August 27, 2025 • 43 mins
Jennifer [00:00:00]:
Hi, welcome back to the podcast. I'm Jennifer.
Ashlee [00:00:03]:
And I'm Ashlee.
Jennifer [00:00:04]:
And I get to introduce our guest today. And as always, we have a special guest. And I was reflecting. I'm like, I actually think I've known this guest since I've been born and I'm not related to them. So it's the first time for that. But we have Dr. Charles Baker with us today and I'm just going to give it to you, Dr. Baker, to tell us a little bit about yourself.
Dr. Charles Baker [00:00:23]:
First of all, thanks for having me and hope I can add something to your podcast here from my background and experiences. Well, I'm originally from Louisville, Kentucky. Grew up here, went to high school here and began college here. I went to Western Kentucky University for a year right out of high school. And that's a little bit relevant to My first real job was on the Louisville Police Department. Today it's the Louisville Metro Police Department. Back in the day, it was the city of Louisville. It's I began my work there in January 8th of 1973.
Jennifer [00:00:57]:
Okay.
Dr. Charles Baker [00:00:58]:
After having one year of college at Western Kentucky, I went to Western out of high school with the goal of being a high school teacher and a coach. But a good friend of my father's was a Louisville police officer and they were in a hiring spree at that time and he encouraged me. So I went down, took the test, and before I knew it, I was in recruit school in January at 70. And that was not my plan. But once I got there, I really super enjoyed it and began my career there. We can get into that later and a lot of it's relevant to what I do today, but I had a lot of assignments during my time there, enjoyed every bit of it. So anyway, I got sidetracked for several years with the Louisville Police Department. And like I said, I had one year of college there while I was on the department.
Dr. Charles Baker [00:01:47]:
The training officers that I had at that time encouraged me to continue to go to college. And we had a federal grant, the leap money that came out of the late 60s, federal grant to pay for college. So I enrolled at the University of Louisville part time while I was working. And it was those original trainers that I had that encouraged me to do that. And I'm always grateful for the department for allowing me to do that and actually paying for it. It was a challenge to go full time to work full time and go to get your degree. But I ended up with my master's degree because of the police. But I did 20 years there, worked in a variety of assignments But I retired when I had my 20 years in and it was, I didn't leave because I disliked the job.
Dr. Charles Baker [00:02:32]:
I really enjoyed it. But I was young enough to do something else in life and allowed me to go back and do what I originally wanted to do, be a high school. During that career time, I also went back to school to get my high school teaching certification. So when I retired from the police department, I could teach social studies in high school, Kentucky certification. And I got a job teaching at, actually the high school that I attended, Iroquois High School. I taught for a couple of two years there, and then I went to a law enforcement magnet at another school and I was in my third year teaching and my wife worked for an airline and she got transferred to Phoenix, Arizona. So, so at that time I was very emotional about this, but I had to quit my job and go out there. And so I only did three years of what I really wanted to do originally right out of high school.
Dr. Charles Baker [00:03:24]:
But I had a good time doing that, went to Arizona, and my first job out there was director of security for the Mesa, Arizona Public. So I became chief of security for them. That was my job when I, when we left to move out there and did that for seven years, my boss, an assistant superintendent, and he hooked me up with a professor at Arizona State University who talked me into earning my doctorate at Arizona State. So moved to Arizona. Instead of watching TV at night, I'd go to college and finished my doctorate and my dissertation tied in law enforcement as well as education. And back then, this was Columbine High school day. So my dissertation was about the attitudes of school principal in reporting crime from school.
Ashlee [00:04:13]:
Oh, wow.
Dr. Charles Baker [00:04:13]:
Is that relevant at that time? 20 some years later, it might be worthy of a follow up with that to see if it's changed. But anyway, finished my doctorate, I had the opportunity to become a professor at Scottsdale Community College. And so I finished my time. I did about seven years at Mesa Schools and 12 years teaching college, got to retire and we moved back home. And since then I've been here teaching as an adjunct at the university. So th
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(00:00):
Hi, welcome back to the podcast.I'm Jennifer.
And I'm Ashley. And I get to introduce our guest
today, and as always, we have a special guest.
And I was reflecting. I'm like, I actually think I've
known this guest since I've beenborn and I'm not related to
them. So it's the first time for that.
But we have Doctor Charles Bakerwith us today.
And I'm just going to give it toyou, Doctor Baker, to tell us a
(00:21):
little bit about yourself. First of all, thanks for having
me and hope I can add something to your podcast here from my
background and experiences. Well, I'm originally from
Louisville, KY, grew up here, went to high school here and
began college here. I went to Western Kentucky
University for a year right out of high school, and that's a
(00:42):
little bit relevant to my first real job was on the Louisville
Police Department. Today it's the Louisville Metro
Police Department. Back in the day, it was the city
of Louisville. I began my work there in January
8th of 1973 after having one year of college, college at
Western Kentucky. I went to Western out of high
(01:03):
school with the goal of being a high school teacher and a coach.
But a good friend of my father'swas a Louisville police officer
and they were in a hiring spree at that time and he encouraged
me. So I went down, took the test,
and before I knew it I was in recruit school in January at 70.
And that was not my plan. But once I got there, I really
(01:25):
super enjoyed it and began my career there.
We can get into that later and alot of it's relevant to what I
do today, but I had a lot of assignments during my time
there, enjoy there, enjoyed every bit of.
So anyway, I got sidetracked forseveral years with the
Louisville policeman. And like I said, I had one year
(01:45):
of college there while it was onthe department.
The training officers that I hadat that time encouraged me to
continue to go to college. And we had a federal grant, the
LEAP money that came out of the late 60s, a federal grant to pay
for college. So I enrolled at the University
of Louisville part time while I was working.
And it was those original trainers that I had that
(02:07):
encouraged me to do that. And I'm always grateful for the
department for allowing me to dothat.
And actually paying for it was achallenge to go full time, to
work full time and go to get your degree.
But I ended up with my master's degree because of the police.
But I did 20 years there, workedin a variety of assignments, but
I retired when I had my 20 yearsin and IT.
(02:29):
I didn't leave because I just like the job.
I really enjoyed it, but I was young enough to do something
else in life and allowed me to go back and do what I originally
wanted to do to be a high school.
During that career time, I also went back to school to get my
high school teaching certification.
So when I retired from the Police Department, I could teach
(02:50):
social studies in high school, Kentucky certification.
And I got a job teaching at actually the high school that I
attended, Iroquois High School. I talked for a couple of two
years there and then I went to alaw enforcement magnet at
another school and I was in my third year teaching and my wife
worked for an airline and she got transferred to Phoenix, AZ.
(03:12):
So at that time I was very emotional about this, but I had
to quit my job and go out there.And so I only did three years of
what I really wanted to do originally right out of high
school, but I've had a good timedoing that.
Went to Arizona and my first jobout there was director of
security for the Mesa, AZ public.
(03:32):
So I became chief of security for them.
That was my job when I, when we left move out there and did that
for seven years, my boss and assistant Superintendent and he
hooked me up with a professor atArizona State University who
talked me into earning my doctorate at Arizona State.
So moved to Arizona instead of watching TV at night.
(03:54):
I'd go to college and finished my doctorate and my dissertation
tied in law enforcement as well as education.
And back then this was ColumbineHigh school day.
And so my dissertation was aboutthe the attitudes of school
principal in reporting crime from school.
Oh wow, is that relevant at thattime, 20 some years later, it
(04:16):
might be worthy of a follow up with that to see if it's
changed. But anyway, finished my
doctorate. I had the opportunity to become
a professor at Scottsdale Community College.
And so I finished my time. I did about 7 years at Mesa
schools and 12 years teaching college, got to retire and we
moved back home. And since then I've been here
(04:39):
teaching as an adjunct at the university.
So that's the Cliff Notes version.
So so. That is incredible and now I
want to go read your dissertation.
Well, it might be boring so. No, no, not at all.
I feel all of that. So I'm I'm excited to have you
on here to talk about that. I'm like, Oh my gosh, this is
(05:00):
amazing. Well, and I don't know that I
knew that your story was so fullcircle in terms of going to a
teacher's college at Western University and that always being
a bit of recalling. So it makes sense that you kind
of merge these two worlds together.
And do you find that your experience on the Police
(05:20):
Department influences how you profess or your teaching of the
criminal justice? You know, when I started
teaching criminal justice at theCommunity College level, a lot
of entry level course survey courses of the criminal justice
system, not just policing and those, but looking at policing,
the courts and corrections that,you know, the three school,
(05:43):
three legs on the stool generally of police.
So I tried to incorporate all those in, but basically with the
police being the catalyst for all of those without police
investigating crimes, making arrests, we don't go to the
court system, we don't go to thecorrectional system.
And so I try to incorporate all of those in there.
And but it's been helpful, especially again, the survey
(06:07):
courses that introduce you to constitutional law and those
kind of things. I try to gear it toward how that
impacts the people that work in the freedom of speech to protest
and those kind of things. And what police officers need to
know about balancing a community's right to express
their views publicly, but yet not cross the line and interrupt
(06:29):
with the civil order and civil disobedience.
How to balance those kind of things out, you know, the search
and Caesar, the right to remain silent, all those things.
How the police officer on the street has to understand those
and know the limits of their authority and those kind of
things. So I've been, I've tried to
incorporate the the practicalityof that with sort of the words,
(06:53):
textbook words, the academic words and I think students have
generally appreciated that so. Yeah.
And that was kind of our next question or one that I had was
how how your students kind of respond.
Do you gave your own real world examples of what it was like for
you when you were an officer andand how do they respond to that?
(07:13):
Well, I up front, I tell them a lot of times and this gets a
little bit, I don't know how to say it, maybe touchy right now
because I've always tried to play devil's advocate and come
up with scenarios during the classroom of practical
situations that may occur on thestreet.
And I would tell them up front, these are not always my views.
(07:35):
I'm just playing devil's advocate to encourage
discussion, to encourage you to come forward and share your
thoughts. And so, you know, I might say
something that's not what I truly believe, but just to, to
foster some, some discussion in the classroom.
And I would bring up scenarios and I would tell them they're
not all mine. They might be some of my
colleagues that have been involved again in this day and
(07:56):
time. I think we have to be cautious
about that because I could come up with a devil's advocate sort
of scenario and someone think that's the way I truly feel,
especially when it comes to racerelations.
When we talk about Floyd, we talk about Rihanna, Taylor, and
all those kind of cases. It can become emotional and you
just have to be cautious about how you phrase things so that
(08:19):
they don't think that that's theway you truly mean.
But we have to, I really believethis in academia, we got to
talk. We got to discuss the truthful
things that go on in our society, even if they're
unpleasant or. Yeah, I think that that's a
really good point in trying to walk that line of giving real
life experiences and not having it.
(08:40):
How to be viewed as your own perspective.
From your perspective, what do you feel like are some maybe
misconceptions or things that get brought up in, you know, in
the classroom that are misconceptions around criminal
justice? Strikes me and it's, it's
(09:01):
interesting, having done this for a long time, I, I, I do
things, I do some online classestoo.
So I have a lot of what I call critical thinking questions.
There's no right or wrong answers, but there are
responses. Or, you know, if we were in the
classroom, it would be class participation.
Raise your hand and speak up online.
It's writing, writing responses.I found out that they they will
(09:25):
post online more, I don't know, truthfulness or their feelings
more than they will verbally in a classroom with other people or
someone could look at. I'm finding that out.
I can see how attitudes have changed among students in a lot
of areas over the course of the years.
One example of that is I would ask them that if someone died of
(09:48):
a drug overdose and the person that sold them those drugs
illegally that killed them, do they have some level of
responsibility? The person that sold it years
ago, it would be no, no, no, no,no.
The person that bought the drugsand took the drugs, it's their
responsibility. I've seen that evolve over the
years where now they're willing to hold the person that sold
(10:11):
them the illegal drugs more culpable.
And I'm not saying them all, I'mjust saying statistically I'm
seeing more that agree with thatthan did several years ago.
But I think what misconceptions,obviously one that's been for a
long time is police drive fast and they shoot guns and they do
this, you know, the the TV type stuff.
And I would tell many, many of your hours a day are boring
(10:34):
driving around patrolling and writing course.
And I, this is one thing that I have emphasized, particularly
when I worked at Community College out in Arizona, because
we worked closely with the localpolice departments around there.
And they would tell us that the,the shortcomings they're seeing
their recruits are the ability to write, the ability, the
(10:55):
ability to document what they did, what they did may have been
correct what they the investigation, but it becomes
lacking because they don't know how to articulate it in writing.
So when you emphasize writing, that's not the fun stuff, OK,
But I tell them how how criticaland important that is.
So that's, you know, the fallacies of that and the
(11:16):
perception because of media, I believe the high profile cases
of George Floyd and horrible, horrible cases of things that
they see bad things that police do sometimes.
And then they, they sort of lumpit all into one pile.
They, they stereotype a lot for that.
And I have to emphasize to them that the vast majority of police
(11:38):
officers just want to go out anddo a good job and want to go
home to their families at the end of the day.
And they're not out to racially profile or are there exceptions
to that like any other. So those some of them that I've.
Yeah, and I love to hear this. I also think like we actually
have a lot of listeners who aren't even in the first
responder world, which is reallycool.
(12:00):
And I think for those listeners too, this is such a great
opportunity to learn that that these things are being talked
about. Because I think it's easy for a
lot of people who are not in thefirst responder world to feel
like it isn't considered. These things aren't talked
about. We turn our heads to it, right?
Like that's what I hear a lot. And I know that that's not true
from working in it so much, but and to hear it from you and to
(12:23):
hear how well, First off, you articulate it amazing.
And and so to hear that and to learn from you, I think is going
to be really helpful to our listeners because you're right,
we have to talk about. And just bury your head in the
sand and they won't go and they'll all go away.
So I think that's important for at the college level or, or
other levels too, even at the high school level sometimes I
(12:43):
did a couple of law enforcement or excuse me, criminal justice
type classes in high school and I thought they were valuable,
particularly young people at that time to be aware of what
the reality of policing was thatthey faced.
You know, when they see a policeofficer on the street, they see
it hopefully totally different. We'll discuss it.
Absolutely, absolutely. And, and how do you, I know you
(13:05):
kind of hit on this a little bit, but maybe you can dive in a
little bit more of like how do you balance your own knowledge
with the academic part? Like, especially if it kind of
goes against what you have thought, you know, within your
career and how things have evolved so much like, I guess
your, your personal self, how doyou manage that when we're.
That's a good that's a really good question.
(13:27):
A couple of years ago here at the university, they have the
Southern Police and Jennifer probably and they had a an
opportunity for me to go teach that class and I went through
that program in 1982. So that's shows you how old and
so I've welcomed the opportunityto go teaching and that had law
enforcement commanders from all over the country in this class
(13:48):
that and this here are probably more than then the undergraduate
or graduate classes I teach. It's they would bring up their
real world experiences and contrast it with the academic
peer reviewed research, so to speak.
And so the one to try to summarize that feeling a little
bit and the way I've tried to doit is certainly you have to you
(14:12):
have to welcome the research, especially good reviewed
research statistical data today.I'm you know, I'm hearing
questions about Washington DC, whether they had accurate
criminals or crime statistics, you know, have they been fudged
and all that. And so, but one of the things
when you look at the academic world of beast of theories and
(14:33):
strategies, the thing that I could emphasizing to them and
from my standpoint is, yeah, youcan have all that academic
information, but in the real world, you have to consider
people's feelings out on the street, the communities
feelings, how they feel about things may contrast
significantly from what the datasaid.
And so that's one thing that I've always loved about when I
(14:55):
worked on the Police Department,you know, I had a lot of good
jobs and I moved up the ranks tosome extent, but the most
rewarding job I ever had was writing a beat.
Jennifer knows in South Louisville, where I grew up and
went to school and where you getto know people on the street.
And if you've got a second, I'vegot one example of that that I
think indicates it. My best friend growing up lived
(15:15):
down the street from me and his mom turned 90 years old.
I went to visit her. She still lived in the same
house. She could live at home.
She thought someone was breakingin her house.
One night she called the police and they told her that you don't
need to worry, this is a relatively safe neighborhood.
Well, I know the neighborhood has changed a lot since when I
grew up and I saw her and she told me that they didn't.
(15:38):
She didn't have to worry. That didn't make her feel good
because she was still scared. And I said we we have to
incorporate balance people's feelings in their perception
with statistical data or peer review research.
I think you have to mess the twotogether.
So that's what I've tried to do.And, and to say, OK, yeah, this
is valuable. But also you have to consider
(15:59):
this, you know, what does the public really feel?
And so I think police officers on the street need to.
I wish they would still have those connections on the beat.
I don't know that they do, but hopefully.
Yeah, as a therapist, I love if you inward feelings.
Yeah, obviously those are reallyimportant.
And I think that that's such a great goal.
(16:20):
And I have a great belief that human beings are herd animals
and we are here to connect with other human beings.
And it to your point how how fresh responders serve a
community is important that it'sconnected with that.
So I think that that is a great a great example of that.
Since we're on the kind of linesof feelings, I want to talk a
(16:43):
little bit more about officers and their feelings and just what
conversations you've seen aroundmental health, the evolution of
that from your career starting in 1973 to, you know, being a
criminal justice professor. Have you seen that shift over
time or anything like that? You.
(17:03):
Know I haven't I haven't actually been on a Police
Department for several years, but I do I'm aware of some of
the the changes and, and evolving.
I think of that particular area,you know, go back to my early
days and maybe even through mostof the career, you know, to
identify an officer as having some sort of emotional feelings
(17:25):
or troubled feelings. Ever since I went on, you know,
the couple of things, alcoholism, suicides and that
relatively speaking in this profession are higher than many
other profession, you know, and they've always said, well, it's
the availability of your weaponsand all those.
The one thing that I hope is getting better and I, I believe
it is, is to recognize that officers all perceive things
(17:48):
differently. They something might have impact
someone very emotionally and onething and someone else did not
really bother them or are there are there they handle it
different. I think anyone that's has a
pulse or a human when you see tragedies happen or if you're
involved in a tragedy or you seea family that's torn apart by
some violent crime, you're always said you're not a human
(18:12):
if you don't feel some level of emotion.
But the question is how do you separate that from doing your
job? You know, I've worked with
officers and including me where I think where we kind of
identified the truly innocent victim is one that hurts.
And I think many times we differentiate that from someone
that put themselves in a bad position that's happening, you
know, But I do feel like at least publicly, departments say
(18:37):
that we recognize this. I can't answer whether they do
it practically. I mean, we hear about it.
Is Idlib service? I don't know the answer whether
it is or not. I hope it didn't, but I think
it's always been difficult for Co workers, first line
supervisors because at least when I was on the apartment,
it's close knit. You know, if you became a
supervisor, you're supervising people that were your friends
(19:00):
for a long time. And I, I really think it's
difficult for any of us to see acolleague or friend that may be
going through some troubled timeto report that because you don't
want to, you don't want to make a, a wrong judgment and you also
don't want to jeopardize their career.
I saying something that you're not maybe not qualified to say,
(19:23):
but it's just based on what you see.
So there's got to be a mechanismto do that, but you maintain
confidentiality and not quote UNquote, ruin someone's career
because you made a comment aboutit.
So I do feel that there are somemechanisms and we hopefully
departments are looking at that.And it's if you come forward
yourself, if you self report that your career is not over
(19:47):
because you, you can't handle the, you can't handle this or
something, you know, police officers are, I don't know,
probably I never thought I was this way that much.
But the tough facade that you're, that you can handle any
kind of kind of situation. There's a human side to all of
this. And people need you to remember
that cops are humans before theywere cops.
That is super powerful to hear you say.
(20:10):
And I think human beings are complicated and to your point,
individualize and what might bother somebody is water off the
ducks back to somebody else and something else could bother that
for another person, you know, water off the ducks back to
them. So I think that's an incredible
point to say that there are individuals, individuals that
are human beings that do this job and and the impact of that.
(20:34):
And I hope it always remains human beings do doesn't become
artificial intelligence. Oh gosh.
I do want to ask you as a professor about AI and your
students, but that's a differentepisode and another question.
One thing when I graduated from recruit school, the the person
(20:56):
that gave our speech at that it was it was a state state police
commander. Back in 73 there are we had a
computer room that had less debton it than our cell phone.
It's huge and computers were beginning to take have an
impact. And he said this, he said we
will always have police officers.
Your job will always be safe no matter what happens with
(21:17):
computers because we always haveto have the human element
dealing with human tragedy or human conflict.
I hope he was right, you know, get a little bit concerned about
that today, but I hope he was correct so.
So true. I have to go back to this whole,
I always say that in my trainings at my, at the police
departments, I always say you are human before you're an
(21:38):
officer. So again, to hear you say that
was incredible for our listenersto continue to hear that.
I think it's just so important. I have a question a little bit
in regards to, and I'm going a little off the beaten path, but
just in terms of like mental health, is that talked about for
first responders in the academicsetting?
I can't say that directly. There are, at least in the
(22:00):
classes that I've, you know, thesurvey classes I've done, the
police in Arizona, I had a classcalled the Police function,
correctional function. And then those classes you talk
about, there's sections of that that deal with those particular
issues for people that work in those professions.
This, the stress of those. I go back to my undergraduate
(22:22):
days. I wrote there was a book that we
came out then called Society's Victim, the Police.
It's a real pen book, but it's one that we read.
And I wrote my graduate paper onstress.
It goes back a long time ago about the, the, you know, we
have, we have stressors for that.
Everyone has financial emotionalstressors, but it went into the
(22:45):
specifics of stressors in law enforcement and there's a whole
laundry list. But I think at least from my
experience and I, I can't speak to all the criminal justice
programs around, but it would beincorporated in parts of those
classes that talk specifically about law enforcement or
specific specifically about correctional laws, those kind of
(23:05):
things. So we would go into it.
I wouldn't say it would be in depth, but we did touch on.
And I'm totally calling us social workers out and I'm
letting it out here. That's, you know, I used to
teach at the college level as well.
And something that I feel super passionate about is in the
social work world, we have all these specialties, so geriatric
social work, right, medical social work, school social work
(23:27):
and so forth. But there was not one thing that
I ever learned about social workin terms of helping our first
responders. So I'm super passionate about
that because I think that is something and we need to start
pushing in colleges as well, right?
Like you guys are all special population that needs to be
acknowledged too. And so that's why I kind of
brought that up to see on that. And I don't know as much about
(23:49):
the criminal justice, you know, part of it.
And so I just know on our end, Ithink that can be something
that's enhanced upon a little bit more well and I.
Again, I appreciate, you know, criminal justice is a broader.
It's not just, and yet, you know, I think that I've worked
with people in the criminal justice realm, like attorneys,
things like that, Judges that have seen horrific cases,
(24:12):
they're not the first responder to that, that those experiences
can be really impactful. And actually, I, you know, I've
been approached by attorney's office here to talk a little bit
about mental health and Wellnessfor, you know, lawyers, you
know, in terms of those heavier cases.
And so I think it's good that there are conversations because
(24:34):
you're exactly right, Doctor Baker.
You know, criminal justice is not just one for me.
It's a whole system. And so I guess I'll try to, you
know, ask this question in that broad system, proven justice.
But is there ever the topic of discussion, you know, mental
health and the impact of workingin a system that you see,
(24:55):
unfortunately society's kind of worse things, obviously mental
health, but also like the impactof a family.
Are there any conversation? And I know that's maybe a very
detailed question, but just really have a lot of curity.
Relative to your to a family, isthat what you're saying?
Yeah. You know, I think again going
(25:15):
back to you know I don't when I've been teaching the classes,
I don't say OK, let's today let's talk about how this
impacts a family. But I have incorporated it like
streaming it through the class. One of the things that just from
a basic standpoint, people say, oh, I'd like to be a police
officer. OK, fine.
Just remember you're going to work weekends, you're going to
(25:36):
work nights for a long time. They will say something like, I
really don't want to be a patrolofficer, but I'd like to be a
narcotics detective. Or I said, you just don't start
out there. You have to pay your dues and
sometimes you pay your dues for the entire career because you
don't get the opportunity to work in CSI that they think on,
you know, every case is going tobe solved by DNA or And so I go
(25:59):
back and I said part of the uniqueness of the job that could
lead to stressful family situation is the fact that
you're working weekends when allof your friends are going to the
movies or going to a concert andyou have to say, I got to go to
work. You have to work at nights
especially. And I can say this, I have two
(26:19):
daughters and I worked out of my20 year career.
So I would bet 2/3 of it was working at night, 311 shift from
midnight to 8. And when you had the two
daughters and growing up with gymnastics, with T-ball, all
these kind of had a, my oldest daughter was in dance.
She was always at these dance recitals that would last for six
(26:42):
hours. I get out of it because I had to
work, but but you missed some things you missed and you think,
well, that's no big deal. But then when I look back on it
and say, man, I wish I could have gone some of them, but it's
a trade off. Now, I have to say, and I can't
speak to that today, but when I was with my Police Department,
you couldn't do it all the time.But if you have something
(27:03):
special that you wanted to go to, you could trade off days
around or somebody would cover for you and you'd trade.
But I do think that has an impact on on families because
inevitably when something goes wrong in the house, it's 2:00 in
the morning and you're at work, that puts a strain on the
marriage. You know that you just, you have
to have a, it's kind of a teamwork thing.
(27:24):
You don't have to work together.And those are things that are,
again, you go back to the uniquestressors of this job.
And I think for me, one thing was, and it's a good thing that
you love your job so much that you want to go to work.
I worry sometimes that that becomes I like to go to work as
opposed to my family. I like it so much.
(27:45):
I love this, you know. You know, you say, yeah, you
love it, but you need to get your priorities kind of straight
too. So I think that's a challenge
for that. So I think those are unique
stressors. You know, there's other
occupations at work, nurses, doctors, work at night, you
know, so you have to have a spouse, a husband or wife,
because we have a lot of women in law enforcement that work
(28:07):
nice. It's probably more difficult for
them, especially if they have children, you know, at least
what our society says they should be.
That's evolving. I think that's evolving
sometimes, you know, and this was me having two daughters.
So I'm empathetic. So, you know that I understand
they're unique place in society with their job and trying to
raise children. So I do think that, you know, I
(28:28):
do incorporate something I buildit in across the class.
I don't have. We have these two days on stress
and family. You know, I just kind of say I
kind of weave it in there. That's so and I love that it's
even been talked about in and I think that you hit on it.
We talk about this a lot on the podcast actually is some of our
first responders in the clinicalwork that we do.
(28:48):
You know, they use work as the escape from home.
You know, like things maybe aren't going great at home and
so I can go to work and work overtime and do all these
things, but then you are missingout on the family aspect of.
You know what you mentioned overtime and I go back a long
time ago and, and I'm, I am eternally grateful the
opportunities that I had and I made a, I think made a good
(29:09):
living, didn't get rich. But there was a time when you,
when you needed, when you're young and you got a young family
and you want to buy something new and the opportunity to work
off duty jobs everywhere or to work overtime.
You start doing that because, OK, you rationalize it.
I'm making money so I can get myfamily these better things.
But what are you sacrificing to get it?
(29:30):
And I think that's reflecting back on that sometimes for even
for myself, I think was it really worth it?
But you don't think about that that for that immediate
gratification right there. So.
You know, I think, you know, it's a through line and like I
thread that you leave throughoutis really impressive and I just
(29:51):
I'm glad that it's there. I think Ashley and I kind of
created this podcast because we had that there are families that
are and not intentionally, you know, I don't think it's an
intention. Like we just don't want to be
with our family. We sometimes people don't want
to be with our families. But is there something within
like academia where there could be opportunities for more
(30:16):
research about families of people that enter the criminal
well? I'm sure there are, you know,
and I, you know, again, I don't know everything it's out there
when it comes to that. But certainly I think it'd be
worthy of research about just what we, we just spoke about was
the office. Do officers love their job so
much that it replaces their families?
(30:38):
Sometimes? It's a close knit, you know, at
least in my experience, is law enforcement close knit those
those people you worked with or who you hung with when you were
off duty too. You went off with you went.
Jennifer knows. You go jogging, you go You know
when the. Softball.
Yeah. Softball and all those kind of
things, you did it with those same people.
(31:00):
And you know the other thing too, going back years ago when
it looks like I wouldn't, I wouldn't call it.
I don't have to be a stressor, but something that becomes part
of your fabric is that if you gosomewhere socially with a group
that are that's not police officers, right off the bat, you
get identified as the the cop inthe room.
(31:21):
And now I always, and I'm sincere about this.
Even when I was young, I didn't want to be identified as a
person because of my profession,but I think we all are.
And he's a doctor, he's a lawyer, he's a he's a cop.
And then then if you're in a room with people that may not
appreciate cops, you get the evil eye sometimes.
(31:42):
So you got to, you know, you, you try to say, well, I'm not
like what you think we are, you know, those kind of things, you
know, those kind of, that's a that's an issue.
So that think that's where it becomes cops tend to hang out
with cops and makes their families hang out with cops too,
instead of socializing to the broader area.
I'm not saying that's all the all the time, but that's I think
that's kind of common. Yeah, I I agree.
(32:04):
And some of that is your point, just that natural thing that
happens around shifts and schedules and and and things
like that, which makes sense. But to your point, like it's
sometimes that work of broadening, right that you are
more than just this one thing, there's different aspects of
you. And it's good to, it's good to
(32:24):
not to see the world from a cop's point of view.
Yeah, we need to see it from theway others perceive it also.
We may not agree with it. It's important.
I think, you know, police officers writing a beat in a
social economic area that they didn't live in.
I think it's incumbent upon themto try to understand the social
economic status and day of life of the people they're serving.
(32:49):
Serving, not patrolling, but serving.
I've always been against the, the term police force.
I never, I thought Police Department or whatever the force
implies, that's all we do. So that's just me though.
So. I know our listeners cannot see
us right now, but Jennifer and Iare smiling from ear to ear
because that was so powerful. Yeah, and so true.
(33:10):
And everybody does Me. I never thought of it as
powerful, but it's just kind of my personal sequel, so.
It really is. And and for the sake, Jennifer,
I hope you're OK with us moving to the next few questions here
just because the sake of time and we're kind of talking about
these things already. One thing we know is like
training and policies and all these everything that's kind of
coming into play today, right? In your view, what is the most
(33:33):
critical change needed maybe in like law enforcement training
today? That's needed today.
Yeah. Human interaction.
Yes. Communication.
Communication with your audience, with your the people
you're serving. And again, I think sometimes
people attracted to police work are not always familiar with or
(33:54):
understand the community they'reassigned to serve.
You know, they, they come from asocial, social, economic
background that they have their views of the world, their world
view. And then they're patrolling an
area that doesn't have that sameworld view.
And again, you don't have to agree with it, but I I probably
can't emphasize this enough thatI worry to this is my kids call
(34:17):
it okay Boomer baby boomer Ale back in my day kind of thing.
But and I try to technology is ait's a wonderful.
I mean, officers are taking writing reports on a laptop and
they're, I had a, I had to writeit on a piece of paper and go to
a telephone and call it in, you know, and that's time consuming.
(34:37):
And so technology is great, but we communicate, like I said, my
students communicate more onlinethan they will in person, face
to face. And you know, as well as I do,
you can say something, you can text something to someone and
they perceive it totally different than what you because
they're not watching your body language, they're not looking at
(34:58):
your inflection. And so you got to be careful,
you know, that's, you know, you husband and wife talking.
That's not what I meant when I, I texted you that.
And so I, I written communication when written.
I mean, even if you do it on a laptop or type it to be able to
articulate an investigation in achronological way that when you
(35:21):
turn that report in and it goes to a prosecutor who don't, who
wasn't there. They, you can, there's a picture
of what you did and you did it correctly.
But also dealing with people on the street, human interaction, I
don't think that's ever going togo away.
Cops have to respond to domesticviolence or people arguing and
fighting over something and you have to intervene and you've got
(35:44):
to be able to quell situations and diffuse situations, not
throw gasoline on the fire. And I think that's, you know, I
guess they say they do that, butthat ought to be ongoing and not
just, OK, let's have a week of how we do communication.
Let's do it all the time. Yeah, I love that.
I'm like, so excited that you'retalking about this, because when
(36:06):
I wrote my dissertation, I wasn't expecting that to be a
huge part of it, to be honest. But almost every police officer
that I interviewed brought that up, brought up in terms of
recruitment and the new generation coming on board to
these departments, just the lackof the communication skills and
how they are concerned about it.And understand body language and
(36:27):
inflections and all that you can.
You can say something that appeases someone or it
infuriates them. It just depends on how you not
just what you say, but how you say it.
Well, and I so appreciate just the humanitarian aspect of this
in terms of like, again, you areconnected to other humans and in
(36:47):
service to them and their community and the compassion of
that. And I think that's something
like kind of what you started with in terms of like
misconceptions and things like that.
You know, I won't speak for Ashley, but I know the people
that I serve are incredibly compassionate, are here to help.
You know, sometimes that is because an experience that they
(37:09):
weren't helped when they were younger and they want to make
sure that, you know, that doesn't happen to somebody.
So I think it's powerful to say like these are actually things
that are happening behind a uniform and also that those are
things that are important when you are in the uniform, you
know, human interaction and how that can either de escalate
(37:31):
something or escalate something.I was so fortunate when I first
came on the department and, and I think I mentioned to Jennifer
about an article I read the other day about them lowering
the educational standards. But you know, when I went on in
73, my, my training officers were all mostly high school
graduates from the 50s and 60s. But at that time, that was a
(37:54):
pretty good education in those days.
Today there's a lot of high school graduates that are not
very academically sound. And I don't mean that meanly,
but that's just just the case. These guys, the people I rode
with were so street smart. They were smart.
They knew how to deal with people.
And I, the ones that I, I'm not saying they were all that way.
(38:16):
I was just very, very lucky to get training officers that
showed me that and instilled that said, listen, let's don't
make this situation worse. Let's calm it down.
And I mean, we've seen examples on the news, a lot of officers
that take a bad situation and throw gasoline on it and make it
worse. And I was, I was lucky to have
people school me in that I guess, back in the.
(38:38):
Well, was there anything in terms of after leaving policing
and, and, and receiving your doctorate that made sense in the
rearview mirror about policing that maybe you didn't quite, you
know, when you're in it, that when you step back in that
academic role had a different perspective for you?
You know, I look back on, on my time there and this goes back,
(39:01):
I'm, I'm driving down the streetyesterday and I remember the
very first call I ever got on the Police Department.
And it was 53 years ago. That's half a century, that's
half a century. And so, but I do remember things
vividly of my very first call and then some others, you know,
and when I reflect back on that today, the Police Department is
(39:24):
really good for me personally because I'd probably get antsy.
And I was had the ability to go and work in different areas.
I worked different, I worked in different patrol areas in our
community. I worked in the crimes against
children you, I worked in the intelligence you.
I worked several years in the inhomicide.
I was commander in the homicide.And I love that because it was
(39:46):
like getting a new job, but I didn't have to start all over.
I'm still getting the paycheck. You know, sometimes you quit a
job because you want to try something new.
I could do it right there and the paycheck would be the same.
And that was good for, for my personality.
If anything, I, I don't regret it, but I do think about it
sometimes that I didn't go into an area to become more
(40:06):
competent, to be, to be more specialized.
Like some people never wanted tomove up the ranks.
They wanted to stay in homicide for all those years and they
became an expert. And you know, I, I became a
Sergeant, went to homicide and had never worked there, but I
had good people that knew what they were doing.
I learned from them. And so you kind of, you know, it
(40:27):
was always my goal to move up inthe rank.
I did to some extent, not as faras I wanted to, but hindsight's
2020. I'm good.
OK. So, you know, I was kind of a
generalist. I'd call it a generalist type
path. Yeah.
As opposed to coming quote UN quote, an expert in a certain
area. I don't know that I would
(40:48):
change, but I do think about that some.
I just say, I think that's how Darwin says we survive, right?
You got to be flexible, so you just made sure you had survived.
I like, I like change. I like different just me
personally. And you know, when I reflect
back, there's, there's things that that we did then we could
do better. Police departments, We evolved,
you know, I tell you how I related.
(41:10):
I started in 1973 and I was really young, just, it wasn't
five years earlier we were having racial turmoil in the
streets in my neighborhood whereI grew up.
You know, I remember being in junior high school in 1968 when
Martin Luther King was assassinated.
And outside my school window, someone hung Martin Luther King
(41:31):
in Ephesus. And I looked out the window and
that I'm like, even my, my parents thought this was
horrible. And so we have turmoil in the
streets of Louisville, KY, and I'm patrolling those beats five
years later. And I'm thinking, you know, we
can do it better, but we learnedlessons, learned lesson from
that. It's troubling today when I see
(41:51):
bad things happen around the country that well, not everyone
learned the less you. Know that and and you know, you
say, oh, back in the day and really in reflection.
OK, Well, I think thank you so much, Doctor Baker.
Just I want to obviously respectyour time.
I know we had like a million in one question.
We didn't. Have a lot of questions we.
(42:11):
Didn't overwhelm me with that. We knew we wouldn't hit them
all, but there's so many good ones and I feel like we really
could keep going. But I appreciate your time and I
honestly like loved learning from you.
So I hope that we continue to dothat.
I appreciate the opportunity andnot, you know, at this point in
my career in life, I like to share my, my thoughts and
they're not always correct, but I always like to posture,
(42:34):
promote the discussion and I appreciate your time.
Well, we really appreciate your time and as much as you know, I
appreciate you saying well, that's maybe outside of my
expertise. I do think that you provide a
lot and have a lot more to use. We really again improve your
time. Thank you.
Thank you very. Much Ashley, what do you got for
us? Yeah.
I mean, I'm just so excited for our listeners to hear this and
(42:54):
always to remember that when thecall hits home, Jennifer and I
are here for you. So thank you guys.
Thank you. Yeah.
Hi, welcome back to the podcast.I'm Jennifer.
And I'm Ashley. And I get to introduce our guest
today, and as always, we have a special guest.
And I was reflecting. I'm like, I actually think I've
known this guest since I've beenborn and I'm not related to
them. So it's the first time for that.
But we have Doctor Charles Bakerwith us today.
And I'm just going to give it toyou, Doctor Baker, to tell us a
(00:21):
little bit about yourself. First of all, thanks for having
me and hope I can add something to your podcast here from my
background and experiences. Well, I'm originally from
Louisville, KY, grew up here, went to high school here and
began college here. I went to Western Kentucky
University for a year right out of high school, and that's a
(00:42):
little bit relevant to my first real job was on the Louisville
Police Department. Today it's the Louisville Metro
Police Department. Back in the day, it was the city
of Louisville. I began my work there in January
8th of 1973 after having one year of college, college at
Western Kentucky. I went to Western out of high
(01:03):
school with the goal of being a high school teacher and a coach.
But a good friend of my father'swas a Louisville police officer
and they were in a hiring spree at that time and he encouraged
me. So I went down, took the test,
and before I knew it I was in recruit school in January at 70.
And that was not my plan. But once I got there, I really
(01:25):
super enjoyed it and began my career there.
We can get into that later and alot of it's relevant to what I
do today, but I had a lot of assignments during my time
there, enjoy there, enjoyed every bit of.
So anyway, I got sidetracked forseveral years with the
Louisville policeman. And like I said, I had one year
(01:45):
of college there while it was onthe department.
The training officers that I hadat that time encouraged me to
continue to go to college. And we had a federal grant, the
LEAP money that came out of the late 60s, a federal grant to pay
for college. So I enrolled at the University
of Louisville part time while I was working.
And it was those original trainers that I had that
(02:07):
encouraged me to do that. And I'm always grateful for the
department for allowing me to dothat.
And actually paying for it was achallenge to go full time, to
work full time and go to get your degree.
But I ended up with my master's degree because of the police.
But I did 20 years there, workedin a variety of assignments, but
I retired when I had my 20 yearsin and IT.
(02:29):
I didn't leave because I just like the job.
I really enjoyed it, but I was young enough to do something
else in life and allowed me to go back and do what I originally
wanted to do to be a high school.
During that career time, I also went back to school to get my
high school teaching certification.
So when I retired from the Police Department, I could teach
(02:50):
social studies in high school, Kentucky certification.
And I got a job teaching at actually the high school that I
attended, Iroquois High School. I talked for a couple of two
years there and then I went to alaw enforcement magnet at
another school and I was in my third year teaching and my wife
worked for an airline and she got transferred to Phoenix, AZ.
(03:12):
So at that time I was very emotional about this, but I had
to quit my job and go out there.And so I only did three years of
what I really wanted to do originally right out of high
school, but I've had a good timedoing that.
Went to Arizona and my first jobout there was director of
security for the Mesa, AZ public.
(03:32):
So I became chief of security for them.
That was my job when I, when we left move out there and did that
for seven years, my boss and assistant Superintendent and he
hooked me up with a professor atArizona State University who
talked me into earning my doctorate at Arizona State.
So moved to Arizona instead of watching TV at night.
(03:54):
I'd go to college and finished my doctorate and my dissertation
tied in law enforcement as well as education.
And back then this was ColumbineHigh school day.
And so my dissertation was aboutthe the attitudes of school
principal in reporting crime from school.
Oh wow, is that relevant at thattime, 20 some years later, it
(04:16):
might be worthy of a follow up with that to see if it's
changed. But anyway, finished my
doctorate. I had the opportunity to become
a professor at Scottsdale Community College.
And so I finished my time. I did about 7 years at Mesa
schools and 12 years teaching college, got to retire and we
moved back home. And since then I've been here
(04:39):
teaching as an adjunct at the university.
So that's the Cliff Notes version.
So so. That is incredible and now I
want to go read your dissertation.
Well, it might be boring so. No, no, not at all.
I feel all of that. So I'm I'm excited to have you
on here to talk about that. I'm like, Oh my gosh, this is
(05:00):
amazing. Well, and I don't know that I
knew that your story was so fullcircle in terms of going to a
teacher's college at Western University and that always being
a bit of recalling. So it makes sense that you kind
of merge these two worlds together.
And do you find that your experience on the Police
(05:20):
Department influences how you profess or your teaching of the
criminal justice? You know, when I started
teaching criminal justice at theCommunity College level, a lot
of entry level course survey courses of the criminal justice
system, not just policing and those, but looking at policing,
the courts and corrections that,you know, the three school,
(05:43):
three legs on the stool generally of police.
So I tried to incorporate all those in, but basically with the
police being the catalyst for all of those without police
investigating crimes, making arrests, we don't go to the
court system, we don't go to thecorrectional system.
And so I try to incorporate all of those in there.
And but it's been helpful, especially again, the survey
(06:07):
courses that introduce you to constitutional law and those
kind of things. I try to gear it toward how that
impacts the people that work in the freedom of speech to protest
and those kind of things. And what police officers need to
know about balancing a community's right to express
their views publicly, but yet not cross the line and interrupt
(06:29):
with the civil order and civil disobedience.
How to balance those kind of things out, you know, the search
and Caesar, the right to remain silent, all those things.
How the police officer on the street has to understand those
and know the limits of their authority and those kind of
things. So I've been, I've tried to
incorporate the the practicalityof that with sort of the words,
(06:53):
textbook words, the academic words and I think students have
generally appreciated that so. Yeah.
And that was kind of our next question or one that I had was
how how your students kind of respond.
Do you gave your own real world examples of what it was like for
you when you were an officer andand how do they respond to that?
(07:13):
Well, I up front, I tell them a lot of times and this gets a
little bit, I don't know how to say it, maybe touchy right now
because I've always tried to play devil's advocate and come
up with scenarios during the classroom of practical
situations that may occur on thestreet.
And I would tell them up front, these are not always my views.
(07:35):
I'm just playing devil's advocate to encourage
discussion, to encourage you to come forward and share your
thoughts. And so, you know, I might say
something that's not what I truly believe, but just to, to
foster some, some discussion in the classroom.
And I would bring up scenarios and I would tell them they're
not all mine. They might be some of my
colleagues that have been involved again in this day and
(07:56):
time. I think we have to be cautious
about that because I could come up with a devil's advocate sort
of scenario and someone think that's the way I truly feel,
especially when it comes to racerelations.
When we talk about Floyd, we talk about Rihanna, Taylor, and
all those kind of cases. It can become emotional and you
just have to be cautious about how you phrase things so that
(08:19):
they don't think that that's theway you truly mean.
But we have to, I really believethis in academia, we got to
talk. We got to discuss the truthful
things that go on in our society, even if they're
unpleasant or. Yeah, I think that that's a
really good point in trying to walk that line of giving real
life experiences and not having it.
(08:40):
How to be viewed as your own perspective.
From your perspective, what do you feel like are some maybe
misconceptions or things that get brought up in, you know, in
the classroom that are misconceptions around criminal
justice? Strikes me and it's, it's
(09:01):
interesting, having done this for a long time, I, I, I do
things, I do some online classestoo.
So I have a lot of what I call critical thinking questions.
There's no right or wrong answers, but there are
responses. Or, you know, if we were in the
classroom, it would be class participation.
Raise your hand and speak up online.
It's writing, writing responses.I found out that they they will
(09:25):
post online more, I don't know, truthfulness or their feelings
more than they will verbally in a classroom with other people or
someone could look at. I'm finding that out.
I can see how attitudes have changed among students in a lot
of areas over the course of the years.
One example of that is I would ask them that if someone died of
(09:48):
a drug overdose and the person that sold them those drugs
illegally that killed them, do they have some level of
responsibility? The person that sold it years
ago, it would be no, no, no, no,no.
The person that bought the drugsand took the drugs, it's their
responsibility. I've seen that evolve over the
years where now they're willing to hold the person that sold
(10:11):
them the illegal drugs more culpable.
And I'm not saying them all, I'mjust saying statistically I'm
seeing more that agree with thatthan did several years ago.
But I think what misconceptions,obviously one that's been for a
long time is police drive fast and they shoot guns and they do
this, you know, the the TV type stuff.
And I would tell many, many of your hours a day are boring
(10:34):
driving around patrolling and writing course.
And I, this is one thing that I have emphasized, particularly
when I worked at Community College out in Arizona, because
we worked closely with the localpolice departments around there.
And they would tell us that the,the shortcomings they're seeing
their recruits are the ability to write, the ability, the
(10:55):
ability to document what they did, what they did may have been
correct what they the investigation, but it becomes
lacking because they don't know how to articulate it in writing.
So when you emphasize writing, that's not the fun stuff, OK,
But I tell them how how criticaland important that is.
So that's, you know, the fallacies of that and the
(11:16):
perception because of media, I believe the high profile cases
of George Floyd and horrible, horrible cases of things that
they see bad things that police do sometimes.
And then they, they sort of lumpit all into one pile.
They, they stereotype a lot for that.
And I have to emphasize to them that the vast majority of police
(11:38):
officers just want to go out anddo a good job and want to go
home to their families at the end of the day.
And they're not out to racially profile or are there exceptions
to that like any other. So those some of them that I've.
Yeah, and I love to hear this. I also think like we actually
have a lot of listeners who aren't even in the first
responder world, which is reallycool.
(12:00):
And I think for those listeners too, this is such a great
opportunity to learn that that these things are being talked
about. Because I think it's easy for a
lot of people who are not in thefirst responder world to feel
like it isn't considered. These things aren't talked
about. We turn our heads to it, right?
Like that's what I hear a lot. And I know that that's not true
from working in it so much, but and to hear it from you and to
(12:23):
hear how well, First off, you articulate it amazing.
And and so to hear that and to learn from you, I think is going
to be really helpful to our listeners because you're right,
we have to talk about. And just bury your head in the
sand and they won't go and they'll all go away.
So I think that's important for at the college level or, or
other levels too, even at the high school level sometimes I
(12:43):
did a couple of law enforcement or excuse me, criminal justice
type classes in high school and I thought they were valuable,
particularly young people at that time to be aware of what
the reality of policing was thatthey faced.
You know, when they see a policeofficer on the street, they see
it hopefully totally different. We'll discuss it.
Absolutely, absolutely. And, and how do you, I know you
(13:05):
kind of hit on this a little bit, but maybe you can dive in a
little bit more of like how do you balance your own knowledge
with the academic part? Like, especially if it kind of
goes against what you have thought, you know, within your
career and how things have evolved so much like, I guess
your, your personal self, how doyou manage that when we're.
That's a good that's a really good question.
(13:27):
A couple of years ago here at the university, they have the
Southern Police and Jennifer probably and they had a an
opportunity for me to go teach that class and I went through
that program in 1982. So that's shows you how old and
so I've welcomed the opportunityto go teaching and that had law
enforcement commanders from all over the country in this class
(13:48):
that and this here are probably more than then the undergraduate
or graduate classes I teach. It's they would bring up their
real world experiences and contrast it with the academic
peer reviewed research, so to speak.
And so the one to try to summarize that feeling a little
bit and the way I've tried to doit is certainly you have to you
(14:12):
have to welcome the research, especially good reviewed
research statistical data today.I'm you know, I'm hearing
questions about Washington DC, whether they had accurate
criminals or crime statistics, you know, have they been fudged
and all that. And so, but one of the things
when you look at the academic world of beast of theories and
(14:33):
strategies, the thing that I could emphasizing to them and
from my standpoint is, yeah, youcan have all that academic
information, but in the real world, you have to consider
people's feelings out on the street, the communities
feelings, how they feel about things may contrast
significantly from what the datasaid.
And so that's one thing that I've always loved about when I
(14:55):
worked on the Police Department,you know, I had a lot of good
jobs and I moved up the ranks tosome extent, but the most
rewarding job I ever had was writing a beat.
Jennifer knows in South Louisville, where I grew up and
went to school and where you getto know people on the street.
And if you've got a second, I'vegot one example of that that I
think indicates it. My best friend growing up lived
(15:15):
down the street from me and his mom turned 90 years old.
I went to visit her. She still lived in the same
house. She could live at home.
She thought someone was breakingin her house.
One night she called the police and they told her that you don't
need to worry, this is a relatively safe neighborhood.
Well, I know the neighborhood has changed a lot since when I
grew up and I saw her and she told me that they didn't.
(15:38):
She didn't have to worry. That didn't make her feel good
because she was still scared. And I said we we have to
incorporate balance people's feelings in their perception
with statistical data or peer review research.
I think you have to mess the twotogether.
So that's what I've tried to do.And, and to say, OK, yeah, this
is valuable. But also you have to consider
(15:59):
this, you know, what does the public really feel?
And so I think police officers on the street need to.
I wish they would still have those connections on the beat.
I don't know that they do, but hopefully.
Yeah, as a therapist, I love if you inward feelings.
Yeah, obviously those are reallyimportant.
And I think that that's such a great goal.
(16:20):
And I have a great belief that human beings are herd animals
and we are here to connect with other human beings.
And it to your point how how fresh responders serve a
community is important that it'sconnected with that.
So I think that that is a great a great example of that.
Since we're on the kind of linesof feelings, I want to talk a
(16:43):
little bit more about officers and their feelings and just what
conversations you've seen aroundmental health, the evolution of
that from your career starting in 1973 to, you know, being a
criminal justice professor. Have you seen that shift over
time or anything like that? You.
(17:03):
Know I haven't I haven't actually been on a Police
Department for several years, but I do I'm aware of some of
the the changes and, and evolving.
I think of that particular area,you know, go back to my early
days and maybe even through mostof the career, you know, to
identify an officer as having some sort of emotional feelings
(17:25):
or troubled feelings. Ever since I went on, you know,
the couple of things, alcoholism, suicides and that
relatively speaking in this profession are higher than many
other profession, you know, and they've always said, well, it's
the availability of your weaponsand all those.
The one thing that I hope is getting better and I, I believe
it is, is to recognize that officers all perceive things
(17:48):
differently. They something might have impact
someone very emotionally and onething and someone else did not
really bother them or are there are there they handle it
different. I think anyone that's has a
pulse or a human when you see tragedies happen or if you're
involved in a tragedy or you seea family that's torn apart by
some violent crime, you're always said you're not a human
(18:12):
if you don't feel some level of emotion.
But the question is how do you separate that from doing your
job? You know, I've worked with
officers and including me where I think where we kind of
identified the truly innocent victim is one that hurts.
And I think many times we differentiate that from someone
that put themselves in a bad position that's happening, you
know, But I do feel like at least publicly, departments say
(18:37):
that we recognize this. I can't answer whether they do
it practically. I mean, we hear about it.
Is Idlib service? I don't know the answer whether
it is or not. I hope it didn't, but I think
it's always been difficult for Co workers, first line
supervisors because at least when I was on the apartment,
it's close knit. You know, if you became a
supervisor, you're supervising people that were your friends
(19:00):
for a long time. And I, I really think it's
difficult for any of us to see acolleague or friend that may be
going through some troubled timeto report that because you don't
want to, you don't want to make a, a wrong judgment and you also
don't want to jeopardize their career.
I saying something that you're not maybe not qualified to say,
(19:23):
but it's just based on what you see.
So there's got to be a mechanismto do that, but you maintain
confidentiality and not quote UNquote, ruin someone's career
because you made a comment aboutit.
So I do feel that there are somemechanisms and we hopefully
departments are looking at that.And it's if you come forward
yourself, if you self report that your career is not over
(19:47):
because you, you can't handle the, you can't handle this or
something, you know, police officers are, I don't know,
probably I never thought I was this way that much.
But the tough facade that you're, that you can handle any
kind of kind of situation. There's a human side to all of
this. And people need you to remember
that cops are humans before theywere cops.
That is super powerful to hear you say.
(20:10):
And I think human beings are complicated and to your point,
individualize and what might bother somebody is water off the
ducks back to somebody else and something else could bother that
for another person, you know, water off the ducks back to
them. So I think that's an incredible
point to say that there are individuals, individuals that
are human beings that do this job and and the impact of that.
(20:34):
And I hope it always remains human beings do doesn't become
artificial intelligence. Oh gosh.
I do want to ask you as a professor about AI and your
students, but that's a differentepisode and another question.
One thing when I graduated from recruit school, the the person
(20:56):
that gave our speech at that it was it was a state state police
commander. Back in 73 there are we had a
computer room that had less debton it than our cell phone.
It's huge and computers were beginning to take have an
impact. And he said this, he said we
will always have police officers.
Your job will always be safe no matter what happens with
(21:17):
computers because we always haveto have the human element
dealing with human tragedy or human conflict.
I hope he was right, you know, get a little bit concerned about
that today, but I hope he was correct so.
So true. I have to go back to this whole,
I always say that in my trainings at my, at the police
departments, I always say you are human before you're an
(21:38):
officer. So again, to hear you say that
was incredible for our listenersto continue to hear that.
I think it's just so important. I have a question a little bit
in regards to, and I'm going a little off the beaten path, but
just in terms of like mental health, is that talked about for
first responders in the academicsetting?
I can't say that directly. There are, at least in the
(22:00):
classes that I've, you know, thesurvey classes I've done, the
police in Arizona, I had a classcalled the Police function,
correctional function. And then those classes you talk
about, there's sections of that that deal with those particular
issues for people that work in those professions.
This, the stress of those. I go back to my undergraduate
(22:22):
days. I wrote there was a book that we
came out then called Society's Victim, the Police.
It's a real pen book, but it's one that we read.
And I wrote my graduate paper onstress.
It goes back a long time ago about the, the, you know, we
have, we have stressors for that.
Everyone has financial emotionalstressors, but it went into the
(22:45):
specifics of stressors in law enforcement and there's a whole
laundry list. But I think at least from my
experience and I, I can't speak to all the criminal justice
programs around, but it would beincorporated in parts of those
classes that talk specifically about law enforcement or
specific specifically about correctional laws, those kind of
(23:05):
things. So we would go into it.
I wouldn't say it would be in depth, but we did touch on.
And I'm totally calling us social workers out and I'm
letting it out here. That's, you know, I used to
teach at the college level as well.
And something that I feel super passionate about is in the
social work world, we have all these specialties, so geriatric
social work, right, medical social work, school social work
(23:27):
and so forth. But there was not one thing that
I ever learned about social workin terms of helping our first
responders. So I'm super passionate about
that because I think that is something and we need to start
pushing in colleges as well, right?
Like you guys are all special population that needs to be
acknowledged too. And so that's why I kind of
brought that up to see on that. And I don't know as much about
(23:49):
the criminal justice, you know, part of it.
And so I just know on our end, Ithink that can be something
that's enhanced upon a little bit more well and I.
Again, I appreciate, you know, criminal justice is a broader.
It's not just, and yet, you know, I think that I've worked
with people in the criminal justice realm, like attorneys,
things like that, Judges that have seen horrific cases,
(24:12):
they're not the first responder to that, that those experiences
can be really impactful. And actually, I, you know, I've
been approached by attorney's office here to talk a little bit
about mental health and Wellnessfor, you know, lawyers, you
know, in terms of those heavier cases.
And so I think it's good that there are conversations because
(24:34):
you're exactly right, Doctor Baker.
You know, criminal justice is not just one for me.
It's a whole system. And so I guess I'll try to, you
know, ask this question in that broad system, proven justice.
But is there ever the topic of discussion, you know, mental
health and the impact of workingin a system that you see,
(24:55):
unfortunately society's kind of worse things, obviously mental
health, but also like the impactof a family.
Are there any conversation? And I know that's maybe a very
detailed question, but just really have a lot of curity.
Relative to your to a family, isthat what you're saying?
Yeah. You know, I think again going
(25:15):
back to you know I don't when I've been teaching the classes,
I don't say OK, let's today let's talk about how this
impacts a family. But I have incorporated it like
streaming it through the class. One of the things that just from
a basic standpoint, people say, oh, I'd like to be a police
officer. OK, fine.
Just remember you're going to work weekends, you're going to
(25:36):
work nights for a long time. They will say something like, I
really don't want to be a patrolofficer, but I'd like to be a
narcotics detective. Or I said, you just don't start
out there. You have to pay your dues and
sometimes you pay your dues for the entire career because you
don't get the opportunity to work in CSI that they think on,
you know, every case is going tobe solved by DNA or And so I go
(25:59):
back and I said part of the uniqueness of the job that could
lead to stressful family situation is the fact that
you're working weekends when allof your friends are going to the
movies or going to a concert andyou have to say, I got to go to
work. You have to work at nights
especially. And I can say this, I have two
(26:19):
daughters and I worked out of my20 year career.
So I would bet 2/3 of it was working at night, 311 shift from
midnight to 8. And when you had the two
daughters and growing up with gymnastics, with T-ball, all
these kind of had a, my oldest daughter was in dance.
She was always at these dance recitals that would last for six
(26:42):
hours. I get out of it because I had to
work, but but you missed some things you missed and you think,
well, that's no big deal. But then when I look back on it
and say, man, I wish I could have gone some of them, but it's
a trade off. Now, I have to say, and I can't
speak to that today, but when I was with my Police Department,
you couldn't do it all the time.But if you have something
(27:03):
special that you wanted to go to, you could trade off days
around or somebody would cover for you and you'd trade.
But I do think that has an impact on on families because
inevitably when something goes wrong in the house, it's 2:00 in
the morning and you're at work, that puts a strain on the
marriage. You know that you just, you have
to have a, it's kind of a teamwork thing.
(27:24):
You don't have to work together.And those are things that are,
again, you go back to the uniquestressors of this job.
And I think for me, one thing was, and it's a good thing that
you love your job so much that you want to go to work.
I worry sometimes that that becomes I like to go to work as
opposed to my family. I like it so much.
(27:45):
I love this, you know. You know, you say, yeah, you
love it, but you need to get your priorities kind of straight
too. So I think that's a challenge
for that. So I think those are unique
stressors. You know, there's other
occupations at work, nurses, doctors, work at night, you
know, so you have to have a spouse, a husband or wife,
because we have a lot of women in law enforcement that work
(28:07):
nice. It's probably more difficult for
them, especially if they have children, you know, at least
what our society says they should be.
That's evolving. I think that's evolving
sometimes, you know, and this was me having two daughters.
So I'm empathetic. So, you know that I understand
they're unique place in society with their job and trying to
raise children. So I do think that, you know, I
(28:28):
do incorporate something I buildit in across the class.
I don't have. We have these two days on stress
and family. You know, I just kind of say I
kind of weave it in there. That's so and I love that it's
even been talked about in and I think that you hit on it.
We talk about this a lot on the podcast actually is some of our
first responders in the clinicalwork that we do.
(28:48):
You know, they use work as the escape from home.
You know, like things maybe aren't going great at home and
so I can go to work and work overtime and do all these
things, but then you are missingout on the family aspect of.
You know what you mentioned overtime and I go back a long
time ago and, and I'm, I am eternally grateful the
opportunities that I had and I made a, I think made a good
(29:09):
living, didn't get rich. But there was a time when you,
when you needed, when you're young and you got a young family
and you want to buy something new and the opportunity to work
off duty jobs everywhere or to work overtime.
You start doing that because, OK, you rationalize it.
I'm making money so I can get myfamily these better things.
But what are you sacrificing to get it?
(29:30):
And I think that's reflecting back on that sometimes for even
for myself, I think was it really worth it?
But you don't think about that that for that immediate
gratification right there. So.
You know, I think, you know, it's a through line and like I
thread that you leave throughoutis really impressive and I just
(29:51):
I'm glad that it's there. I think Ashley and I kind of
created this podcast because we had that there are families that
are and not intentionally, you know, I don't think it's an
intention. Like we just don't want to be
with our family. We sometimes people don't want
to be with our families. But is there something within
like academia where there could be opportunities for more
(30:16):
research about families of people that enter the criminal
well? I'm sure there are, you know,
and I, you know, again, I don't know everything it's out there
when it comes to that. But certainly I think it'd be
worthy of research about just what we, we just spoke about was
the office. Do officers love their job so
much that it replaces their families?
(30:38):
Sometimes? It's a close knit, you know, at
least in my experience, is law enforcement close knit those
those people you worked with or who you hung with when you were
off duty too. You went off with you went.
Jennifer knows. You go jogging, you go You know
when the. Softball.
Yeah. Softball and all those kind of
things, you did it with those same people.
(31:00):
And you know the other thing too, going back years ago when
it looks like I wouldn't, I wouldn't call it.
I don't have to be a stressor, but something that becomes part
of your fabric is that if you gosomewhere socially with a group
that are that's not police officers, right off the bat, you
get identified as the the cop inthe room.
(31:21):
And now I always, and I'm sincere about this.
Even when I was young, I didn't want to be identified as a
person because of my profession,but I think we all are.
And he's a doctor, he's a lawyer, he's a he's a cop.
And then then if you're in a room with people that may not
appreciate cops, you get the evil eye sometimes.
(31:42):
So you got to, you know, you, you try to say, well, I'm not
like what you think we are, you know, those kind of things, you
know, those kind of, that's a that's an issue.
So that think that's where it becomes cops tend to hang out
with cops and makes their families hang out with cops too,
instead of socializing to the broader area.
I'm not saying that's all the all the time, but that's I think
that's kind of common. Yeah, I I agree.
(32:04):
And some of that is your point, just that natural thing that
happens around shifts and schedules and and and things
like that, which makes sense. But to your point, like it's
sometimes that work of broadening, right that you are
more than just this one thing, there's different aspects of
you. And it's good to, it's good to
(32:24):
not to see the world from a cop's point of view.
Yeah, we need to see it from theway others perceive it also.
We may not agree with it. It's important.
I think, you know, police officers writing a beat in a
social economic area that they didn't live in.
I think it's incumbent upon themto try to understand the social
economic status and day of life of the people they're serving.
(32:49):
Serving, not patrolling, but serving.
I've always been against the, the term police force.
I never, I thought Police Department or whatever the force
implies, that's all we do. So that's just me though.
So. I know our listeners cannot see
us right now, but Jennifer and Iare smiling from ear to ear
because that was so powerful. Yeah, and so true.
(33:10):
And everybody does Me. I never thought of it as
powerful, but it's just kind of my personal sequel, so.
It really is. And and for the sake, Jennifer,
I hope you're OK with us moving to the next few questions here
just because the sake of time and we're kind of talking about
these things already. One thing we know is like
training and policies and all these everything that's kind of
coming into play today, right? In your view, what is the most
(33:33):
critical change needed maybe in like law enforcement training
today? That's needed today.
Yeah. Human interaction.
Yes. Communication.
Communication with your audience, with your the people
you're serving. And again, I think sometimes
people attracted to police work are not always familiar with or
(33:54):
understand the community they'reassigned to serve.
You know, they, they come from asocial, social, economic
background that they have their views of the world, their world
view. And then they're patrolling an
area that doesn't have that sameworld view.
And again, you don't have to agree with it, but I I probably
can't emphasize this enough thatI worry to this is my kids call
(34:17):
it okay Boomer baby boomer Ale back in my day kind of thing.
But and I try to technology is ait's a wonderful.
I mean, officers are taking writing reports on a laptop and
they're, I had a, I had to writeit on a piece of paper and go to
a telephone and call it in, you know, and that's time consuming.
(34:37):
And so technology is great, but we communicate, like I said, my
students communicate more onlinethan they will in person, face
to face. And you know, as well as I do,
you can say something, you can text something to someone and
they perceive it totally different than what you because
they're not watching your body language, they're not looking at
(34:58):
your inflection. And so you got to be careful,
you know, that's, you know, you husband and wife talking.
That's not what I meant when I, I texted you that.
And so I, I written communication when written.
I mean, even if you do it on a laptop or type it to be able to
articulate an investigation in achronological way that when you
(35:21):
turn that report in and it goes to a prosecutor who don't, who
wasn't there. They, you can, there's a picture
of what you did and you did it correctly.
But also dealing with people on the street, human interaction, I
don't think that's ever going togo away.
Cops have to respond to domesticviolence or people arguing and
fighting over something and you have to intervene and you've got
(35:44):
to be able to quell situations and diffuse situations, not
throw gasoline on the fire. And I think that's, you know, I
guess they say they do that, butthat ought to be ongoing and not
just, OK, let's have a week of how we do communication.
Let's do it all the time. Yeah, I love that.
I'm like, so excited that you'retalking about this, because when
(36:06):
I wrote my dissertation, I wasn't expecting that to be a
huge part of it, to be honest. But almost every police officer
that I interviewed brought that up, brought up in terms of
recruitment and the new generation coming on board to
these departments, just the lackof the communication skills and
how they are concerned about it.And understand body language and
(36:27):
inflections and all that you can.
You can say something that appeases someone or it
infuriates them. It just depends on how you not
just what you say, but how you say it.
Well, and I so appreciate just the humanitarian aspect of this
in terms of like, again, you areconnected to other humans and in
(36:47):
service to them and their community and the compassion of
that. And I think that's something
like kind of what you started with in terms of like
misconceptions and things like that.
You know, I won't speak for Ashley, but I know the people
that I serve are incredibly compassionate, are here to help.
You know, sometimes that is because an experience that they
(37:09):
weren't helped when they were younger and they want to make
sure that, you know, that doesn't happen to somebody.
So I think it's powerful to say like these are actually things
that are happening behind a uniform and also that those are
things that are important when you are in the uniform, you
know, human interaction and how that can either de escalate
(37:31):
something or escalate something.I was so fortunate when I first
came on the department and, and I think I mentioned to Jennifer
about an article I read the other day about them lowering
the educational standards. But you know, when I went on in
73, my, my training officers were all mostly high school
graduates from the 50s and 60s. But at that time, that was a
(37:54):
pretty good education in those days.
Today there's a lot of high school graduates that are not
very academically sound. And I don't mean that meanly,
but that's just just the case. These guys, the people I rode
with were so street smart. They were smart.
They knew how to deal with people.
And I, the ones that I, I'm not saying they were all that way.
(38:16):
I was just very, very lucky to get training officers that
showed me that and instilled that said, listen, let's don't
make this situation worse. Let's calm it down.
And I mean, we've seen examples on the news, a lot of officers
that take a bad situation and throw gasoline on it and make it
worse. And I was, I was lucky to have
people school me in that I guess, back in the.
(38:38):
Well, was there anything in terms of after leaving policing
and, and, and receiving your doctorate that made sense in the
rearview mirror about policing that maybe you didn't quite, you
know, when you're in it, that when you step back in that
academic role had a different perspective for you?
You know, I look back on, on my time there and this goes back,
(39:01):
I'm, I'm driving down the streetyesterday and I remember the
very first call I ever got on the Police Department.
And it was 53 years ago. That's half a century, that's
half a century. And so, but I do remember things
vividly of my very first call and then some others, you know,
and when I reflect back on that today, the Police Department is
(39:24):
really good for me personally because I'd probably get antsy.
And I was had the ability to go and work in different areas.
I worked different, I worked in different patrol areas in our
community. I worked in the crimes against
children you, I worked in the intelligence you.
I worked several years in the inhomicide.
I was commander in the homicide.And I love that because it was
(39:46):
like getting a new job, but I didn't have to start all over.
I'm still getting the paycheck. You know, sometimes you quit a
job because you want to try something new.
I could do it right there and the paycheck would be the same.
And that was good for, for my personality.
If anything, I, I don't regret it, but I do think about it
sometimes that I didn't go into an area to become more
(40:06):
competent, to be, to be more specialized.
Like some people never wanted tomove up the ranks.
They wanted to stay in homicide for all those years and they
became an expert. And you know, I, I became a
Sergeant, went to homicide and had never worked there, but I
had good people that knew what they were doing.
I learned from them. And so you kind of, you know, it
(40:27):
was always my goal to move up inthe rank.
I did to some extent, not as faras I wanted to, but hindsight's
2020. I'm good.
OK. So, you know, I was kind of a
generalist. I'd call it a generalist type
path. Yeah.
As opposed to coming quote UN quote, an expert in a certain
area. I don't know that I would
(40:48):
change, but I do think about that some.
I just say, I think that's how Darwin says we survive, right?
You got to be flexible, so you just made sure you had survived.
I like, I like change. I like different just me
personally. And you know, when I reflect
back, there's, there's things that that we did then we could
do better. Police departments, We evolved,
you know, I tell you how I related.
(41:10):
I started in 1973 and I was really young, just, it wasn't
five years earlier we were having racial turmoil in the
streets in my neighborhood whereI grew up.
You know, I remember being in junior high school in 1968 when
Martin Luther King was assassinated.
And outside my school window, someone hung Martin Luther King
(41:31):
in Ephesus. And I looked out the window and
that I'm like, even my, my parents thought this was
horrible. And so we have turmoil in the
streets of Louisville, KY, and I'm patrolling those beats five
years later. And I'm thinking, you know, we
can do it better, but we learnedlessons, learned lesson from
that. It's troubling today when I see
(41:51):
bad things happen around the country that well, not everyone
learned the less you. Know that and and you know, you
say, oh, back in the day and really in reflection.
OK, Well, I think thank you so much, Doctor Baker.
Just I want to obviously respectyour time.
I know we had like a million in one question.
We didn't. Have a lot of questions we.
(42:11):
Didn't overwhelm me with that. We knew we wouldn't hit them
all, but there's so many good ones and I feel like we really
could keep going. But I appreciate your time and I
honestly like loved learning from you.
So I hope that we continue to dothat.
I appreciate the opportunity andnot, you know, at this point in
my career in life, I like to share my, my thoughts and
they're not always correct, but I always like to posture,
(42:34):
promote the discussion and I appreciate your time.
Well, we really appreciate your time and as much as you know, I
appreciate you saying well, that's maybe outside of my
expertise. I do think that you provide a
lot and have a lot more to use. We really again improve your
time. Thank you.
Thank you very. Much Ashley, what do you got for
us? Yeah.
I mean, I'm just so excited for our listeners to hear this and
(42:54):
always to remember that when thecall hits home, Jennifer and I
are here for you. So thank you guys.
Thank you. Yeah.
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