't haveanything to do.
So if, if you're expecting meto be the type of sergeant like

(39:45):
in patrol, for instance thatgoes out and can make an arrest
and take them to the jail andbook them in and do all that
stuff, that's not me, that's notmy job anymore.
I gave up that right to do allthat.
Now I shouldn't be dumping workon you, that's for sure, but we
know how this job goes.
Every once in a while you justget stuck with the shit sandwich
and you got to handle it.

(40:05):
But I should be out theregiving you those tools you need
to succeed and you're the onethat should be doing your job.
I will do my job Right.
And if you are upset that I'mnot out there kind of doing what
you're doing, well, maybethere's something that you need
to self-reflect on and what youthink leadership is, because I

(40:27):
don't expect my lieutenant to bedoing sergeant stuff.
Yeah, I don't expect adetective to be doing officer
stuff right, so don't expect meto do officer stuff.
I need to have an understandingyour job.
I need to be able to explain itfor sure let me ask you this
right.

Speaker 2 (40:42):
So I know you and I've known a lot of guys that
have worked for you since you'vepromoted.
Right, you aren't above goingout there in oh no, on the
ground I was.

Speaker 1 (40:54):
I was out on the foot all day.
That's my point, right.

Speaker 2 (40:56):
So you have.
You know, you have a supervisorthat is willing to help Yep,
knowing that that's not theirjob anymore, which is great,
right, like I've had greatsergeants and great lieutenants
that will show up on a call andthey're like what do you need?
Yeah, like that's awesome.

Speaker 1 (41:16):
Yeah, just an extra hand.

Speaker 2 (41:18):
Right, but that 15 minutes that they spend out on
that call, the amount of timeand you know from when you were
an officer uh, you know when Iexperienced that and you go tell
other people and other peopletalk to other people and other
people talk to before you knowit, like now, you have a bunch,
a group of solid officers thatwant to work for this sergeant

(41:43):
or lieutenant because theyaren't scared to get out there
and help when you're.
You know you got 65 callsholding or right, whatever the
case may be.
Right, yeah, and no officershould expect a sergeant or
lieutenant to go handle 25 calls.
Right, that's yeah, that's notwhat we're talking about, but
the fact that they're willing todo that because, on the flip

(42:05):
side of that, you've had, you've, I'm sure you've experienced
sergeants and lieutenants wherethey never leave the office.

Speaker 1 (42:10):
Mm, hmm.

Speaker 2 (42:10):
And it feels like you're drowning out there and
you're like if I could just havesomebody go get like those four
cars information yeah, thiswreck, I could be out of here
like an hour sooner, yep, and Ican go on to the next one, but
there's nobody.

Speaker 1 (42:25):
And the benefit.
You know, you knew the areathat I worked, so you kind of
had I feel the sergeants shouldbe out there, yeah, Because it's
just so dangerous and you'reoutnumbered the entire time.
It's a bar district,entertainment district, and I
needed to have a pulse of howthey handled things anyway,
right, so I can't learn thatfrom a body cam.

(42:45):
It can help, but I can't learnthat from a body cam.
So being out there, I was ableto see kind of where their
control tactics were at, wheretheir mindset was at on decision
making, and it was a bunch ofyoung, rookie officers at zero
to three year mark.
They hadn't even had babies,yeah they were young, most of
them.
They hadn't even had babies man, yeah, they were young most of

(43:06):
them and watching them go outthere in the, in the you know
time that I was down there, wewere able to drop violent crime
by like 37%.

Speaker 2 (43:11):
Yeah, you guys killed it.

Speaker 1 (43:12):
Yeah, they put an article out.

Speaker 2 (43:14):
Yeah, you were killing Jeff.

Speaker 1 (43:14):
Cunningham was definitely a part of that too.
So between him and I and thetactics that we used and the
training, that's the other part.
You know, you can't just lookat your guys and be like you
need to fix that, I need to giveyou a path to fix it.
Yeah, well, luckily controltactics was my thing and swat
stuff was his thing.
Well, I kind of knew.

Speaker 2 (43:34):
So, you know, kind of fast forward in my career a
little bit to to present day.
We'll go back, obviously, but,um, you know we're gonna
tarantino this yeah, for sure,no.
So I kind of knew that whereyou and jeff were supervisors at
, yeah, I knew that it was goingto change.
When you guys kind ofcollectively came down and said,

(43:58):
hey, we want to train ourpeople after hours, yeah, right,
yeah, which was awesome like wenever experienced that at the
range and and having having twosupervisors like you and jeff
that we can trust to like,especially jeff because he knew
all that stuff on the range.
Yeah, yeah, right but, but youknow, like not to steal all the
bullets, or like not right, yeah, not to leave the range like

(44:21):
all destroyed tacticallyappropriate.
We don't steal, yeah, exactlyright.
Um, but no, seriously, in, youknow, having those conversations
and being a part of thoseconversations because of my
position at the range right now,in, in kind of where I'm at
when it comes to the trainingside of things, I, I was all for
it.
Yeah, I'm like, absolutely, youknow, like jeff's, like hey, I

(44:42):
want to put on a carbine schoolfor my people.
And I'm like, yeah, got bothteams spun up.
That's an amazing idea, likeyou know, and you guys did it at
your own pace, which is fine.
You covered all the things thatwere required by T-Cole Great,
you know, and it, we loved it.
Yeah, and it was team buildingand that's the biggest thing

(45:03):
right there, you know, is you'reforcing the team to be together
to go through training.
We're all gonna live throughthis.
We're all gonna do this.
Like I thought it was awesome,like I think you guys, you guys
kind of set the bar for where Ithink a lot of different
entities within the departmentshould be.
Unfortunately, there's not,they're not all there, but it's

(45:26):
definitely moving in thatdirection and you guys were a
definite part of it.

Speaker 1 (45:29):
Yeah, well, it helps.
One thank you for allowing us,because you took a risk, and
then two it goes to supportinghow.
I still think the team model isthe best model and that is
exactly why because you areworking together with the same
people, you understand eachother, how they move and you're

(45:51):
going to be less likely to getinto a higher use of force
because you guys know each otherand your tactics and all that
stuff.
So I really dislike the currentmodels that I see where you're
my supervisor for two days, thisperson's my supervisor for the
next two days and I work withhalf of these people this couple

(46:12):
days and then these half of theI hate that, I hate it.
That's because I've worked onteams and then I went to that
and now I'm back to teams.
Yeah, it's tough, so it's very.
Yeah, that's, that's adifficult part, but um, yeah
anyway, let's go back.
So you did the narcotics thing.
You learned how to do the ucstuff by I did by being out

(46:32):
there yeah, I did so.

Speaker 2 (46:34):
I did go to school for that.
I did a lot of things at haida.
Yeah, haida is yeah, could youamazing?

Speaker 1 (46:40):
can you explain what haida?

Speaker 2 (46:42):
so the high intensity drug trafficking agency is
there are they're kind ofcentralized with throughout the
nation, right?
So I did the North Texas Haida.
It's in Irving and you go tothey offer schools and courses
and they also have their ownentity within the you know crime

(47:05):
fighting with the DEA and theATF and so they partner with
them and there's people actuallyassigned to Haida as task force
officers.
But my experience through Haidawas just training right and it
was amazing training likeundercover narcotic survival,
undercover buys, buy bust, allthese you know warrant writing

(47:26):
how to write warrants issomething that's big right.
And it's the four cornerdoctrine, like, if it's not
within the four corners of thispiece of paper, it didn't happen
or I can't take it into account, right.
So, learning how to writewarrants and, um, you know,
learning how to write warrantsand you know, learning how to
network with judges and districtattorneys and to speak with

(47:50):
these people.
So all the training that I wentthrough once I made it to
narcotics was it was amazing, itwas a lot of fun, very eye
opening, because I approached itas not a police officer.
I approached the training assomebody who's out there buying
drugs, right.

(48:11):
And I learned that from a verysenior narcotics investigator in
Irving at the time and hebasically said, like man, your
ultimate goal obviously is toarrest these people, but if you
walk in there with the mindsetof a police officer, you're
going to portray yourself as apolice officer and it's not

(48:34):
going to work out real well incertain situations, right.
And you know, I think there'stimes where that definitely
benefited me.
You know, I've been in traphouses in different locations in
different big cities in NorthTexas.
You know, and it's kind of likewho are you?
You're right, and the mostbeautiful thing about narcotics

(49:02):
and undercover work is theability to communicate.
You have to effectivelycommunicate because when you're
in a house with four or five,six guys and you know I don't
however much dope you want tothink about their being there on
the table and you're there tobuy some, yeah, they don't know

(49:25):
you.
They automatically assume theworst.
Yeah, they automatically assumeyou are the police, which you
are, but you can't portrayyourself as that.
Right like, I never carried anyidentifying information on me,
ever.
I mean, I had my fake driver'slicense and whatever, but
nothing police related.

(49:47):
You know, had to put out assiston buys and the SWAT teams come
in lights and sirens and I wasable to talk them down and
luckily, my partner was able totell the SWAT team in time like
everything's good Stop.
He got it under control becausewhen they get there, it's mass
chaos.
But you have to have theability to talk to people and
understand the situation thatyou're in.

(50:10):
Yeah, um.
So, yeah, haida, haida was veryinstrumental in that and um, I
think the approach to it isinstrumental too.
I've seen several narcoticsguys go into narcotics because
they they want to do theundercover things and they want
to go buy buy drugs and theywant to help the communities by

(50:33):
sifting these people out, butthey can't let go of the fact
that they're the police.
You know they still wear the.
You know I got your six or yeah, they got the Oakley can glass.

Speaker 1 (50:45):
Yeah, like their watch has a thin blue line on it
or whatever Punisher tattoo.
Yeah, and you're like dude comeon, which is great.

Speaker 2 (50:52):
I'm all for pro-police, but sometimes I try
to steer towards the mostopposite.

Speaker 1 (51:01):
I really do when I'm off, I'm off.

Speaker 2 (51:03):
I don't have any stickers on my truck.
I don't have any, as you cansee.
Star Wars.

Speaker 1 (51:09):
Yeah, you're a see star Wars.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're a starWars guy for sure, but no like.

Speaker 2 (51:12):
so I think, um, guidance with that helped me a
lot and having guys that havebeen down that road for a very
long time and kind of guided me,which made me successful doing
the narcotic stuff.

Speaker 1 (51:25):
So yeah, I did narcotics for four years, almost
four years, the unit guys notactually doing narcotics.

Speaker 2 (51:31):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (51:33):
Yeah, somebody's going to sound clip that.
Later he did narcotics.
He did narcotics for four years.

Speaker 2 (51:37):
Yeah, no, I don't do narcotics, but no.
So I left there and then I wentback to patrol for a short
stint and then, you know, triedout for SW and and got to play
that play that game for a littlebit, which is awesome how many
years did you do?
Swat.
Um, so I was on the team fortwo years before I lateraled to

(52:04):
Fort Worth.
Okay, yeah, so made the bigbucks.
Yeah, no, I lost money comingto Fort worth did you really?

Speaker 1 (52:10):
yeah, I took a huge pay cut.
I thought it was during thattime when they had the big no no
, no, no.

Speaker 2 (52:16):
So I yeah, that was wild man.
That's why, you know, weearlier in in this show we
talked about, people were like,dude, you're crazy because I
lost a lot of money but it wastime, yeah, like it.
Um, it was, it was better forme, it was better for my family
and I'm not I'm not here totrash on irving at all like they
were a great department.
I was super blessed man like Igot to do so many cool things

(52:38):
over there, got to experience somany cool things.
But it's, it's one of thosetimes where it's kind of like I
look at it like kind of likebarry sanders, yep you know,
glad you relate to my team, youknow, because I'm a lion's guy.
Yeah, I know, but I love barrysanders.
No so greatest running backever.
Thank you um I second thatmotion.
You know, barry sanders was likeit's time to go and they're

(53:00):
like, but there's so much moreyou could do here.
And he's like, yeah, but it'stime to go.
Yep, it's time to go.
Yeah, and that's kind of how Ifelt.
Yeah, you know, like it's time,it's time for me to go.
I had a couple of things thathappened, super minor, like no
discipline, obviously, but likewith some supervisors and

(53:21):
getting getting shunned on somethings because they said I was,
you know, too decorated as anofficer or whatever.
That's a thing.
Being too decorated, yeah, Iguess, but I mean, at the end of
the day, like that was justkind of like I already made my
decision.
Yeah, you know, it wasn't like,oh, that tipped me over the

(53:41):
edge, like you know, gotta getout of this place now, like it
wasn't none of that at all.
It was it's time to go, likeyou know.
You know, so I, I then, you know, lateraled over to fort worth
and uh, did a couple years overthere.
I knew a lot of the guys at theI say a lot, I know a couple of
the guys at the range, um,before I even came to fort worth

(54:03):
.
A lot of people don't know that.
But, um, like you know, pinky I, we had known each other for
several years before I went toFort Worth through different
trainings and stuff, andobviously he's one of the OGs at
the range.

Speaker 1 (54:17):
He's a stud, yeah, yeah, he is, and so I'm always
happy when I go down I see thathe's behind the counter.
I'm like I'm going to get takencare of, yeah.

Speaker 2 (54:26):
Pinky's my brother man, he's, he's, he's my dude.
So um, no, and then you know,kind of, it was just kind of a
one of those scenes where Ialways wanted to work at the
range um ended up putting in,didn't get it the first time,
believe it or not.
Um got it the three monthsafter.

(54:48):
You know, I put in and thensomebody else got it and then
three months later I was broughtover and it's kind of where.

Speaker 1 (54:56):
How long did you do, and were you probably in patrol
that whole time?
A couple of years?
A couple of years?

Speaker 2 (55:00):
I did a couple of years in patrol in Fort Worth
and you know, obviously thereare some people that are like oh
, freaking lateral.
Oh, shut up I only did twoyears and then you get to go to
the range.

Speaker 1 (55:12):
Listen, you do what's best for the department and the
citizens, not what's best foryou.

Speaker 2 (55:16):
Yeah, I know, I agree 100%.
You know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (55:18):
The people that get hurt about that.
That's how you're looking at it.
You're looking at it about you.
You're not looking at it.
What's best?

Speaker 2 (55:31):
for guys like people don't realize how tight the
range guys and SWAT guys are,because obviously, the SWAT guys
I mean their offices right downthe the building from us, but
the SWAT guys are at the rangeevery day.
Yep, every day we interact withSWAT guys, um, and so seeing a
lot of those guys that, likeCurry and Buck that got to yeah,

(55:52):
came in.

Speaker 1 (55:53):
I think he was like a Seattle SWAT guy.

Speaker 2 (55:54):
Yeah, you know, like dude, like he's a lateral, but
the dude did like four or five,six, eight, however many years
on, a legit SWAT team in SeattleLike it wasn't, like you know,
a tested team.
They've been tested a lot.
So, um, but to your point,exactly like what's best for the
department, what's best for thecommunity, yeah, you know, kind

(56:15):
of what's best for the officerkind of comes last right and uh
I don't mean like mental healthwise or anything like that, but
like for the betterment of thedepartment yeah, right, and SWAT
it's also who's best for theteam, because it's a team
concept.

Speaker 1 (56:31):
Swat is not an individual.
It's very much, you know, likea Navy SEAL concept.
You know what I mean.
Like, the people they weed outare the ones that are about
themselves.

Speaker 2 (56:40):
Yeah, I heard a guy once say and I think it kind of
translates to any team aspect,right, but he was relating it to
a selection process for a tierone unit in the military, but I
think it.
You know, I'm not saying thatswat is like delta, that's not
what I'm saying, but I'm sayingI I think it translates with the

(57:00):
selection side of things and hesaid I can train somebody to be
stronger, I can train somebodyto run faster, I can train
somebody to shoot better, but Ican't train somebody to fit in
with my guys right character.
Like if you don't fit, youdon't fit yeah.
Like if you fit great and yousuck at shooting, I'll make you
better at work at that, yeah,but I can't make you fit in with

(57:21):
my guys, yeah, and I thinkthat's something that is.
You know, that's kind of lostsometimes with people I I've
honestly always wanted to doswat.

Speaker 1 (57:30):
I don't have the tactical training, um, and I
know that, but I also am not ina point in my life that I could
put the team first, and I thinkif you're gonna do that, that's
what your mindset needs to be isthat you're gonna put that team
first.
Yeah, I mean.

Speaker 2 (57:46):
So it would be selfish for me to try to go you
know, I don't know, obviously Inever did narcotics, uh, the
undercover narcotics not.
When I say do narcotics, Idon't mean like smoking weed
guys, like I never did thenarcotics unit in fort worth,
right, but in irving, uh, it wasone of those things, man, where
we were working 80, 90 hours aweek, whoo, and it was that's

(58:10):
why you made a lot of money,yeah.
So, um, no, in all seriousness,like we, like my wife and I, we
had this, we had we had youngkids at the time, so it was, it
was, it was easy, easy for you,right, it sucked for her, but it
was easy for me.
Um, like I would literally gethome and then she would do two
things she would lay out a freshset of clothes and she would

(58:32):
have food ready.
Oh, no matter what time, that'sthe best, because I can't count
how many times I would get homeand I've been in trap houses all
day, or buying dope or testingheroin or whatever Change in the
garage so you don't have to gothrough the house, right, yeah,
so I would literally change myclothes, get in the shower and
my undercover phone would ringand it would be my sergeant and

(58:55):
he'd be like we're gettingcalled out and I would get out
of the shower and Zoe would belike, hey, you got called out
and I'm like, yeah, and there'sa set of clothes on the bed,
there's a plate of food Like Iwould be like dressing and
eating at the same time and Iwould like give her a kiss.
I've been home for 11 minutes.
Yeah, I'll see you in ninehours.

Speaker 1 (59:15):
That's a different life.

Speaker 2 (59:16):
Yeah, so like that was, it was very um at that time
in the way that the and I'veheard that it's kind of changed
over the last 20 years.
The narcotics game has changed.
They 20 years, the narcoticsgame has changed.
They don't.
They don't use UCs like they do.
Yeah, like they don't do.
You know a lot of stuff that weused to do as UCs Right Um it's

(59:37):
all CIs.
Yeah, um, there's a lot ofthings that I heard have changed
and I don't know I've been outof the game and the narcotics
game for so long, um, I've beenout of the SWAT game for 10
years, so that's changed too.
But you know, going fromnarcotics and and having that um
be normal, yeah, like I gotcalled out every christmas.
Every christmas, you know, andwhen you have kids that are two

(59:59):
and three, it's kind of no harm,no foul.
They're not going to rememberthat, right, you know wife
remembers yeah family remembersfamily remembers.
You know, and it's like you knowyou, I, I remember literally
tallying up the time and I spentthree to one the amount of time

(01:00:22):
with my narcs compared to myfamily.
Yeah, and to kind of you know,to kind of bring this out to the
to the listeners right now,there was a guy and swats the
same way, right swats the sameway.
Swat gets caught on all thetime, like they are constantly
on call.
You constantly have to plan, nomatter where you go, like if

(01:00:44):
you want to go to a range againwith your family, you have to
plan before that to be calledout.

Speaker 1 (01:00:48):
Yeah, because you probably are going to be called
out in the fifth inning orwhatever like yep, you're either
taking an uber and letting themstay and watch the game, or
you're you got a plan for itright.

Speaker 2 (01:00:58):
So like I'll never forget this story.
And this story actually kind ofmade me start to think about
things differently.
And there was a SWAT guy, um,he came into the office and he's
like I quit, like I'm goingback to patrol.
And everybody's like what, whatdo you mean?
You're going back to patrol?
He's like I'm out, I'm done.

(01:01:20):
He had a, he hit a wall, well,and so one of the supervisors
was like what do you what?
Hold on time out?
Like time out?
Yeah, like what, what?
What's going on?
He goes.
My son asked me where I livelast night.
Oh, yeah, that hurts.
Yeah, like, where do you live?
Like you're, you don't eversleep here, you're never here.

(01:01:41):
Yeah, you're always gone.
Like can I go to your house?
Like where do you live?
Wow, wow, you know.
And it's one of those thingswhere that's that dedication to,
to, to serving, and dedicationto the team, it it not only
takes a lot from you as theofficer, but the amount of it,
the amount of strain andpressure and stress it puts on

(01:02:02):
your family, especially familieswith kids of age.
That know, yeah, two-year-olds,they don't really get it yet.
Yeah, you know, nine-year-olds,that's tough man.
Yeah, absolutely, you knowthat's tough, you gotta have
those.

Speaker 1 (01:02:18):
And I think what ends up happening a lot with cops
that start to go down the youknow divorce route, which is
high with police, is thededication to service and the
lack of communication andexpectation with the family.
So if you're not talking toyour wife about, or your husband
if you're a female cop, aboutwhat the job and the path that

(01:02:41):
you're trying to take entails,because you both have to be in
it, you can't just decide I'mgoing to go do SWAT, whether you
like it or not, it's not goingto or not, it's not gonna work.
It's not gonna work.
No, they have to knowreasonably what those
expectations are and I think alot of officers they get into
either new marriages or whateverit is.
They that communication side ofyou know I want to do this job,

(01:03:06):
can I do it?
You know, or they tell theirway.
I'm going to try to put in forthis position.
Okay, well, right, they don'tknow what questions to ask.

Speaker 2 (01:03:15):
They don't know what to expect.

Speaker 1 (01:03:16):
Yeah, so if you're not taking the time to tell them
, you're asking for trouble downthe line, for sure.
And then what ends up happening?
When the divorce happens, orwhen it's getting close to
happening, yeah.
And then they start to reflect,like you said, the guy walks in
and says I'm done, I'm going topatrol, like that is a
tumultuous moment in their life,that they are not right in the

(01:03:37):
head?
Yeah, no at all.
That's hard.
And we hear about officers allthe time taking themselves out.
What did this whole 22 kill?
All that stuff, you know.

Speaker 2 (01:03:53):
So would this whole 22 kill all that stuff, you know
.
So it's a that's a huge topicright now.
Yeah, it's one of those thingsand luckily I've been so blessed
to have a wife that fullysupported everything that I
wanted to do my career.
But she was one of those peoplethat said, you know, like, for
example, when I wanted to put infor narcotics, she said okay,
what does it mean?
What does that mean, like, what?

Speaker 1 (01:04:13):
how actually inquired .

Speaker 2 (01:04:14):
Yeah, how's that going to change?
Like, what does that mean?
Like what?
What are you going to be doing?
Like you know, and she didn't Idon't want to say she didn't
care about that job itself andthe dangers that came with it,
cause she obviously did Right.
But she also has a job too, asa mother and as a wife to a.
How can we support this?
You know, what do you need fromus as a family and me from as a

(01:04:38):
wife?
You know, what can I expectfrom you as a husband and as a
police officer?
Like there's all these things.
Like we literally sat down andlike like laid out the pros and
cons of this and that's likethat's huge, yeah, and being
able to do that for so manyyears and be successful, because
you're right, like the divorcerate and then, unfortunately,

(01:04:59):
the you know, the suicide rateof officers that go through
these things is far too many,yeah, far too many.

Speaker 1 (01:05:09):
There's been, I think , at least one every year that
I've been a cop.
Yeah, places that I know notjust like oh, there's a dead
officer over here, but likeplaces that I physically, I talk
to these places and yeah, like,yeah, yeah, for sure, yeah, so.

Speaker 2 (01:05:26):
So, communication, communication, communication is
key.
You know, you have to be ableto communicate and be on the
same page and, as much as it maysuck to hear this, I firmly
believe this that if you are apolice officer and your goal is
to go to SWAT or narcotics orwhatever, fill in the blank

(01:05:53):
right, and if that means doingso at the detriment of your
family, don't do it.

Speaker 1 (01:06:00):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:06:02):
Don't do it.

Speaker 1 (01:06:02):
Yeah, it's hard.
It's a hard pill to swallowbecause you all want to have fun
in our jobs.
Sure pill to swallow becauseyou, we all want to have fun in
our jobs.
Sure, and you know we all haveways that we think we can serve
better and do that while havingfun.
But yeah, don't it's not worth.
It's not worth the cost of yourfamily.

Speaker 2 (01:06:20):
Yeah, it will cost to your family, it will cost you
your family.

Speaker 1 (01:06:24):
Yeah, yes, we've seen all too many officers god, I, I
can go down the you just look,and what's one of the you know
internal cultural jokes that wehave, like, oh, you're not a
real cop until your firstdivorce right, and that's why
they'll say that to them, like,oh, me and the missus are
getting divorced, and they'lldrop that line.
And I don't think we're reallyhelping when we say that we're

(01:06:46):
not no, and I've been so blessednot to.

Speaker 2 (01:06:48):
Obviously I've never been divorced, thank god.
But um, yeah, you're right, man, it's just like I can't count.
I don't, I can't count how manypeople have you know, I know
guys with four yeah, I know 10that are going through one right
now, like, yeah, like, as wespeak, they're like going
through, like it's wild and umtell my wife and I her and I are

(01:07:09):
an anomaly because we wentthrough the military and
policing and haven't divorced.

Speaker 1 (01:07:14):
Yes, that's awesome, man.

Speaker 2 (01:07:15):
Yeah but I think, and I don't know, you know, I just
I just met your lovely wife afew minutes ago, but I would, I
would probably guess that youguys are very, very effective
communicators oh, for sure, yeah, and we've been together since
seventh grade.
Oh yeah, you guys definitelyyou guys yeah, you guys have got
to figure it out.
Y'all need to like write booksand yeah, I tell people.

Speaker 1 (01:07:36):
I'm like yeah, well, when we started dating we were
roller skating together.
So like, yes, that's that's howlong we go back.
You know you do kid stuff.
You know, summertime came, we'dbreak up, go back to school, we
, and we'd start dating again.

Speaker 2 (01:07:49):
Summertime break up.
Typical kid stuff yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:07:51):
And then, once we got our licenses and vehicles, then
we just stayed together, that'sawesome Congratulations.
Thanks, it's been great.
But let's get back to you, sir.
So you do the NARC, youtransfer, lateral transfer, you

(01:08:11):
come over and you get in therange.
Now I know you're good with agun, all that stuff, but can you
kind of give people a littlebit of what?
What does it take to get picked?
You have to go through ainstructor, instructor school.
So kind of tell us a little bitabout what instructor school is
like.
But what also is the um, thehiring process, because I'm sure

(01:08:32):
they put you through some sortof practical test yeah, yes and
no.

Speaker 2 (01:08:37):
So the instructor school uh, it was a week-long
deal.
We've actually kind of revampedit to what it used to be, but it
was basically you had to pass aseries of shooting tests, okay,
um, they kind of took you downthe road of of being an
instructor and what all thatmeans the liability side of
things and you know, thepurchasing side, testing side,

(01:08:57):
all all the things that have todo with a larger agency firearms
unit, and then, uh, like, uh,like anything else.
You got to show interest, right,yeah, so I actually, um was
very unluckily lucky, if thatmakes sense so I I blew my
shoulder out, had to havesurgery, um, and while I was

(01:09:22):
rehabbing they sent me down tothe range.
So I spent several months downat the range while I was kind of
rehabbing, meeting, you know,getting to know the guys being
utilized to do kind of the gruntwork stuff.
You know, take the trash outand do this and do that and kind
of earn my keep that way, whileI was on light duty status,

(01:09:49):
which was very beneficial, youknow, if you don't get hurt and
get to do that there's, we'reconstantly looking for people to
come down and volunteer likewe're like everybody else in the
rest of the country in lawenforcement.
We're hurting for people, we'reshort stuff.
Yeah, you know, um, but comingdown and I would go and help out

(01:10:11):
with recruit classes, I'd goand help out with carbine
schools, I'd go, and that's allmy own time, right, like on my
days off I would go volunteer,like I would just go get comp
time or whatever, right, andjust show interest and and learn
the systems and learn the lingoand learn how to do things and
learn to talk to the guys andwhatever the case may be.
So when the you know, when itfinally came up to where there

(01:10:33):
was an opening to put in for Iwas able to able to slide in
there.

Speaker 1 (01:10:38):
Nice, okay, so you do the instructor school, are they
?
What is some of the things thatthey can expect in an
instructor school for learninghow to shoot firearms or teach
it?
I?

Speaker 2 (01:10:49):
should say so.
You have to be able to not onlyshoot well, but you have to
convey that and teach people howto do the same.
And a lot of instructors,especially new instructors and
this is one of the things wefocus on now, chancey and I we
focus on this a lot.
We focus on now, chancy and I,we focus on this a lot is so

(01:11:17):
many times people revert back tothe way they were taught and
how they did things six yearsago, eight years ago, two years
ago, 12 years ago.
Well, it's constantly evolving,right.
So, in order to be able to tomake people better, you have to
be able to convey theinformation to them, and in a
way that they understand it andand they can implement it, not

(01:11:42):
just regurgitate what you'resaying.
And I think for so long as aninstructors for instructor
schools, you would go and youwould say this is how you teach
this drill period, end of story.
And then that person goes andteaches that drill that way,
right, and it's never changed.
And I saw a lot of that umcoming up throughout my career

(01:12:05):
in law enforcement where, like,you go to a school and you're
like when did we start teachingthis?
And they're like, oh, westarted teaching this 17 years
ago, like it hasn't changed,right.
No, that's just the way we'vealways done it.
Which is the most dangerousthing you can say in training

(01:12:26):
it's all, it's the way we'vealways done it right.
So not only do you expect alevel of proficiency from people
who are teaching firearms, butthey have to be able to convey
it.
So one of the things that we dois we will teach them a block,
whether it's pistol, rifle,whatever right.
We teach them a block in themorning, in the afternoon, we
expect them to teach it back tous, not only teach it back and

(01:12:47):
be able to demonstrate it, to dothe demos, but they have to be
able to speak on it as well.
So we will partner people up,for example, like if you and I
are partners in instructorschool.
We'll get two blocks ofinstruction.
Whatever they are.
One of the blocks, you're themouthpiece for it, so you're the
one standing up in front of theclass explaining everything.

(01:13:08):
I'm the demo guy and it's myjob to demonstrate exactly what
this drill is okay and I have tomatch.
My demo has to match whatyou're saying and what you're
saying also has to match my demo, because you can't say we're
doing, you know we're going torun, uh, predictive doubles, and

(01:13:31):
then I'm up there running abill drill.
People are like those are twototally different things.
These guys are not on the samepage, right?
So on the flip side, the nextblock of instruction that we get
as a team, our roles reverse.
So now I'm the mouthpiece andyou're the one pressing the
trigger the whole time.
So we do that multiple timesthroughout the week, right?

(01:13:54):
So throughout the entire weekyou are not only speaking to a
class, you're teaching, you'realso demonstrating in front of
the class multiple times a week.

Speaker 1 (01:14:05):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (01:14:05):
So that's one of the things that we really harp on is
the ability to do, because webelieve firmly that you have to
be able to demonstrateeverything that you expect your
class to do.
You know, there's instructorsout there and they are very
big-name instructors I'm notgoing to mention any names but
they demo nothing.
They're like, yeah, yeah, justgo do this, go to the 7-yard
line and do this.

(01:14:25):
They speak a lot, but they yeah.
So we're, we're, we're kind ofthe opposite of that, and you
have to have the, the ability toeffectively communicate what
you want done and what youexpect.
And then you have to have theability to perform on demand.
At any given time you're askedto do it Right.
And then, on the flip side ofthat, as you are evaluating the

(01:14:47):
students as an instructor, veryrarely do I ever look at a
student's target Very rarely.
Yeah, you know, I'm watchingtheir shoulders, I'm watching
their hands, their grip, theirgrip tension, the tensions in
the back of their hands, thetensions in their forearms, I
mean all these things I'mlooking at and you get to the

(01:15:09):
point to where you can watchsomebody shoot and you could be
pretty dang close at tellingthem what their target looks
like without looking at theirtarget, just because you can see
how, what their interaction iswith the gun right and how the
gun is tracking and how they'regripping the gun and how the
gun's returning and how they'repressing the trigger and all
these different things that youshould be able to put pick up on

(01:15:29):
as an instructor.
Compared to how old instructorsused to be, which you know and I
know, they would stand behindthe shooter and they would just
watch the target and, as holeswould appear, they'd be like
stop jerking the trigger, stopslapping the trigger, right,
stop jerking the trigger, andthat's has nothing to do with
anything, right.
So it's really diagnosing theshooter, but giving them the
ability and confidence to knowwhat to look for and to diagnose

(01:15:53):
the shooter at the shooterlevel.
Yeah, you know, in regards towhat the target looks like, yeah
.

Speaker 1 (01:16:00):
so now you're, you become an instructor, you're
going through, you know officershave been cops forever and
you're dealing with recruits.
Yeah, two totally differentanimals.
Can you kind of tell me whatit's like in that training
process for a recruit?
And then same thing with asalty?

Speaker 2 (01:16:24):
vet seasoned guy Salty.

Speaker 1 (01:16:26):
That may be good or may be terrible seasoned guy
salty.

Speaker 2 (01:16:31):
That may be good or may be terrible.
Recruits are 100 times easierto train, 100 times easy.
Blank slates, blank slates,most of them, especially
nowadays, you know, uh, youprobably grew up shooting a
little bit, maybe I don't know,with your granddad not pistols,
but rifles and shotguns, but youunderstood how a gun worked
Right.
Yes, yeah, okay.
So you know back when, kind ofwe started 20 years ago plus or

(01:16:55):
whatever the case may be, mosteverybody has some experience
with firearms.
Nowadays it's no.
Nobody does Nobody right.
So I use a lot of like analogycall me crazy, but like call of
duty.
Hell, yeah, they all know whatcall of duty is, you know,
especially teaching people howto shoot red dots I use it all

(01:17:17):
the time and which we'll getinto that.

Speaker 1 (01:17:19):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:17:20):
Um, so yeah, Teaching recruits.
Now they're they're blankslates.
There's no bad habits that youhave to correct.
There's no.
You know well, I've been doingit this way for 22 years, since
before you were born you know,and so teaching recruits, um, is
very, very easy compared toteaching uh and in service class

(01:17:41):
with with veteran officers.
Now I will say this the let thetime it takes for recruits to
get to a point of acceptableproficiency is a certain amount
of time, right?
I don't know what it is,because it's different for every
recruit.
Now, when you have a veteranofficer that truly is engaged

(01:18:04):
and truly wants to try somethingdifferent and try to improve,
like you, right, you go fromfrom you know here to here
relatively quickly, because youhave 20 years of experience to
pull from Yep and and whetherit's good or bad experience,
because both of them teach yousomething equally right, whereas

(01:18:27):
a recruit, they're kind of likewell, I don't really know if
I'm doing good or not, yeah, Iguess doing better, I guess I'm
doing okay, whereas you, you'relike, okay, I know, I was here,
I'm gonna forget everything I'velearned up until this day and
I'm gonna do everything thatthese guys are telling me to do.
And at the end of a two-dayclass, you're here, right,
you're like, oh, yeah, I, I'veimproved, whereas recruits are

(01:18:50):
like well, I guess I'm doingbetter.

Speaker 1 (01:18:51):
Yeah, I don't know.
I went from a, let's say, abouta 95, 96 average and then, when
I went through you and Chancey,I've always shot 100.
Always, every single time, I'veshot 100, which is crazy
Because I push the envelopeevery time.
Yeah, you're good.

Speaker 2 (01:19:08):
That's because we're behind you, like go faster, yeah
, go faster, go faster.

Speaker 1 (01:19:12):
Well, you know.
And then the old school mindsetslow is smooth, smooth is fast.
And I think I take that to anextreme now, where I'm just like
, yeah, bow, bow, and it's tooslow.

Speaker 2 (01:19:24):
So I hate that saying just as much as I hate the
saying of's what we've alwaysdone it right.
Oh, really, I hate it.
Really, I hate it with apassion.
Okay, I hate slow, smooth asfast, and here's why slow is
slow okay, fair, you're notwrong, I mean slow is slow.
You cannot define being fastwith using the word slow in it

(01:19:47):
yeah like slow is slow and I'llequate it to this because we
have recruits, perfect example.
We have recruits say I was toldslow is smooth, smooth is fast.
And I'm like, okay, If you wantto get good at being fast, what
do you need to do?
Not be slow?

Speaker 1 (01:20:06):
You need to work on being faster.

Speaker 2 (01:20:08):
Like you need to fail at speed?
Yes, right, slow.
You need to work on beingfaster?
Yeah, like you need to fail atspeed?
Yes, right, and I use thisanalogy okay, when you teach
somebody pursuit driving, do youtell them I want you to drive
around this track at three milesan hour, because slow is smooth
and smooth is fast.

Speaker 1 (01:20:24):
No, you tell them, push it till you wreck.

Speaker 2 (01:20:26):
Oh really, yeah, oh so you don't tell them to go
slow, right, no, yeah, so why dowe do it in firearms?
Good boy, you know, like it'sone of those things where it's
like oh, slow, smooth.
Well, in reality, in practicallaw enforcement engagements,
there is nothing slow about it.
So why do we train slow inpursuit driving when the

(01:20:47):
suspect's doing 140?
There's nothing slow about that, yeah, so why do we?
Why would we train how to dopursuit driving at three miles
an hour?

Speaker 1 (01:20:56):
fair.
Yeah, you know who's reallyfast, that I probably the
fastest.
I've seen fucking bryles superquick.
Oh, driving, no, no, no,pulling, pulling the gun out
like his from holster to shootoh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, joe
dude, yes, joe, yeah, yeah superquick.
I'm like dang, I wouldn'texpect that from you that's all

(01:21:16):
those years of drawing the taser.

Speaker 2 (01:21:17):
I guess you probably got one billion draws yeah, dude
, he's so quick, I'm like hedoes have fast hands.
Yeah, he does not accurateshots, but fast, so she'sosu's
all right.

Speaker 1 (01:21:29):
No, he's good though.
Yeah, he's good.
Yeah, but no, going throughy'all's class, like you said.
That old, you know, but I cameto learn.
I knew.
I know I'm not good Likecomparative to my peers, but you
can be.
But I'm good now.
I mean, I think I'm You're good, I'm way better than I was
before.
So but yeah and then.

(01:21:50):
So, as you train recruits, Ilike the blank slate you know,
idea and that they, they shootreally well.
How?
How many rounds are they goingthrough and in in how short of a
time period?

Speaker 2 (01:22:04):
So we have the recruits for initially we have
them for one week for T-Cole,okay, so we have to get
everything T-Cole related fortheir state license done in that
week.
So we have to hit all theclassroom stuff.
We have to hit the the minimumamounts of shotgun and low light
training.
Um, it's kind of like reallydrinking through a fire hose for

(01:22:26):
them, because it's just aplethora of information, right,
that we have to give them, butthey're only tested on a very,
very few things, right, and thenthey come back for another
three weeks.
So over the the amount of amonth, each recruit is shooting
anywhere from 6,500 to 7,500rounds total each.

Speaker 1 (01:22:45):
That's so many.
I know people may hear that ifyou're not in law enforcement or
been in any sort of job thatcarries a firearm, that's a lot.
That's a lot of ate up fingers.

Speaker 2 (01:22:58):
Yeah, we sold 40 or 50 times 7,000.
Yeah, that's a lot.
So many bullets we go throughfor a month.

Speaker 1 (01:23:05):
But when they get done, what are the average
scores?

Speaker 2 (01:23:09):
So we just changed our scoring system so it's kind
of skewed a little bit, butthere are in in.
Before we change the program towhere it is now, the average
score for a recruit class wasanywhere between 95 96 average.
Right, we just hit our 99.
For an entire class, theaverage was 99%.

(01:23:29):
Damn yeah, the first time ever.

Speaker 1 (01:23:32):
And that was prior to Red Dot than going into Red Dot
, correct?
Yeah, so we'll talk about thatin a second.
But okay, so, recruits, that'sawesome.
That's the type of scores youwant to hear, and what's the
passing?
85% 85% is passing.
These guys are scoring at least10% higher, and now they're
scoring almost 20% higher thanwhat's required.

(01:23:53):
So that's good Boys versusgirls.
Who shoots better?

Speaker 2 (01:24:00):
Uh, just curious it, does you know it?
I haven't been able to say likewith certainty like boys are
better or girls are better, andhere's why because we've had
girls come through class thatjust rail on dudes, right, oh,
they smoke them, yeah, like they, just they lit they.

(01:24:22):
They learn different though,right, like girls learn
different than boys, right, theyask a lot of why?
Questions, which is fine, guys,you can kind of tell them
something and go do this,because I said, and they're like
Roger, girls are like, well,why do I need to do that?

Speaker 1 (01:24:38):
They need to understand behind the scenes.

Speaker 2 (01:24:39):
Yeah, which is cool.
It's kind of an unfaircomparison because predominantly
there's more males than femalesobviously yeah, maybe 20%
females yeah exactly right, butI will say this so we do a drill
, a walk back drill, and westart at the two yard line and
they have it's a like three inchby three inch circle.

Speaker 1 (01:25:02):
Like a steel target.
No, it's on paper.

Speaker 2 (01:25:04):
It's the white oval of our target.
Oh, ok, in the middle.
So it's like three or three anda half inch by three and a half
inch, however big it is, andthey start at the two yard line.
And then you know, on thecommand of shoot, everybody has
unlimited time to fire one round.
It's just got to be inside thatcircle.

Speaker 1 (01:25:19):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (01:25:20):
And if you shoot and you miss, you're out.
Okay you miss, you're out, okay.
So like king of the king of thehill type thing.
Yeah, exactly right.
So everybody's in.
You go back to the five, the,to the seven, the nine, the ten,
the twelve, the fifteen, thetwenty five, and by the time you
get back to, like the, the 15yard line, there's a handful of
people left.
You know, the record holder forour department to this day with

(01:25:43):
iron sights, was a femaleofficer.

Speaker 1 (01:25:45):
No shit oh, dang, okay yes, 37 yards, holy cow.
Oh, so you guys are out therifle doing that, yeah, 37 yards
.

Speaker 2 (01:25:56):
She made it back to 37 yards before she missed, so
that's crazy.

Speaker 1 (01:26:01):
Okay, yeah, I was always curious because in the
military all of our combat armsguys cadres.
They would tell us that handsdown females shoot and learn
quicker, faster in the military,and so I was just curious if it
was the same.
And that's Air Force what I'veheard.

(01:26:21):
So I was just curious if it wasthe same.

Speaker 2 (01:26:23):
I wouldn't say they learn quicker or faster.
I would say that they learndifferent.
You have to approach themdifferent.
They're not worse.
Yeah, you know, um, you knowwe've had recruits that are
females, that are b for barelylike they barely pass right
right.
But on the flip side we've hadgood dudes like four or five
guys that are like b for barelyyou know they're like you know

(01:26:47):
they shot 7 000 rounds andthey're barely here yeah, now,
in the event that they fail,yeah, what is the?

Speaker 1 (01:26:55):
what?
Can you tell the public howthat process goes like?
Do they get another chance?
Is there only a certain amountof chances a recruit gets?
How does that work?

Speaker 2 (01:27:04):
are we talking about recruits, recruits, okay.
So, uh, you get three attemptsas a recruit, right?
Um, if you do not pass yourthird attempt, then it is
recommended by the range thatyou are terminated okay, that
you can no longer continue intraining.
Now, that's very situationaldependent.

(01:27:25):
We've made recommendationsbefore, and they've been honored
, to where the recruit has beenterminated because they didn't
pass firearms, and we've alsomade recommendations before
where it was.
We were asked to remediatethese people further and allow
them to have another attempt.

Speaker 1 (01:27:46):
So when a person initially fails, you don't just
make them step back up and juststart shooting again.
You guys actually take the timeto evaluate them try to see how
you can correct it.

Speaker 2 (01:27:55):
Yeah, so the way we normally do it is we have an
entire recruit class right, andso they shoot their first call
as a group and we take thetargets down and we score them
away from them Privately, yeah.
Privately, yeah, so nobody knowsthat they passed or failed.
And then we go and we shootanother 100 rounds, just as
practice to work on differentthings.

(01:28:16):
We'll shoot anywhere from the25-yard line to the 3-yard line,
right.
Then we give them a break andwe shoot another qual and score
it privately.
And if somebody fails thosefirst two quals, then we'll pull
them in and say, hey, here'sthe deal, the reason we used to
do that way in the past, whichwe went away from and we can

(01:28:38):
talk about later but you wouldsee guys that would shoot 100 on
their first qual and then theirnext qual.
They would just try to go, goall out, they would just do dumb
stuff.
Yeah, like they would like I'mgonna do headshots only and
you're like what do you mean?
Like when were you trained to?

Speaker 1 (01:28:55):
do yeah, like when did we?

Speaker 2 (01:28:56):
ever teach you to shoot headshots.
Like, yeah, you just went fromshooting a 100 to a 62.
Like congratulations, you know.
So now, or that was the.
That was kind of the reasoningbehind us grading them, so
nobody knew if they passed orfailed, right, um, but if you
failed the first two, then youwould be pulled in by the range
master and talked to by therange master and the lead

(01:29:18):
instructor which I had to do acouple of times and say, hey,
here's the deal, you know, likeyeah you need to pass this one
kind of thing, and then youwould, um, you'd give them a
little bit more training beforethe qual.
Would the third qual would, yeah, take place okay you take them
into range two or whatever.
And yeah, I'll work on a coupleof things, just kind of hit

(01:29:39):
pocket real fast, 10 minuteslike yep, I think it's fair.

Speaker 1 (01:29:43):
I that.
I think that's a good system.
I like that.
Uh, okay, so they get through.
I'm just trying to help thepublic understand what that
process is, cause you'll hearall the time like there'll be an
officer involved in theshooting and they'll like and
they find out that their rangequals were hot garbage or they
all these different things.

(01:30:04):
Cause at the end of the day,when an officer gets in trouble,
one of the first places they goto look is you yeah, I know
like one of the first threecalls that are hap that happen
after an officer involvedshooting is to the range.

Speaker 2 (01:30:14):
Yep, by major case.
You know like they they call.

Speaker 1 (01:30:18):
They want to know qual scores, they want to know
if they're qualified, they wantto all who trained them all that
shit, yeah, like everything'sgetting pulled up, right
everything, everything's gettingpulled there's a lot of
responsibility and, uh,liability that falls on the
range guys and I think that goesunderappreciated.
I don't think people understandlike, yeah, there's a lot I
mean not just in the eventsomething bad happens down the

(01:30:40):
road during because you getpeople that have never held a
gun and they're like I thinkmine's broken and they start
yeah, you know there's a lot of.
You know it's like teachinghand grenades.
I remember the day we taught wewere learning throwing hand
grenades in the Air Force.
Yes, we threw hand grenades.
So, learning how to throw thehand grenade and everybody wants

(01:31:00):
to look.
You throw it and you want to seewhere it landed and you want to
see it blow up and they'll tellyou over and over and over
again like don't fucking look.
And they'll even draw, becauseyou throw a dummy one several
times before you ever throw areal one.
And if you're a looker they'lldraw an eyeball on your helmet.

(01:31:21):
So I always thought that waspretty funny.
But looking back and seeing allthe safety precautions that
they had to do, because you'llget people that panic, you'll
get people that you know thetypical, you know cartoon style,
they'll pull the pin and throwthe pin and now they're holding
on to a live grenade.
Yeah, and now the guy in thepit with a mask like grab it

(01:31:44):
throw it.
Throw them both on the ground orthrow them over to the safety
pit on the other side, like it'scrazy and the pressure, I
couldn't do it.
I could not for the life of me.
So for you, who's on the linewith 50 bodies, you know
probably what.
One instructor per five, maybe,maybe per 10?

Speaker 2 (01:32:04):
Yeah, I mean, it depends on what we're doing.
Yeah, you know, if we're doingstatic line stuff, it's super
easy to get away with lessinstructors.
Uh, we do a lot of movementbased stuff, especially early on
with the recruits, and yeahit's which is new for people
listening.

Speaker 1 (01:32:21):
That's a very, very new um yeah so no, it's.

Speaker 2 (01:32:24):
Uh, it's not a one-to-five ratio at all.
When we're running around therange with loaded guns.
No, it's very controlled andstructured.

Speaker 1 (01:32:33):
Okay.
So in that, like I was saying,like I said, people do stupid
stuff that you're just like,they're just not, they're
confusion and they're wanting toask a question and that, in
conjunction with moving partsaround, it can be very nerve
wracking.
I've shit.
It's nerve wracking around someofficers.

(01:32:55):
If I'm going to be honest.
I'm like, yeah, bro, downrange,yeah, it happens.
Yeah, Okay, so let's.
I do want to go back to recruittraining cause you guys are
doing some things.
Yeah, but I also want thatcomparison so people understand
what it's like when you'reshooting on the range with
seasoned guys.
So in the seasoned going fromiron sights, new firing qualls.

(01:33:21):
You know what do you guys callit?
The qualification itself?
You guys probably call it.
You guys call it thequalification itself.
You guys probably call itsomething Not state of fire,
what the hell do you call it?

Speaker 2 (01:33:34):
Stage of fire.
Is that what it is?

Speaker 1 (01:33:36):
Yeah, you guys have changed the course of fire.
That's what I was thinking.
You've changed the course offire.
Oh for the actual qual.

Speaker 2 (01:33:43):
For the actual qual, yeah, the course of fire for the
actual qual.

Speaker 1 (01:33:47):
That's what I was trying to get to.

Speaker 2 (01:33:50):
What has that been like?
Well, we've always changed thequal, so we change it every
couple of years.
That's how it's always beenchanged.
We changed the course of fireas well as the scoring now of

(01:34:12):
fire, as well as a scoring nowin the before time.
You could have, uh, 45 roundsin the dark blue or off your
designated impact zone and stillpass the qual, which is crazy,
right right, yeah, out of 100yeah yeah, yeah, I mean.
Well, 45 rounds, no, like youcould have 45 points off out of
60 rounds fired and still pass.
Like it was crazy.
Oh my god, yeah, um, and I'lljust say this, and everybody

(01:34:34):
knows it, it's not a secret, youknow, you can look it up the
fbi.
Uh, as a profession, lawenforcement, we suck at shooting
across the country.
As a profession, right, youcould argue anywhere from 13% to
18% to 23% hit rate.

Speaker 1 (01:34:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:34:52):
So 20%, we'll say.
You know, two out of 10 roundshit meat intended, meat Right,
you know.

Speaker 1 (01:34:59):
Now for those listening.
You got to consider too, whenwe're firing at a person,
there's a whole lot of otherpsychological things going on.
Yes, versus firing at the rangeyes, yeah, yeah I mean, and
that's one of the that's.

Speaker 2 (01:35:11):
But to your very point, right, there is why we
significantly changed ourtraining to a more practical
side or a more practicalapproach to training, where that
involves a bunch of movement.
Yeah, a bunch of movement thatinvolves a bunch of vision
barriers and and stimulusvisually to try to mimic real

(01:35:32):
world stuff.
Because for so long in lawenforcement the police officers
would train at the five yardline or the seven yard line and
it would be like on the whistledraw and fire two shots and then
holster.
Well, that's not real worldstuff, yeah, you know.
So we, we obviously we can'tshoot at the recruits and we
can't mimic real world stuff.

(01:35:52):
But we know a couple of thingsare most likely true in law
enforcement.
Engagements is like theofficer's moving, the bad guy's
moving, or you're both moving,yeah, right, and they happen
very, very quickly.
This isn't slow down and getyour hits type of thing.
Right, you know, and in lawenforcement for so long and I'm
guilty of this, right, teachingit this way it's like slow down,

(01:36:12):
slowly, press the triggerslowly to get your hit.
Well, in reality, that is thecomplete opposite of what
officers are doing.
So I think that we've beenfailing our people for so long,
teaching them one way andexpecting them to go out and do
the complete opposite in thereal world, when real lives and

(01:36:33):
real bullets are being fired.

Speaker 1 (01:36:34):
The one I hated the most was don't slap the trigger.
Yeah, motherfucker, if I'm inthe shit, I'm gonna be slapping
that trigger.

Speaker 2 (01:36:40):
Yeah, and you learn now, after coming through our
class, that you can slap thetrigger and still get your hits
right, it doesn't matter, right?

Speaker 1 (01:36:46):
yeah, chancy's little demonstration.

Speaker 2 (01:36:48):
Yeah, exactly like, as long as you grip the gun the
way you're supposed to, you canslap you like chancy says, you
can slap like it owes you money,right?
Yeah, yeah, one of the forthose listening.

Speaker 1 (01:36:56):
What we did was I think I was holding the gun, or
maybe he was holding the gun andI slapped the trigger.
He slapped the trigger.
I don't remember how it went,but um, that's the demo like.
Is he's showing you that themechanics of holding the gun
doesn't matter how you hit thattrigger.
Yeah, you can slap the shit outof it, still right hit target.

Speaker 2 (01:37:11):
So yeah, so now we take a more practical approach,
right?
So day two with recruits we'removing on the range, we're
moving and shooting on the range.
That's awesome, like they arerunning around the range with
real guns, real bullets, runningtowards each other, running
away from each other, running uprange, running down range.
They're running and they'reshooting and moving, and all the

(01:37:34):
things from day one because andnobody shot each other yet.

Speaker 1 (01:37:37):
So that's a plus knock on wood yeah, um no.

Speaker 2 (01:37:40):
so you know there's so many agencies out there that
I know still today, likeeverybody on the five yard line,
Static shooting, yeah Like allright, I want you to shoot five
shots in this five inch squareand you got no time to do it,
and if you miss one then theyberate you for missing one.
They don't you know, and it'slike.

Speaker 1 (01:37:57):
Oh bro.

Speaker 2 (01:38:04):
When I go shoot my air force.
Qual they think?

Speaker 1 (01:38:06):
I'm literally it's static shooting at a target that
doesn't move.

Speaker 2 (01:38:10):
Yeah, yeah, it's a yeah, it's, it's very no.
So, yeah, we take a differentapproach with the recruits now
and we've seen a lot of successand we're actually gathering
data with major case Chancey'sdoing that right now, talking to
some people in major case andour hit rate as a department is

(01:38:30):
through the roof, really,compared to the nation stuff.
That's crazy, it's wild manlike it's.
We're approaching 80 hit ratewith red dots.
Wow, yeah, which is insane,which is great.
Well, let's get into red dots,yeah, because that's the one
thing I've been wanting to talkto you about forever because you
guys changed my life.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:38:50):
All right, red Dots, red Dots, I've been very very
excited about this.
So when our department got RedDots approved finally and I knew
that that was out there I hadgot with I think it was chancy
and was asking him like is thissomething that I should get, is

(01:39:11):
this something the department'sgoing to give out, or whatever?
And he's like wholeheartedlyget one.
I was like, all right, cool.
And then you guys were able toget me into the red dot class
and one of the things you wantedme to do was talk about it and
get it out there yeah, andthat's and I've done it a
million times on the podcasttalking about how red dots
changed my life as a shooter.
And, as we were talking aboutearlier, I went from a average

(01:39:33):
95, 96.
Shit, sometimes I'd shoot a 93,94 if I was really trying to
get too fast.
But I've always been that typeof guy.
I know I'm going to shoot likeI want to shoot how I think I
would shoot in a real situation,which is quick, fast and in a
hurry and that gets me a littlebit all over the place.

(01:39:53):
But when we went through thered dot course, I went from
shooting I got worse before Igot better, but it was only a
two day class, so I dipped andthen I started to doubt and I
kept on chancy.
I was like you, I was like thisis not working I'm getting worse

(01:40:13):
and chances just kept saying,trust the process, trust the
process.
Yeah, I was like all right andsure shit.
Last half of the day, on thesecond day, it just clicked
something happened.
Something happened and I waslike, oh my God, I'm John Wick
and I was just shootingeverything in a nice tight group
and my confidence level wentthrough the roof.

(01:40:34):
It's so much so that after wefinished the two-day course, I
asked for extra rounds to goshoot some more.
So, I went and I ended upshooting another 100 rounds
because I just wanted to see itfor myself on my own, I didn't
want people around me and just,and I wanted to shoot a little
more controlled and just to seehow dialed in I was and all of

(01:40:54):
that and make sure it was.
You know, I just keep you knowI'm always kind of been a
two-eye shooter anyway, but inthat, you know, it's just really
hyper focusing on that, and itjust changed the way that I use
firearms, like completely likenow, where I used to only be
comfortable with the gun that Iwas issued, like I never any gun
I would buy for myself.
That was the only type of gun Iwould get, cause I knew

(01:41:17):
everything about it Right.
And now I'll go to the rangewith friends or whatever and let
me see your gun, let me seeyour gun.
And just with the principlesand that they had the red dot on
there, just planking baby.

Speaker 2 (01:41:29):
Yeah, fucking fun, but it's awesome.

Speaker 1 (01:41:30):
You guys had the foresight to try to move
policing to the future toprogress, and it seems like I
mean we're looking at I got my300 black out here with my aim
point.
This has been a thing in theAir Force since I got in back in
, you know 06 and before that.
Yeah, why did?

Speaker 2 (01:41:54):
that never translate over to a pistol.
It was taboo.
Well, that's the biggest thing.
It was taboo, right?
So there you know.
Guys have been running red dotson pistols for years.
There's videos of guys out ofthe early 90s running them.
Yeah, you know like, but it wastaboo.
Well, yeah, they would strapthis thing on their pistol, but
they'd be railing on their gun.
They would just be railingfolks.
But yeah, no, it was taboo.

(01:42:15):
It was one of those things andI'll be honest with you and I
don't think I've ever sharedthis with you.
When the first time I ever shota red dot on a pistol, I was
like this is stupid, like thisis so dumb right you know, um,
being from a uh, you know swapbackground and having so many
years in and shooting experiencewith irons, and then I started

(01:42:36):
to educate myself and I startedto go into classes and started
to really understand things andlook at things differently and
actually actually do what theinstructors are asking you to do
, because that's very hard to dosometimes when you go to class
is to get out of your comfortzone and to change the way
you've always done things to anew way while you're in class

(01:42:58):
and I really started to do that.
Then I started to see, like thebenefits just go through the
roof.
Yeah, you know the practicalside of things, the biggest
thing with the department's like.
So we've set up red dot programsin 22 different states holy
shit and you know it's one ofthe things that's always asked
is the big l word when it comesto departments.

(01:43:21):
Right, it's the liability.
Well, what if the red dot dies,or what if the glass breaks?
Or what if this, what if that?
You know, and it's like um, youknow there's so many ways to
answer that that we combat andin a we could do in five minutes
on the range.
But you know, there that was abig thing with our agency too.
It was a liability of it for solong, for for the first year

(01:43:43):
and a half of us shooting reddots and teaching red or testing
red dots, they weren't approved, right, um?
I built a, a program, a testingprogram for red dots that has
been utilized by every singlered dot manufacturer out there.
Have sent me dots to shoot andtest and torture and and at one

(01:44:06):
time I was under eight differentndas oh my god and um, testing
different things for differentum entities you know, different
companies, different, different,uh, three-letter, and you know
agencies that want testing done,um, because you know we're not
the biggest agency in the nationbut we're one of the biggest

(01:44:27):
agencies and one of the mostrespected as far as training
goes.
Right, and people recognize that, and so I took that very, very
serious, very serious.
You know, when I would be askedto do these certain things and
it wasn't only red dots, it wasactual weapons and holsters and
everything else weapons andholsters and everything else,

(01:44:48):
you know, um, like the, the newsafari land holster, I have a,
you know, a 3d printed prototypethat I've had for like over a
year yeah, testing that theyrecently came out with, or like
the, there's a new eotech comingout that I can't talk about,
but it's it's coming out okayum, I've had that in my locker,
that I've been testing foralmost a year now, you know.
So, being able to do that, Itake that very, very, very

(01:45:11):
serious, because not that, like,what I say is gospel, that's
not what I'm saying at all.
But they know that the way thatwe go about testing things,
it's not like we're going tojust fire 10 rounds through it
and be like, oh, that's cool.
Yeah, like they wholeheartedlyknow we're going to push it to
failure.
Yeah, like it's, we're going tofind the breaking points.

Speaker 1 (01:45:30):
And then you made us, as students, use those breaking
points and show that we couldstill shoot it.
Yes, that was the cool part.
So, like we shot through brokenglass, we shot through blacked
out glass where you can't seethrough it at all.
Shot when the dot was off, shotwhen the dot was on.

Speaker 2 (01:45:51):
I mean, I think that's pretty much all the
different things that we did andI still shot on target, yeah,
and, and you know so, there's alot that goes into the whole red
dot thing, but it's such a gamechanger and for me I you know
if I had my way there I thinkiron sights are obsolete on red
dot pistols, really 100 because,like you showed, we didn't even

(01:46:13):
use our iron sights when wewere using broken or simulated
broken red dots and one of thethings like we teach you guys
how to shoot with the dot, thedot, feather drills right, the
dots turned off, and so we, wegive you the different ways of
indexing the either the gun orthe, the optic housing in
reference to the target.
We give you those things andthen we tell you to shoot the

(01:46:35):
gun right.
And you ask people at the endof a two-day class because you
see people when they go topresent the gun and their index
isn't there and they're fishingfor the, the dot, they're moving
the head and the gun.
Why don't they just revert totheir irons?
Yeah, none of them do none,yeah.
And you go to simulationtraining with just iron sight

(01:46:58):
guns and I've filmed it a bunchof times.
You've been the bad guy insimulation, I've been the bad
guy, you've been the good guy,vice versa, whatever right.
So people don't line up theiriron sights, they instinctually
shoot.
That's exactly right.
What do they do in the realworld?
You don't believe me.
You look at officer involvedshooting videos with iron sights
and you mean to tell me theyhave equal height, equal light

(01:47:19):
on their front sight?
not at all right.
No, they are hard focused onthe target muscle memory.
They are indexing the gun inreference to what they're
focusing on, which is all weteach.
And when you do it properly,there's a red dot.
That's a period that appears infront of your face.
Yep, we'll put that where youwant the bullets to go and press
the trigger.
Yep, you know.

Speaker 1 (01:47:38):
Yep, and then it's two plus two stuff.
You guys changed my grip, thatleft-handed dominant grip with
your left hand, yep.

Speaker 2 (01:47:48):
So your support hand, support hand.
Yeah, all those wrong-handedpeople out there that she left
we don't talk to them.

Speaker 1 (01:47:54):
So, yeah, you changed the way that I did that.
That was the game changer, thatwas.
That's changed my shootingcompletely.
Um, I just death grip with thathand and no, it doesn't throw
anything off.
But if you death grip with yourtrigger hand, you definitely
throw things off.

Speaker 2 (01:48:11):
Don't press the trigger with your whole hand,
just your trigger finger.

Speaker 1 (01:48:13):
Yes, yeah, so doing that that changed my game.
But it to your point you saidit without saying it and I'll
say it for you is that you guyschanged the way firearms
training is going across thenation and trying solely.
It was because of you, chancypogue and the team that you guys

(01:48:35):
got built up there.
Yeah, and people don't knowthat yet and I'm hoping they get
to know, and I hope theydefinitely get to know it
through the podcast, becausewhat I'd like to do is
eventually get you and chancyand we just that's it.
That's the only thing we talkabout is the red dot, and that
can be its own littleeducational piece.

Speaker 2 (01:48:52):
Oh, we could spend a lot.
We could spend hours talkingabout red dot training.

Speaker 1 (01:48:54):
Yeah, so that could be its own little thing, just to
kind of.
The purpose behind it would beto wake up police departments to
get with the times on that.
So I know how much you changedmy shooting in that.

Speaker 2 (01:49:11):
How much change did you see in the recruit class?
So, percentage wise, on scoresfor targets, we went from 94,
95% to 98, 99%.

Speaker 1 (01:49:19):
Yeah, which is huge.
Yeah, that's crazy.
And and quickly, yeah.
I think, I think they pick thatup quicker than they do with
the iron sights A hundredpercent Because it's so
instinctual, right Like you.

Speaker 2 (01:49:30):
Just look where you want the bullets to go and index
a gun and press a trigger.

Speaker 1 (01:49:34):
Yeah, yeah, and I think what helped me a lot when
I was.
People are like well, you saidyou did worse before you got
better.
I did worse because my grip waswrong, we weren't talking and
your vision was messed up, if Ican remember.

Speaker 2 (01:49:52):
No, no, no, because I've always been a two-eye
shooter, right?
Yeah, so you weren't lookingtoo you are.
You were looking at the wholepicture, like seeing red
somewhere on the target yes, andnot looking precisely yeah,
right, you, you.

Speaker 1 (01:50:01):
You didn't have the visual discipline that you
needed initially yes, and so inthat, once my grip was changed,
that was the game changer.
Yeah, uh, and then the red dotitself just kind of fell into
place.
So, um, where was I going withthat?
And cough threw me off whatwe're talking about?
The recruits, them goingthrough it, the yeah, the uh,

(01:50:25):
learning quicker, faster.
And and then we opened it up tolateral not laterals, but, uh,
current officers to get.
And how was that transition forthem?

Speaker 2 (01:50:36):
uh, first, for the most part yeah, for the most
part it was great.
Yeah, because most officers arealready doing what we're asking
them to do.
They just don't realize they'redoing it.
You know, when we have, when,when they stand on a static line
, they revert back to the.
Let me close my non-dominanteye, let me hard focus on the
front side, let me do all thesethings right.
But when we start having themrunning around the range, or if

(01:51:00):
they're in it's this ammunitionvillage, they're not doing any
of those things, just likethey're not doing in the real
world.
So we put them in positions towhere they're going to be
performing kind of the same waythey would be in the real world
if it was to happen yeah, minusthe bullets coming at them or
whatever.
And then they realize realquick, like holy cow.
I've been looking at the targetthe whole time and now what?

(01:51:21):
There's a red dot there, yep,and I just shoot.
I'm like, yeah, that's exactlyright.
There's a red dot there, yep,and I just shoot.
I'm like, yeah, that's exactlyright.

Speaker 1 (01:51:27):
Yeah, you know, yeah, I.
I remember getting yelled at,not yelled at, but just like
told repeatedly close your eye,close your eye, close your eye.
We, even in the air force, weyou shoot your rifle that way,
not your pistol, shoot yourrifle that way, not your pistol.
And I'm like I can't help.
I don't think to shut an eye, Iam thinking to shoot the target
.
So I just always would keepthat both eyes open.

Speaker 2 (01:51:55):
And it's funny how I went from being scorned for it
for quite a while to the pointwhere now I'm being praised for
it, like yeah, good job, likethat's how you should do it.
Keep doing what you've beendoing.
Yeah, keep doing what you'vebeen doing.

Speaker 1 (01:52:09):
You beat me for doing that.
So there's hope old dogs canlearn new tricks.
Absolutely so everybody outthere listening.
Red dots are where it's at.
I'm an sro fan that's myfavorite one me too.
Um, it's one of the reasons.
This gun that you were lookingat earlier, uh, that was really
the only option when I firstbought that site and I just I
feel like I have to turtle more,or really raise that gun up
With RMR.
With RMR.

Speaker 2 (01:52:27):
I'll get you an SRO for it.

Speaker 1 (01:52:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:52:30):
I'll get an SRO for you to put on that gun.

Speaker 1 (01:52:32):
Okay, I'm down.

Speaker 2 (01:52:33):
I'll trade you for the RMR.
Okay, if you have some crazyattachment to the RMR.

Speaker 1 (01:52:41):
Not at all, I can't stand that RMR, I'll trade you
an SRO for it.
I turn into a turtle.
I can't get this one like I canthe SRO, that EOTech that you
got me that one.
I like that one too.
Clear glass yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:52:56):
It's not bad.
It's not bad.

Speaker 1 (01:52:59):
Just like the SRO, the sight picture, it's instinct
.
Just there that one, I got tohunt for more.

Speaker 2 (01:53:05):
I'll get you hooked up.
Okay, it's instinctuous thereLike that one.

Speaker 1 (01:53:06):
I got to hunt for more.
I'll get you hooked up.
Okay, I like it.
All right, sir.
So we got into Red Dot.
We talked about that.
There's two more things I wantto talk about on the range, and
then I want to talk about someother things that you got going
on.
You work at one of, if not, themost progressive,
forward-thinking range slashvillage.

(01:53:29):
that's in the nation that I knowof, and I don't work in the
ranges but you get to see rangesall over the nation.
How is that range holding up,and can you talk a little bit
about what makes your guys'range so unique?

Speaker 2 (01:53:44):
Yeah, it's holding up great.
So we have the largest indoortraining facility in the nation
for law enforcement.
So we have four indoor ranges,about 120,000 square feet of
total training space indoors,you know, with with one range
being 40 lanes 50 yards deep,another range being five lanes,
25 yards, another range being 40lanes, 50 yards deep, another

(01:54:05):
range being five lanes, 25 yards, another range being 30 lanes,
25 yards, and then 100-yardindoor range, which is 10 lanes
wide.
You've got them memorized, yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:54:15):
I've been there for a while.
You've been there a minute.

Speaker 2 (01:54:17):
Yeah, so yeah, comparatively speaking, we are
extremely blessed.
Yeah, you know.

Speaker 1 (01:54:25):
But what are the capabilities of that range?
It isn't just a shooting laneno, it's endless.

Speaker 2 (01:54:30):
So a couple of the ranges you can drive into, yeah
patrol car right up in there.
Yeah, I mean, we do a lot ofstuff like that.
Swat does a lot of things with,uh, their bear cats.
They drive into the range.
We we're able to build out, umfloor plans for houses in our
ranges, yep, for, uh, you know,swat to use training wise or
whatever the case may be.
So it's kind of endless what wecan do.

(01:54:51):
Everything in there is 50 calrated.
Every single range is 50 calrated.
So, um, that means the ceiling,the, the trap yes, the ceiling
gets shot a lot.
I've seen it.
Yeah, um, you know the walls,everything is 50 cal rated.
So you know there's nothingthat we can't shoot in our range
.
Obviously, you know we're notgoing to be shooting any.

(01:55:12):
You know crazy ap rounds orright, um, anything.
You know anything like that.
Um, no tracers or anything.
We want to catch a range offire, although range has been
caught on fire several times.
But yeah, um, yeah, so what wecan do is is, it's up to your
imagination, man, like, what doyou want?

Speaker 1 (01:55:29):
to do because you can do crowd, noise, fog, lightning
and thunder yeah, like red andblue.
Red and blue flashing all overthe place, baby screaming yeah
it's insane all the differentthings you can do and I don't
think a lot of people understand.
It's not just that the range islarge, it's not just that the
range has the ability to firerifle rounds inside those are
very cool features it's all theother things bringing the cars

(01:55:53):
in being able to change thingsaround, the ability to let your
people shoot and move becauseyou've got the space for it and
the stuff behind it and then thelow light training.

Speaker 2 (01:56:02):
Obviously you know there's so many places that you
know if you're, if you'retraining outdoor.
Like chancy and I, we went andtaught a class last summer I
think it was, uh, somewhere alittle east of here in in texas,
and they wanted low lighttraining but they wanted to
start the class at like noon andwe're like in the summertime,

(01:56:22):
oh like well, we'll get to lowlight 10 hours into the day,
because that's when, that's whenit happens, that's when it's
low you know.
So it um having the ability to.
You know, just walk to the backof the range and hit a button
and make it completely pitchblack, to where you can't see
your hand in front of your face.
And now let's do training.
And it's 10, 30 in the morning.

Speaker 1 (01:56:45):
Yeah, you know.
Yeah, you're not limited.
Yeah, it's pretty cool.
I like that, okay, and then thelast question I had about the
firearms and range stuff iswhat's on the horizon?
What are some of the cool stuffto look forward to?

Speaker 2 (01:56:59):
So we are.
We really want to keep pushingout the different pistol and
rifle classes for in-service.
I really want to keep pushingout the different pistol and
rifle classes for in-service.
For so long we've kind of notprovided further training for
firearms for our department.
You kind of like you got tocome qualify and then you got to

(01:57:22):
practice whenever you felt likepracticing right, we really
want to get to the point towhere we're mandating firearms
training.
I think it's going to be asmall step at first, like a
four-hour block that it'smandatory you have to go to, but
we are constantly implementingnew classes in between recruit
classes and everything else thatwe have.
So, like we have a pistol, oneclass, which is the first half,

(01:57:48):
is the fundamentals and then thesecond half is movement.
Pistol two is all movement inthe dark because so many
officers the only time they getlow light training is in the
academy, but yet they go out andthey work in low light
conditions yeah, now can you dome a favor when you do this
mandatory stuff, because onething that I hate that the
military does is mandatorytraining in things that don't
apply to that person's job.

Speaker 1 (01:58:10):
Yeah, so, like for me , you guys are going to have
your hands full if you make itfull department wide, but I
would say it's more pertinentfor that training to be for
patrol.
And then you know officeworkers like and I know the
argument is like well, thesepeople can be out in the street
tomorrow.

Speaker 2 (01:58:27):
Yeah, I don't, I don't buy that.

Speaker 1 (01:58:28):
I don't like that.
Like have that be an optionalthing but not necessarily a
mandatory thing, because I Ithink it helps alleviate a lot
of pressure and getting as manypeople through as we have.
But at the same time, like yougotta be smart about like you
don't want a guy that's beenworking back office for the last

(01:58:48):
10 years.
Why are you putting themthrough training that?
You know our backgrounds guys,you know what I mean.
Like I don't think you should.

Speaker 2 (01:58:56):
You know what I don't think you know what I like that
, so I I right automatically.
I thought of okay, so we'llhave a, a pistol, one class
that's mandatory for for patrol.
Yeah, a pistol, one classthat's mandatory for patrol.

Speaker 1 (01:59:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:59:07):
A pistol, one class, that's mandatory for detectives
and it's all from concealment.
Yes, yes, stuff like that, notblue uniform gun belt, because
they don't carry that, theydon't wear that every day.
There's guys that haven't wornthat in 20 years, right, but
they carry.

Speaker 1 (01:59:21):
You know, they wear a suit or they wear whatever I
like that I'm always appendix orI'm my new thing is a sling bag
.
I got a sling bag.
That yeah it looks like a purse, yeah, yeah, no, I know exactly
what it is, but yeah we, yeah,we, we may allow, not on duty we
may allow some people to dothat on the range other people.

(01:59:42):
It's like yeah, not on duty, Iwill clarify.

Speaker 2 (01:59:45):
You know what I like, that I like that feedback.
I haven't thought about that.
I will definitely take that tothem and say hey.

Speaker 1 (01:59:50):
Yeah, because how many times have you been in
training?
Because I was a trainerinstructor down at the academy
and you get these guys that arelike why am I going through this
?

Speaker 2 (01:59:58):
Okay, let me ask you a question Because you've been a
to happen.
We don't see a lot ofdetectives come through pistol
training?

Speaker 1 (02:00:10):
and is it because they don't want to throw their
gun belt on um I?
I think that's a part of it.

Speaker 2 (02:00:13):
They want to like just train the way they always,
yeah, carry their now we're alldifferent.

Speaker 1 (02:00:18):
Here's another thing with detectives in training
there is.
There's some formalstandardized training that you
go through.
Here's how you file your cases.
Here's your caseload.
Here's how you read through allthat.
One thing that they don't haveis a standardized operating
procedure when you go into thefield.
So they'll be in the office allday long with their little cute

(02:00:39):
badge and a little leatherpaddle holster that they spent
$150 on because it looks goodwith their suit and they get the
matching ones and all that shit.
I had a and this was just mymindset.
I'm like, if I'm going out andI'm going to go try to find some
leads on stuff, I got one ofthose outer padded belts, you
know battle belt, and I had mymag, I had my, my gun, I had a

(02:01:02):
most importantly, a place tohold a radio and my badge bare
minimum, you know I and cuff Ithink I had one set of cuffs
with me, right.
But my thought process was likeI work east side, like, right,
they see that I'm a cop if Ijust have this one mag in my my
like I'm not ready, yeah, andI'm also not ready to engage as

(02:01:26):
well with a holster that I don'twear that much, yeah, and the
detective's holster, for mostlistening, it's usually just
some little leather holster ormaybe a Kydex holster, but it's
not the same as drawing fromyour duty belt and stuff like
that.
So I tried to get as close tothat as I could when I went out
in the field, but I was rare.
Maroney was another one that hewould wear it like that.

(02:01:53):
I see a couple other detectives,but I think part of the problem
getting those detectives downthere is there isn't really a
set standard of what you wear,how you wear it and what to do
when you're out in the field.
Yeah, most of them don't evencarry a radio, right, and I'm
like what are you gonna do?
You get an engagement.
You're going to hope that youget on your phone.

Speaker 2 (02:02:06):
Yeah, or somebody else calls for you, yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:02:08):
Have you ever tried to do that?
Like it's very hard.
I chased a car burglar out ofmy own house Not thinking, yeah,
I had my gun, that was it andmy cell phone.
And now here I got to like getthe phone out, and as soon as I
went for the phone, he took offrunning.
What am I going to do?

(02:02:28):
Shoot him.

Speaker 2 (02:02:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:02:29):
I can't shoot that dude in the back, you know Right
, especially since I alreadysaid stop police.
Yeah, you know like there's somuch training that needs to go
for officers handling stuff whenthey're off the clock.

Speaker 2 (02:02:40):
All right.
So this is what I would askfrom you right, come talk to us
about it okay seriously, becausewe're in the process now of
adding more things we'reactually looking at at.
Uh.
So chancy and I the four-hourblock for the pistol refresher,
we did a four-hour block forpatrol and we did 44 classes in

(02:03:02):
three months oh shit and we didall hours, like we were there
till like three in the morningand it was just a sign up.
If you want to do it yeah, youknow, and guys loved it.
They loved it because they gotfour hours of training and then
they got to shoot their annualcall at the end of the year and
it counted.
Yeah, at the end of the classit counted for their yearly call
speaking of.

Speaker 1 (02:03:18):
We're gonna do that.

Speaker 2 (02:03:18):
Yeah, yeah, I got you um, so they loved it, yeah.
And then we went eight-hourblock and we saw participation
kind of dip Dip, and I think alot of it has to do with the
fact that it's harder for guysto A they want to go on their
work day, which obviously Yep,and it's harder for some

(02:03:39):
supervisors to allow two orthree guys from a team to pull
them from the streets for theday to send them to training.

Speaker 1 (02:03:46):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:03:49):
So team to pull them from the streets for the day to
send them to training.
Yeah, you know, um, so we wereactually just talking about this
.
Is is maybe offering more ofthe four hour block ones, just
two of them a day, because Ithink, as a sergeant, if you're,
if one of your guys says, hey,I want to go to this class at
the range, it's four hours yeah,you may be gone at the
beginning.
Yeah, yeah, okay, that's cool ifyou're like I'm gonna be gone
all day beginning yeah, yeah,okay, that's cool.
I feel like I'm going to begone all day and you're like,
well, this guy's already gotvacation and this guy's off, and

(02:04:09):
this guy's already got training.
It's easier for supervisors, Ithink, to allow guys to come
down for a half a day.
So I think we're going to lookat that more.
But having the training that istailored to positions, I like
that.

Speaker 1 (02:04:27):
Yeah, I positions, I like that.
Yeah, I, I think so, and andthat's something that the
military has actually started todo.
That's why I asked like um ptstandards.
They have a traditional ptstandard for the majority, but
then they've got other optionsfor people that are in active,
like you know, like the cops.
The cops have to be in adifferent type of shape than the
dental hygienist.
That's yeah, not gonna arm up.

Speaker 2 (02:04:47):
No, it makes sense.
Yeah, it makes sense.
So that's just just the idea.
But cool, here's the deal.
Bring it.
I want you to collab with us onthat, okay, for sure for you?

Speaker 1 (02:04:55):
yeah, I can, because I can tell you right now there's
a whole course that needs to goto detectives about going out
in the field and because, like Isaid, I've been out there like
field operations yeah, field ops, like if you get called out,
you're on, you're on callbackand you're going to a scene.
Yes, there's a bunch ofofficers there, but you've got

(02:05:17):
your pistol and your your badge.
Yeah, that's it.
You've got no light, you've gotno, nothing, like some may have
it.

Speaker 2 (02:05:24):
I think we can probably collaborate with sean
on this too.
Yeah, and do some practicalstuff in the village.
Yeah, yeah, sean Harris, yeah,that'd be cool, I've been
wanting to get him on here too,by the way.

Speaker 1 (02:05:33):
Yeah, make him come up, but yeah, yeah, for sure.
Okay, excuse me.
All right, love it.
We got through a lot of thepolicing side of things that I
wanted to get to.
Yeah, now we need to get to thefuture of the Bryan stall.
So with your 20 plus yearcareer and your love for service

(02:05:56):
, you got other, bigger andbetter things coming down the
pipe.

Speaker 2 (02:06:00):
What do you got, buddy?
I'm currently running forUnited States Congress.

Speaker 1 (02:06:03):
Holy shit.

Speaker 2 (02:06:04):
Yeah, I'm in the middle of the campaign right now
so what in the hell inspiredthat?
a couple of things.
So I got obviously having aservant's heart in in serving
communities for 20 plus yearsright and doing it in a way that
um, encouraged and involvedcommunication.

(02:06:26):
Like we as law enforcement, wecan't solve people's problems
unless we know what thoseproblems are.
And in order to know what theyare, we have to answer the call
for service and then listen andthen provide options or give
them feedback or guidance orwhatever the case may be Right.
So that's kind of how myservice and your service is

(02:06:47):
structured, obviously because ofour upbringing in law
enforcement.
So a little over a year ago Ibecame a city councilman and
then a mayor pro tem, and so I Igot involved with politics that
way.

Speaker 1 (02:07:01):
The hell's a mayor pro tem.

Speaker 2 (02:07:02):
So it's kind of like if the mayor is out, or if the
mayor steps down, or the mayoris out of town and something
needs to be done okay I step inas the role of the mayor.
Where did you do this?
At covington covington.

Speaker 1 (02:07:18):
Yeah, so I never never been there yeah, little,
little, little, small town okayI love it, man.

Speaker 2 (02:07:23):
It's like living in the 1960s.
It's great that's awesome yeah,it's super cool, but um so you
know, yeah, my kids still likerun around until way after dark
and ride bikes with all theneighbor kids and I will say you
you hid this well, because Inever knew any of this until all
of a sudden, you're like thisis what I'm doing.

Speaker 1 (02:07:42):
I was like yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:07:44):
So I got the the political bug um year and a half
two years ago, ish, right andthen I fell in love with it.
Man, I really did.

Speaker 1 (02:07:52):
I loved that kind of service and yeah that's really
hard for a cop to say, by theway, yeah, because cops hate
politics.
Well, it's.

Speaker 2 (02:08:00):
There's a lot of people that are like are you
crazy?
Like what are you doing?
You know, yeah, right, um,you're one of them.

Speaker 1 (02:08:04):
Like, what are you?

Speaker 2 (02:08:05):
doing.
But no.
So, man, I loved it.
And so I started to look intohow I can, how I can better
serve the community in thataspect, you know, and how my
service from law enforcementtranslates over to that that

(02:08:26):
kind of service.
And then I started looking atthe uh, elected officials that
we had and, um, that Iwholeheartedly believe that we
deserve more and we deservebetter than what we're currently
getting because of the lack ofcommunication, the lack of
community involvement, the lackof um, you know, um, but the

(02:08:49):
right way of serving the peopleI think we're missing.
And when I say the lack ofengagement with constituents is
a big thing, I think if you areserving a large group of people
and you are their representativein United States Congress, I

(02:09:10):
think that your sole missionshould be serving those people
and not yourself and not anyother entity, and I think it
shouldn't just be a title.
I think when you go toWashington, you have to go to
Washington and you have to havea team that you built, people

(02:09:34):
that you hired behind you, thatyou can trust yeah, not that
we're put there, but a team thatyou built right and you have to
be able to understand what theneeds of the people are, and you
have to be able to answer thecalls and you have to be able to
provide them with options andsolutions, and you also have to

(02:09:58):
be able to be available for themas much as you can.
Right now.
If you're in Washington, you'rein Washington, but when you're
at home, you need to beavailable for the people.
You need to be doing thingsthat involve community
engagement.
You need to be doing thingsthat involve community
engagement.
You need to be doing thingsthat involve interacting with
first responders and with policeand fire.

(02:10:19):
You have to, you have to makeyourself available and be able
to effectively listen andcommunicate with those people,
and I think that we deserve aheck of a lot more and a lot
better than what we're currentlygetting.
I'll give you an example.
So I was down in a County that'sin my district and I was

(02:10:42):
talking to a couple of theofficers there.
Well there's, they have afederal grant, federal grant for
a new bear cat.
Well, it has been stalledthrough some process within the
city or the county and they'renot allowing them to purchase
this piece of protectiveequipment.
Well, they've made severalphone calls inquiring about this

(02:11:06):
to a representative of theirsto no avail.
No phone call back.
No, nothing Right.
Same place has a fire truckthat they need to buy.
They had a federal grant for itGot approved.
They're not allowed to buy thefire truck, it's a federal grant

(02:11:26):
.

Speaker 1 (02:11:27):
Right.

Speaker 2 (02:11:28):
It's not a city grant or a state grant, it's a
federal grant Right.

Speaker 1 (02:11:31):
You would think that money is going to go the
community.

Speaker 2 (02:11:53):
You would think that would be a priority.
You know, and you know I get it.
Timing matters and sometimespeople are getting busy and
stuff, but this has been goingon for well over a year.

Speaker 1 (02:12:04):
So there's no excuse.

Speaker 2 (02:12:05):
There's nothing that this just happened yesterday you
know.
So I think that my approach toservice and how I've been
brought up in this serviceentity when it comes to law
enforcement right, I think issomething that is um much needed
when it yeah in terms ofrepresentation in in united

(02:12:29):
states congress yeah, and Ithink one of the good parts
about having somebody with yourbackground is the training
mindset and knowing how blessedwe are right where we're at.

Speaker 1 (02:12:40):
Because, like I said, I I've said this for a long
time now obviously, doing thepodcast, I can't say where I
work.
You guys can figure it out.
You'll never hear me say it onhere, but in that the training
that we have is literally itshould be.
The mold like this is where youshould.
I'm not saying everybody has todo the exact training your

(02:13:01):
police training needs to fityour culture where you're at.
But when it comes to beingprogressive and not in a woke,
progressive way, it's not what Imean but progressive, always
pushing the envelope, alwaystrying to improve where you're
at is such a benefit to what youdo.
Because when you see theseother agencies that are asking
for a bear cat and you see thatthey're lucky if they get to

(02:13:26):
shoot more than just their qualonce a year because they can't
afford the ammo and all thatstuff, you can make a logical
and reasonable argument on theirbehalf to say, like getting
this piece of equipment shouldhave been a higher priority
because you're allowing them tobe safer, not just for
themselves right but for thecommunity, because if officers
show up without this, there's ahighly higher likelihood that a

(02:13:48):
use of force, a serious use offorce, is going to happen,
versus having the protectionsitting back, waiting or
whatever.
But that is what your ability,because I'm in the same
environment where we get thishigher training level that we
can help start spreading thataround the, at least around the
state of Texas, but around thenation.

Speaker 2 (02:14:11):
Yeah, so one of the things that I'm, that I'm one of
the pillars I'm running on, islaw enforcement and judicial
change.

Speaker 1 (02:14:18):
right, I want to Like accountability type thing.

Speaker 2 (02:14:21):
Well, yeah, there's, there's a lot of that, right.
So I'm talking about the reformand people are like, oh, you
know what does that mean?
Cause it can mean a plethora ofthings, right?
So when I talk about lawenforcement reform, I'm talking
about being able to fund them ina way to provide them with
real-world practical trainingand equipment.
Yeah, and having that fundingnot be tied up in red tape,

(02:14:45):
bureaucracy, crap.
That happens and we see it allthe time.
How many times have you heardof things being approved but not
funded?
Yeah, there's money out there.
Yep, you know, there's moneyout there.
When you have agencies that areforced to do things by the
state, which they're great, theyare Okay, I'm not saying that,

(02:15:06):
you know, we shouldn't have moretraining, that's not what I'm
saying.
But when we put the pressure onagencies that are significantly
smaller than ours, this is amandate and they don't have the
funding.
And they don't have the funding,they don't have the personnel,
they don't have the knowledge,the instructors, the experience.
They have nothing to facilitatethat and if they don't
facilitate it, they're going tobe fined.

(02:15:27):
Yeah, however much money, Ithink we're failing our people
and I think that we could dobetter, and I know that the
federal government can come inand supplement a lot of that
with funding.
Yep, and I know that.
Because, and how about?
Instead of spending, you know,400 billion dollars to ukraine,
why don't we take a third ofthat and put it in law

(02:15:49):
enforcement training in theunited states?
Right, absolutely of that, andput it in law enforcement
training in the United States?
Right, absolutely.
We would be the most trainedlaw enforcement entity as a
nation worldwide.

Speaker 1 (02:15:59):
We've already.
There's working models thatwe've proven.
The defund doesn't work Right.

Speaker 2 (02:16:04):
We need more funding we need more funding and we need
people that can go and speak onthat and the importance of that
, because I think as a whole thenation and I think both sides
really you know, not so muchthis isn't a Republican Democrat
thing anymore.
I think it used to be when thewhole defund police was really
big.
I think that's kind of gone nowand I think both sides can

(02:16:26):
agree like we need to fund theseguys, like they need more
training.

Speaker 1 (02:16:31):
We still have guys that are falling for first
amendment audits.
Yeah, we still have officersthat think, because they were
called on scene, that they havethe right to your id.
Yeah, we need to protect theconstitution.
So if you start taking awayfunding and they're not getting
somewhere, it's not clicking.
With the most basic of training, right, like all this other

(02:16:51):
stuff that's coming down thepipe that's being mandated,
they're not going to have achance, right, because they
can't even get the propertraining for the fundamentals on
some of this stuff.
Right, and that's a problem.
Like 2025, we should not beseeing officers fall for First
Amendment audit stuff whenpeople are on public sidewalks
or whatever it is.

Speaker 2 (02:17:12):
Like, let's get back to the constitution.
Let's, I'm a huge constitutionguy like I.
I wholeheartedly believe inthat.
You know, I had a conversationwith a really young guy um a
month ago actually, and he saidwell, what, what two amendments
are your favorite?
the first two yeah, yeah, rightwell, and I said well, obviously
you know the first and secondare obviously the most important

(02:17:33):
, right, I said.
But let me throw you acurveball, because one of them
is actually one that one of myum issues that I'm running on.
So the second amendment'sobviously important to me, right
?
I believe everybody has a rightto keep and bear arms should
not be infringed.
I'm not a big fan of the thirdright.
Okay, yeah, there's a quarter.
You're like quartering yeah.
It's not really.
Yeah, it's not really a thinganymore until it is yeah.

(02:17:55):
You know, and then the 10thamendment.
I'm big on the 10th amendment.
I believe that we need toreturn all of the rights to the
States from the federalgovernment.
That should not have anyfederal government oversight.
I think the federal governmentshould do a couple of things.
I think it should providenational security.
Right, let's make sure all ofour borders not just the North

(02:18:15):
and South, but all of ourborders are protected, and I
think that they should betransparent, justifiable and
responsible with the nationalbudget.
Because you know as much aseverybody would like to say,
let's abolish taxes, like I getthat, yeah, I do Right, abolish

(02:18:37):
them.
Great, but the federalgovernment, if, if they would
utilize the money that they getin properly, how much different
would it look for us?
Right, you know, and I get it.
There's things that arenecessities, that have to be
paid for with tax dollars thatsome people don't like.

(02:18:58):
But on the other side, look atall the stuff Doge just exposed.
You know you're spending $44million to transgendered animal
studies in Uganda.

Speaker 1 (02:19:11):
I heard about that.
What are we doing?

Speaker 2 (02:19:14):
You know, like all these unnecessarily funded
programs in other places, whydon't we take that money and
dump it into our own people?

Speaker 1 (02:19:27):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:19:29):
And.

Speaker 1 (02:19:29):
I the thing that makes because I don't dip into
politics a whole lot.
But one of the things thatreally irritates me with that
type of thing is where is theoversight of the money?
Yeah, because, yeah, thisthing's getting funded, but
there's zero to show where thatmoney went.
Did it even go to the programthat it was supposed to go to,

(02:19:50):
or did it just go in somebody'spocket?

Speaker 2 (02:19:52):
Yeah, I mean that's, you know I can't answer that you
know, honestly, but it's,that's such a super valid
question but that's.

Speaker 1 (02:19:59):
But that's the point.
That's what I'm talking about.
What you're getting to is theaccountability.

Speaker 2 (02:20:06):
Show me, and I want to be able to defend every one
of my decisions as a congressmanEveryone which means I have to
be open and honest andtransparent, like one of my
plans is I plan on implementinga network through emails,
because that's how most peoplecommunicate now, especially

(02:20:27):
nowadays.
You start with the top cityleaders, okay, and every city
within your district, and thenyou, then you, then you take all
of of of uh, first responders,right, or public service let's
say, police, fire, ems, right,and you build a network and then

(02:20:47):
you also start branching out toyour constituents, and this is
actually something that I heardanother congressman trying to
implement.
I thought it was a brilliantidea, right.
And then you are so transparentto where, when you can, you
send them via email.
Here's all the bills that we'revoting on.
I may be sitting in WashingtonDC.
Here's all the bills we'revoting on.

(02:21:09):
We're going to vote on these intwo days, whatever.
Give me feedback.
Yeah, yeah or nay, like.
Here's a quick, down and dirtyparagraph of this 10 000 page
bill yeah, this is what itentails, yeah I mean, we can use
ai to you, can?

Speaker 1 (02:21:26):
you can use ai to help summarize things exactly.

Speaker 2 (02:21:29):
Yeah, right, you take these 10,000 pages.

Speaker 1 (02:21:31):
They can't hide shit in bills anymore.

Speaker 2 (02:21:33):
No, take these 10,000 pages and turn it into a
paragraph and AI will do it likethat it's over.
But take those things and thenyou push it out and then you
solicit response.
You ask them hey, how do youwant me to vote on this?
Yeah, this, yeah.

(02:21:57):
And if you have 600 emails thatcome back of your, you know,
100 plus thousand constituents,well, if 600 responded and 94 of
those 600 say yes, well, guesshow I'm voting.
Yeah yeah, at least can Ijustify that.
Yeah, absolutely.
Now, when I go home to thepeople and they're like, why'd
you vote this way?

Speaker 1 (02:22:11):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:22:12):
Here.
It is 94% of the people thatresponded said yes.
I voted yes.

Speaker 1 (02:22:16):
Yeah, and then you can people know.
All the ones that are going tovote for you are going to know.
Hey, he announced this is whathe's going to run his campaign.

Speaker 2 (02:22:24):
That's how I'm running it.

Speaker 1 (02:22:26):
So can I throw?
Can I throw something at you?

Speaker 2 (02:22:29):
Yeah, can I throw something at you?
Yeah, an idea, throw it.

Speaker 1 (02:22:30):
Throw it, because while we're sitting here
thinking you're a cop, mm-hmmwhy don't you wear a body cam
when you can Show people how youwork?
A body cam where Doing your jobJust like a cop would.
If you're dealing with thepeople, boop, boop, turn it on
when you're not dealing with thepeople, turn it off.

Speaker 2 (02:22:51):
Turn it on when you're not dealing with people.
Turn it off.
You say okay, oh, you'retalking about in congress.

Speaker 1 (02:22:55):
Yeah, oh, okay, I think that, bro, you would stand
out.
People would be like, yeah, butI may stand up for the wrong
way too, though, right?

Speaker 2 (02:23:01):
no, who cares?
People may be like I ain'ttalking about dude, you're a cop
.

Speaker 1 (02:23:06):
Yeah, they can't get around that like I think.

Speaker 2 (02:23:09):
I think I think that I don't.
I'm not, here's the deal.
I'm not going to say it's nevergoing to happen.
However, I think it would be agame changer.
That's funny.
However, I think that there'sprobably conversations that may
be had, or may be caught on that, that are Absolutely.

Speaker 1 (02:23:26):
You know, classified yes, and I'm not saying during
that, and having to like what ishe?
Talking about, but like theday-to-day, you know.
Oh, like the interactions withthe people and stuff.

Speaker 2 (02:23:37):
Yes, dude, I don't think there's anything wrong
with that.

Speaker 1 (02:23:38):
Yeah or if you're making calls like if you're like
, all right, today I got thisamount of emails, yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:23:47):
Okay, you've already got a camera all right, here's
my emails.

Speaker 1 (02:23:50):
This is what I'm getting through.

Speaker 2 (02:23:51):
That is wild man.
I've never thought about thatin that.
Okay.

Speaker 1 (02:23:53):
So in that aspect I you know what bro I think people
would love it and then post itI was just gonna say if you
could even live stream it if youneeded to yeah, like hey, you
guys want to see what I'm doingright now.

Speaker 2 (02:24:05):
Yeah, let's go live with a congressman yeah log on
to this link.
This is what I'm doinganswering emails.

Speaker 1 (02:24:10):
Sounds like you need me on your campaign.

Speaker 2 (02:24:13):
I like you, I love you, you know what I have not
thought about that only becauseyou know you.
You think of like theeverybody's got these, like you
know, crazy perceptions aboutwhat happens in dc and stuff
right and, and I do too becauseI'm not there.
You're not there yet obviously,but you, you think like every
conversation's classifiedconfidential, which is that's

(02:24:34):
not, or it's like some sort oflike.
Hey we'll get you in with thisperson, but you got to do this
favor and, oh yeah, I'm suresome of that happens, like
obviously, like I'm, I'm new inthe obviously new in the
fundraising mode and campaigningmode right now and, um, you
know, I can honestly saynobody's like yeah, approached

(02:24:55):
me and been like you know, ifyou do this, then I'm gonna give
you, you know, x amount ofdollars, right.
Everything is so on the up andup when it comes to that,
because of the fec filings andall those things.
You know I'm, I, I haven't, Ihaven't experienced that.
But again, I'm so new into thisI'm not saying it doesn't
happen, I don't know if ithappens or not.
I think it would maybe be alittle hard to do it in that way

(02:25:18):
.
I'm sure there's ways around it, obviously.
But the whole quid pro quothing like you vote yes and I'm
going to give you a milliondollars in this briefcase.

Speaker 1 (02:25:29):
I don't see that.
Did you guys see Stahl rollingaround in a Lambo?
Yeah, weird.

Speaker 2 (02:25:34):
Yeah, it was so weird .
He rolled up in a truck.

Speaker 1 (02:25:37):
He had a body cam on.
We could figure out how thathappened.

Speaker 2 (02:25:40):
Yeah, you could audit me, you could audit my body,
cam Right.
Bro, I'm telling you there'ssomething there.
That's the first I've everheard of it and I'm not going to
dismiss it.

Speaker 1 (02:25:49):
Yeah, I think that would be.

Speaker 2 (02:25:50):
I'm not going to dismiss it.

Speaker 1 (02:25:51):
Because, if I knew, okay, he says he was in the
office and he said he looked atthis.
And then all of a sudden you'relike, oh yeah, I remember the
day I looked at that one.
Let me pull up my body, camstuff.
Yep, there I did.
I read the email.
I made calls, at least on myside.

(02:26:13):
You could put it on speaker.
You could even put it onspeaker.
Yeah, bro, it'd be sick.
Dude, you know what you wouldbe known as?
The guy that's transparent.
That is transparency, that isthe definition, because I want
judges to do that.

Speaker 2 (02:26:29):
That's another thing.
One of my issues is judicialreform.

Speaker 1 (02:26:32):
Yes.

Speaker 2 (02:26:33):
Right and it's.
I have a real problem withjudges not being held
accountable for reduced bail orno bail or PR bonds or all these
things where guys re-offend.
Now I'm not saying every singleperson that gets thrown in jail

(02:26:55):
is guilty.
That's not what I'm saying.
There's been plenty of peoplethat have been accused of and
arrested for murder and yeah,the innocence project.

Speaker 1 (02:27:04):
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 2 (02:27:05):
And found it not even to that length.
Right, the innocent project isgreat.
But two weeks later newevidence comes in and they're
like, oh, it wasn't that guy, itwas this guy, you know.
So I'm not saying that, that'snot what I'm saying.
All I'm saying is is that ifyou, you could probably pick
between the two of us, we couldpick five crimes that if
somebody commits these crimes,there is no bond.

(02:27:28):
Right Period, there's noreduced bond, there's no PR,
there is no bond.
Yeah, because how many timeshave you seen it across the
country where somebody'sarrested for aggravated robbery
or murder or aggravated assault,aggravated sexual assault, and

(02:27:49):
they're let out on $150 bond andthree days later, what do they
do?
Re?
They're let out on $150 bondand three days later, what do
they do?
Reoffend, reoffend, yeah.
And who's held accountable?
Nobody.
I have a real problem with that.
Yeah, I have a real problemwith that.
I think the judges should haveto justify it and I think that,
if it happens, there should beserious repercussions to that.

(02:28:11):
Now, I get it, everybody'shuman, everybody makes mistakes,
and you can't see the future.
I get it.
But if you are a judge and youhave let out four of these
offenders in the last year,maybe you shouldn't be a judge
anymore.

Speaker 1 (02:28:25):
I think that they should have to publicly post
summarized judgments online,daily, daily for those things or
for anything for for anythingreally, but it like if they made
a decision.
you know, case, dismissed case,all these like it should be
posted on a daily log.
Here's what this judge didtoday on these cases and gives

(02:28:46):
you the.
I mean, the technology is there, ai can do it for you as this
stuff goes in, sure, but haveyou know the stuff that they did
and what they decided on?
And I think the same thingshould be for prosecutors,
because that's another realm ofthings that doesn't get checked.
You know, as a detective Iwould get cases constantly like
no, we're not going to take thiscase Right.

(02:29:07):
And I'm sitting there, I'm likeit seems, it seems like I got a
slam dunk.
You know, there's there's timesthat maybe I'm a little off
right, um, where they they'llpoint if I, if you get lucky and
get a good prosecutor, it'slike takes the time to explain
to you why they don't want totake this one right, um, where
I'm like where's the checks andbalances on that?
Or if they, they dumb it down.

(02:29:27):
Because they have discretion,they can dumb down your case I'm
.
I'm like this dude's been introuble like 18,000 times and
you're dumbing down this.
He needs to go.
He's a continuous problem,whether it's property crime
stuff or it's a violent felony.
There's no the checks andbalances.
There's a lot of checks andbalances for cops.

(02:29:47):
There's no checks.
There's very limited checks andbalances for every other part
of the criminal justice system.
Right, we are the front andcenter because we're the ones
out there and I'm all for it.
Great, I think you've gotten.
Policing's continued to improve.
But, like what you're sayingwith your campaign, that I like
is that needs to go to thecourts, not just the judge, but

(02:30:08):
the prosecutor and ourcorrection system.

Speaker 2 (02:30:19):
Yeah, I know, I agree , I mean more, more transparency
in, in, you know, maybe not tothe extent for body cams for
everybody, although again, Idifferent approach man but
you're right, ai is there liketo have summary judgments on
things when it you know youcould just hit, have a recorder
going in a courtroom and thenliterally take that recording,
upload into ai and say summarize, and it's done transcripts like

(02:30:39):
, literally in 30 seconds, theysend out.
They send it out like thetechnologies are to do that.
I'm all for transparency, I'mall for accountability and being
able to justify your position,whatever it is.
And I know for a fact, I know,that there's going to be times
where I'm going to be put into aposition to where I'm probably
going to have to make a decisionthat's not going to be popular

(02:31:02):
for some people.

Speaker 1 (02:31:04):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:31:04):
Right to communicate effectively with them and then
justify your decision and nothide behind it or just, you know
, kind of shun them.
Yeah, um, I think calling your,your representative's office or
your, you know, your electedofficial's office, no matter
what level it is, whether it'sus congress or or state or

(02:31:28):
whatever and having to call 17to 20 times before you get a
response back is crazy to me.
Crazy, yeah, you know, and alot of people don't even know
who their representatives areand have never called their
office.
But the ones that do need thehelp and the ones that do call
should be served Right.

Speaker 1 (02:31:50):
I don't know mine.

Speaker 2 (02:31:51):
Yeah, mine, yeah, I mean a lot of people don't and
that's fine, but if you hadsomething that you were, you
know, told, hey, you need to letyour representative know this.
And you're like, that's a greatidea.
And you called them.
And you called them 17 times,yeah, over a course of four

(02:32:14):
months before you finally gotsomeone to answer the phone.
And they're like, yeah, we'llget back to you.
And they never do, yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:32:22):
How would you feel?
Yeah, I would feel they need tobe replaced Exactly.
I would want to know what thevolume of calls are which you
could probably public recordExactly.
I would want to know what thevolume of calls are which you
could probably public record,and if I don't see that that
volume of calls is somewhat likewhat our dispatchers may have
to deal with, then I'm not goingto give you an hour.

Speaker 2 (02:32:39):
They are not nearly, I know, you know.
I promise you that any.
There is not a sitting UnitedStates Congressman that has 700
calls for service waiting rightnow.

Speaker 1 (02:32:50):
Right, yeah, like in in our city or whatever.
Shout out to our dispatchers.

Speaker 2 (02:32:54):
Yeah, exactly Like.
Could you imagine if you calledthe police and you had to call
17 times over three monthsbefore you got dispatched?
And they're like yeah, yeah,yeah, we'll get back to you.
Yeah, I grew up in Flint dude?

Speaker 1 (02:33:05):
Yeah, I grew up in Flint Michigan.
Yeah, I get it right.
Yeah, yeah, if you ever watchedthat docu-series on netflix
called flint town dude got homeinvaded or something like that
and beat the brakes off of himand he the cops didn't show up
for like 48 hours yeah, that'scrazy because they were so great

(02:33:26):
crazy yeah crazy.

Speaker 2 (02:33:27):
But now call 17 times over three months Exactly, you
know.
But yeah, yeah, I get it.
So, yeah, man, that's what Igot.
You know, campaign's goingreally good, cool.
Yeah, I got a team built aroundme.
You know I always have acampaign manager.
We got a really awesomefundraiser.
Hell yeah, chief strategist.

(02:33:48):
We have, you know, a bunch ofdifferent people around us that
are working really hard.
Our consultant team is reallyreally good, so we're really
excited about that.
We're hitting the groundrunning.
That's a lot of.
I'm not a career politician man.
I'm not.
Like I'm learning stuff on thefly, but it's.

Speaker 1 (02:34:09):
You're about to be a retired cop, yeah, but we're
attacking it like full steamahead.
Some of the best politicians,though, are the ones that
they're not career, the onesthat I've always liked they were
not career, yeah, so that'spretty cool.
You're obviously the firstperson that I talked to on the
phone with friends that isrunning for anything.
I've had some other people that, like manny, I kind of I, I

(02:34:33):
didn't, I didn't know manny likeI didn't hang out, talk to him,
none of that, but right, butwith you I was like what the
fuck?
I was like I can't.

Speaker 2 (02:34:41):
I did not see that coming, so I love it, man, if
all, if all goes well in march,then yeah cool.

Speaker 1 (02:34:47):
Well, let me know, let's do, we'll do a follow-up.
We should do a follow-upupregardless, just to kind of talk
about it for any cops that maywant to follow down your path.

Speaker 2 (02:34:56):
Yeah, any questions or anything that they may have,
you know I'm sure they'll bouncethem off of you and your social
media platform.

Speaker 1 (02:35:03):
Yeah, for sure I'll end up.
I'll make a bunch of clips outof this.
Give a little media kit for youso you guys can play with it a
bunch of clips out of this givea little media kit for you so
you guys can play with it.
And yeah, that'd be great withthat, and uh, yeah, no, but I
appreciate it, brother, you gotanything you want to get out
there no man other than that.

Speaker 2 (02:35:17):
You know appreciate the support.
Yes, sir, you can follow.
Follow along with our campaign.
We're on facebook and instagramand, um, you know, we just got
a youtube page okay, so where dothey got to go to find?
it.
Yeah, stall for congress.
Yeah, our website is is stallfor texascom.
Um, so, yeah, the whole, thewhole, uh, social media game

(02:35:42):
thing.
We have a couple people runningthat.
I have a couple people runningthat for me, so they're, they're
the ones that are doing a lotof that stuff.
Yeah, I got a social media teamthat I'm building up.
That's okay care of it.
So it's um, I wasn't huge onsocial media before you know.
Like you know, chancy and Iwere all everybody else tells
like y'all need to post things,y'all need to post things, and

(02:36:03):
we're like, oh yeah, yeah, we'retoo busy teaching or training
or we forget.
But it's, this is a differentworld, so we have to to do more
and we are doing more and we'regetting more of a following,
which is great.
You know that's that's that'skind of the new age way of
reaching people you know um veryfew people nowadays, I think,
have like cable TV right.

(02:36:24):
Most people like stream thingsand see ads on Google and and
YouTube and Facebook andwhatever.

Speaker 1 (02:36:33):
So that's where kind of the cream rises to the top.
I try to tell people that I'mlike.
You get on social media and youdo it long.
The hard part is consistency.
You've got to stay consistent.
So if you stay consistent, yourstuff gets out there and if
it's good, not just because youthink it's good, but the people
will let you know and the peoplethat are in your niche will

(02:36:53):
definitely let you know.
Right so you know, in the gungame there's, there are a dime,
a dozen out there, but when youstart showing that you're doing
things different, it will riseto the top.
Yeah, instantly.
Which is why I've been tryingto get you assholes on the show,
because I know you make ithappen.
I know you'll make it happen.

(02:37:16):
I know you got somethingdifferent, but yeah, next time
we'll chance you.
Now come over and talk aboutred dots.
Hell yeah, brother.
Well, I wish you luck, sir.
Appreciate you.
Yeah, take it easy.

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