America's Criminologist 06 30 26 Guest Chief Scott Hughes

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
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Speaker 2 (00:19):
Calling to live.

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Speaker 2 (00:31):
Bruce, start the fame.

Speaker 4 (00:35):
And here's America's criminologists, doctor Kerry Myers.

Speaker 5 (00:43):
Expreciate it.

Speaker 4 (00:44):
Happy Independence Day Week, two hundred and fifty years incredible.
I remember when we were celebrating our two hundred So
I'm showing my age a little bit. But it's wonderful
and there's so much going on. Well become to America's criminologist,
Doctor Curry Myers here, retired major county sheriff, former special

(01:05):
agent State Troopers, also spent fifteen years in the world
of academia, serving as a school dean and teaching and criminology.
This is a show where we talk about crime culture
and the foundations to sustain as civil society. I have
a new book coming out in the spring of twenty
twenty seven that's called The Rise of Feral Man. It's
actually going to be a two volume examination of America's

(01:27):
moral crisis. It's going to be the rise of feral
Man and the return from Faraoh Man. I'm working on
it now and getting the edits, so I feel like
that I'm on the right glide path to be able
to release it next year early next year. It's a
roadmap for restoring faith, family, and formation, and the foundations
of a healthy civilization. So stay tuned for more updates

(01:50):
and as we get closer to the release dates. As always,
take a look at my substack post at doctor Curry
Meyers dot substack dot com doctor Curry Meyers dot substant
right now and working on the history of law enforcement
specifically in America. But we got to start out from
the beginning, So we're going to go back early in time,

(02:12):
four thousand years ago, and we're going to go through
and move through the time to current American policing today.
This segment of America's criminologists is brought to you by
Real Resilience. That's our ee L Resilience. It's a transformative
program helping inmates prepare for successful re entry. It uses
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entry isn't just released, it's a second chance done right.

Speaker 5 (02:55):
Okay.

Speaker 4 (02:57):
As I said, we're celebrating in Dependence Day week. There
is so much going on around the United States. We
also have the World Cup soccer here, and it's amazing
to hear people from other countries come here and talk
about how great we are, and how great the food is,
and how nice we are, what a welcome retreat from

(03:18):
what we get from the media every day. And so
it's nice to have those kinds of things that occur.
But each fourth of July, regardless of it's two hundred
and fifty years now, but regardless of the year, we
commemorate far more than the signing of the document in Philadelphia.
We celebrate the birth of a revolutionary idea, my friends,

(03:40):
was an idea so bold that it altered the course
of history. It proclaimed the legitimate government does not derive
its authority from kings or emperors, from privilege or military conquest. Instead,
government exists by the consent of the governed and remains
permanently subject to the rule of law. Now, this idea

(04:01):
transformed politics, and it transformed liberty, and it transformed law
enforcement into one of the greatest law enforcement organizations or
series of organizations in the world. I think American law
enforcement stands out beyond any other law enforcement in the
world just because of this. It exists by the consent

(04:24):
of the govern If America had succeeded in winning independence,
which they did, the question then became, who would enforce
its laws? What would it look like? I mean, we
just came from a monarchy that we rejected with officers.
How would they serve? Would they serve a new political class,
would they answer to whatever temporary faction may be holding

(04:47):
power or something else entirely new. Now, history remind us
that every enduring institution begins first with an idea. Long
before stones for cathedrals or someone a mad them, long
before constitutions govern nations, someone argues for these very principles.
And that is precisely what happened during one of the

(05:08):
most uncertain times in American history. Beginning in October seventeen
eighty seven, a series of essays appeared under the pen
name Publius, honoring the Roman statesman Publius Varius Publicola, remembering
as one of the founders of the Roman public This
pseudonym itself was significant. The authors deliberately shifted away from

(05:30):
the personal reputation and towards the strength of their argument.
It wasn't about who wrote it, but the argument itself.
The question was not had who had written the essays,
but whether it was sound reasoning. We later learned that
these three authors were remarkable of Mann, Alexander Hamilton, James
Madison and John John Jay. Together they produced eighty five

(05:55):
essays that remain among the greatest works of political philosophy
ever written. The essays became known as the Federalist Papers,
and as although written persuade New Yorkers to ratify the Constitution,
it soon became far more significant. Today. Judges, constitutional scholars, historians, legislatures,

(06:16):
and attorneys routinely consult them to understand what the framers
actually intended when they drafted the Constitution. For students of
American law enforcement, however, the Federalist Papers reveal something equally profound.
They explain why American policing developed differently than policing anywhere

(06:36):
else in the world, and that brings us to our
guest today. Scott Hughes has been an esteem member of
law enforcement community since nineteen ninety seven. Throughout his career,
he has held leadership roles across multiple departments and led
cultural transformation through strong leadership, effective people management, accountability. He

(06:57):
has distinguished instructor with the Ohio Peace Officers Training Commission
for over two decades. He collaborates with attorneys to teach
use of force, force tactics, and case law. Additionally, he's
respected contributing writer and instructor for Caliber Press on various
subjects including leadership, officer safety, and the legally Justified but

(07:21):
It Was Avoidable training course that he and a fellow
instructor developed. Scott is a graduate of the FBI National Academy.
He holds a bachelor's degree in Organizational Leadership and has
earned the prestigious Certified Law Enforcement Executive designition. It's a

(07:43):
testament to his vast expertise and knowledge in law enforcement.
After ten years of policing, Scott retired in May from
one of Ohio's fastest growing suburbs. Is it Hamilton Township, Yes,
the Hamilton Township and in twenty twenty five, Scott founded

(08:04):
Crosden Consulting. It's a public safety consulting firm that specializes
in expert witness services and general consulting and public safety. Scott,
it's pleasure to have you on the show. Thanks for much,
Thanks for your service. And there's nothing like the first
couple weeks of retirement because you probably walk around and go,

(08:25):
somebody's in my office. They shouldn't be there. Who is
this person interacting with my troops. It's a weird feeling,
but I'm sure it's a good feeling because I'm sure
you've prepared for that, and he made sure that your
department was taken over by somebody who could carry on
the good work that.

Speaker 5 (08:43):
You did well. I appreciate that. Yeah, the departments in
great hands. And all the mentors that I've had in
my career at the chief level, I was chief for
ten years, like you said, four different departments as a
chief for the last ten years, and all the mentors
told me that you'll know when it's time to leave.
You want to leave on your terms, not on someone else's.
So boom, here we are. I still feel like I'm

(09:05):
on vacation. It's just been over the months. Yeah, it's
set in today though, because it's today's Tuesday, and at
eleven o'clock this morning, I was at home depot mine
plants and stuff with my wife. So there you go.
I'm like, this is what it's like here. We are here,
we are here. I am hey, it's great to be
back on the program. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (09:25):
Well, it's an honor to have you on your reoccurring guests.
And there's a reason why, as you're very knowledgeable, but
you're also well respected in the law enforcement community, not
just in Ohio but outside Ohio, and you're someone that
appears as an expert to talk about many different situations.
And because of the founding, I thought it was important

(09:46):
to bring you on to get your perspective because you
do teach a lot about use of force, rule of law,
constitutional matters when it comes to policing, which I really
number one. I want to say thank you for doing
that kind of training because because there isn't enough of
that in law enforcement. You know, we don't get enough
of truly understanding the Constitution, how it's applied, the things

(10:10):
that we can and cannot do. And that's you know,
in many ways law enform I don't know if you'll
agree or not, but law enforcement are training in order
to get certified. I mean, you can become a barber.
It takes longer to become a barber than longer become
a police officer. So any kind of training that we

(10:30):
can increase the capability and knowledge is going to be
a good thing.

Speaker 5 (10:35):
So I'll tell you we here in Ohio, it's eighteen
hundred hours to be a barber, and it's a seven
hundred eight hundred hours ish to be a police officer.

Speaker 4 (10:45):
I just don't think most people understand that. And there
are some states that are a little bit longer, they
have different requirements than others, but in general, none of
the states have long enough training. And then I don't
even want to talk about annual training. I mean, our
annual training is a joke. I mean it's you know,
it's basically forty hours. That may change in different areas,

(11:08):
but it's basically forty hours. And I mean a good
half of that is made up in firearms and some
you know, and hr stuff, you know, and it's not
concentrating on other stuff. So the more that we can
have training, and I would like this, I would like
us to have you know, this is where fire departments

(11:29):
are well above us on establishing standards for equipment, standards
for training, standards for uniforms supplies well.

Speaker 5 (11:39):
Fire department too. Doctor the fire department to schedule allows
them to do training the twenty four forty eight offs,
so when they're not putting the wet stuff on the
hot stuff, they're training. You know, they have their schedule
allows it. Most law enforcement agencies in this country, you
log on, you got calls pinning, you go to the calls,
and you run call to call to call until the
end of your shift. So there's no there's no downtime.

(12:02):
You know, it's it's but anyhow, yeah, it's when you
when you ask me to come on and you know,
you kind of we're talking about what you want to
talk about.

Speaker 6 (12:09):
It.

Speaker 5 (12:09):
It was interesting because you know, I do a lot
of expert witness work defending cops in most cases around
the country, and I spend a lot of time on
the Fourth Amendment. I mean a lot of the a
lot of the a lot of the cases that I'm
involved in center around Fourth Amendment violations or alleged violations
nineteen eighty three acts. And you know, our our authority
comes from the people, you know, through the Constitution, and

(12:32):
that in that constitution limits us with what we can
and can't do. And every time I I've taken four
oaths in my career, and you know that oath that
we all take is to support and defend that Constitution,
which doesn't sound like a big deal, but that's that's
pretty profound when you think about it. There's a lot
of power in that. You know. I I tell recruits
in the academy when I was teaching them that an

(12:53):
American police officer is the only person in America they
can tell another American to stop and you have to stop,
like you're the like you think about how much power
you have to restrict other people's freedom and liberties that
that can't be taken lightly. And sometimes I think I
think cops can forget that at times, like Yeah, as
an American, we have the right to go about our

(13:14):
day and do what we want to do and not
be bothered until the police officer says stop. That's a
lot of power. There's a lot of authority, and the
Constitution kind of tells you how you're allowed to use it,
so kind of defines the limits of the power of
the government. But you know, I think I think that's
what separates American policing from, like you said in your intro,
kind of other countries and how they do things. But anyhow, yeah, man, anyhow,

(13:35):
all that to say is great to be back on
the show appreciated. I guess I guess we say happy birthday?
Is that? Is that what we say?

Speaker 7 (13:42):
Sure?

Speaker 4 (13:42):
Yeah, I mean yeah, America is a beautiful country and
they're having a big two hundred and fiftieth birthday. So,
you know, like anybody else, I mean, dads don't get
a birthday week. It seems like everybody else gets a
birthday week, right, you know, and the kids certainly get
a birthday sometimes a birthday month. But you know, let's
give our country a birthday week. You know, I think
I'm perfectly okay with it. And you know, with two

(14:02):
hundred and fifty years, I'm all right celebrating for about
a month on this thing, because two hundred and fifty
years means something.

Speaker 8 (14:08):
Now.

Speaker 4 (14:10):
We can't lose it, you know. And Jefferson warned to this.
He said that over time, the country could falter because
it takes each generation to continue to enforce the constitution
that was built, you know, to guide this. So before America,

(14:32):
civilization had some form of law enforcement. So there's always
been around. I mentioned on the trailer when opened up today,
and if you go back to Mesopotamia, that's when first
some of the first law enforcement officers were existed that worked,
and it was.

Speaker 2 (14:46):
A a.

Speaker 4 (14:48):
Highly education educated society at that time. And they realize that.
But whether it's Rome, France, Mesopotamia, England, officers ultimately serve
the crown or a ruling class or somebody.

Speaker 5 (15:02):
Now.

Speaker 4 (15:03):
The founders envisioned something revolutionary, a system where government itself
would be subject to the law. As someone who spent
an entire career wearing that badge, how does that difference
affect way American officers view their responsibility today. So you're
in the classroom now with officers that are still on
the job, how are they viewing their relationship today as

(15:24):
a police officer.

Speaker 5 (15:26):
Well, I think it's I think the reminders it's not
our job to take sides, and sometimes it's not even
to win right. It's not to serve whoever holds, you know, office,
or who's in charge, who has power. It's it's to
apply the law fairly, exercise the authority professionally, and stay

(15:47):
within the boundaries of what the Constitution allows.

Speaker 4 (15:51):
You to do.

Speaker 5 (15:52):
So I feel like, you know, this this this generation
is my opinion, of course, but I feel like this
generation takes a lot of bat at times, you know,
for various reasons. But the one thing that I've seen
in my in my experience is this is a smart group.
We're seeing more uh, college educated folks coming up through
the ranks entering the profession and I and I would

(16:15):
like to think that maybe some of them have a
have a better foundation for kind of where we are
and how we got here and they and they kind
of can appreciate, you know, don't take some of these
things personal when you're out here working, Yeah, you know,
just do your job, don't worry about things that are

(16:35):
outside of your control, and just focus on what you
can focus on. And I've always kind of viewed, you know,
the Constitution and kind of the what guides us again,
like the like the guardrails. Just stay inside these guardrails
or stay inside these bumpers on a bowling alley, and
you're going to be fine. And I feel like in
some regards, this generation kind of understands that a little
bit better than the maybe past generations.

Speaker 4 (16:57):
Yeah, exactly, and in fact matter and wrote in Federalists
ten that government exists to control factions and prevent one
group from using power against another. That's really the foundation
of impartial justice is we don't go around viewing factions. Now,
my concern, Scott, to be perfectly honest with you, is
sometimes with mayors that have taken on the mantle of

(17:19):
being a quasi police chief, we're seeing faction enforcement. We
saw at the beginning with COVID when police chiefs and
not as much sheriffs, because they're more of elected a
little bit, they have the ability to kind of do
their own thing and say no easier. But sometimes the
chiefs are pressured into doing things because a mayor decides it.

(17:43):
And I don't know about you, but you know, fifteen
twenty years ago, when a chief was selected to be
a police chief somewhere, the mayor was supportive of them
except if they did something wrong or there was something
bad with the department. But they let them have the
police department to run it as he or she should,

(18:05):
and the police chief reinforced that and the mayor got
too much into it. The police chief would have a
quiet conversation with that mayor saying, Mayor, you've hired me
to do my job, Let me do my job. I
think that's the vast majority of chiefs today are doing that,
but we have some that have not been able to

(18:26):
push back for some reason. Do you see it that way?
Or am I am I misinterpreting that.

Speaker 5 (18:34):
No, I think you're spot on. I think you know.
I always said, look at when I became a chief,
there was a couple of things I did want. I
made sure I had a contract. I was too young
to just come in as a police chief out of
a contract. Because to your point, you work for a
governing board, and if you upset you know the majority
of that board, you're gone. Right, I've got family and
kids and things that you know are important to me.

(18:54):
Obviously that sought that was that was critical. But to
that point, you come in into one of these jobs
and you you work for that person. That person says, no,
you're going to this way, my way. If not, you're
not gonna have a job. Now you start thinking about
your family and your you know, your livelihood. So it's
very easy to just become lazy in this profession. In fact,

(19:16):
one of the classes in some of the classes that
I teach, and uh, we talk about things about about
is being is how easy it is to be lazy
because if you go in, you try to rock the bow,
you try to make all these kind of changes, people
start pushing back on you. It's like, you know what, fine,
I give up. Let me just ride this thing out
three or four more years to hit my retirement date.
And then that just has a ripple effect with moral culture,

(19:37):
et cetera. You know, the law doesn't change depending upon
who someone voted for, right, And I think that's that's
the problem with with with with with these mayors and
some of these councils that get to they they get
elected on an agenda, and then they want to push
that agenda down on quite honestly weak leaders. And I
don't like to use the word leaders in that same sentence,

(19:59):
but you know, if you're a position of authority as
a chief of police, you're a leader. And some of
these leaders just don't have the backbone to stand up
against it for fear of losing their job. And then
you lose your job in one of these departments, you're
now blackballed, and now you've got to worry about, well,
how do I explain what happened to me if I
want to go apply for their job, and you know,

(20:19):
and then you get the media involved, and then they
run their story the way they want to run it,
and it's just it's just this snowball effect, if you will.
So it's easier, quite honestly, for chiefs to be like,
you know, what the heck with it, I'm just going
to sit back, not rock the boat, not try to
make any drastic changes. Whatever they told me to do
is what I'm going to do. And then we and
then we just see these organizations kind of suffer, unfortunately,

(20:41):
and it becomes more about politics and popularity and public
pressure than it does about doing your job.

Speaker 4 (20:46):
I'm glad you mentioned that because you can also see
it in the field, because if you're an active police officer,
and there's nothing wrong, by the way, with an active police,
active police officer wants to go out and protect people.
I was in a great career. I was honored three
different organizations. All of them were outstanding, and the vast

(21:09):
majority ninety nine percent of the people that I worked
with were of the same ilk and just wanted to
go serve others. Different personalities, different races, different cultures, but
just wanted to go serve others and protect others. That
was their main emphasis. It wasn't about oh I get
to carry a gun or I get to have a badge.
That does happen, but I never saw it, and I

(21:31):
never saw racism, you know, and so you know, those
kinds of things really bother me. But when it's kind
of a false narrative that goes around, but it gets
to the point where if you do go out and work,
all of a sudden, you have an eye on you
because you're actually going out and enforcing the law. For instance,
let's say I work in a sector that is predominantly black,

(21:54):
and so as a result of that, based on the
laws of probability, you probably are going to stop more
black people. So your percentage of black interaction is going
to be higher than an officer that works a different neighborhood,
let's say a suburban area of that town. But they're
going to be targeted by because nobody looks at people today,

(22:14):
look at data, and they don't look at the color
behind the data. They don't look at the information through
the data. It's the number one problem I have with
criminologists today is they're just data wonks and they don't
sift through it to understand why, reason why. And I
think it does cause law enforcement officers to go why
should I go out and work. I'm just going to
respond to calls. And I think we especially saw that

(22:37):
with as we survived through COVID, and many officers said
I'm done. You know, we had senior field people, really
important people, patrol officers that were senior leaders that left
after fifteen years or did early retirement, or police officers
did early retirement, and the rest said I'm going to hide.

(22:59):
Not everybody.

Speaker 5 (23:00):
Yeah, and they can do it, yeah, yeah, and.

Speaker 4 (23:02):
You almost can't blame them. No.

Speaker 5 (23:04):
Like I said, it goes back to what I said before,
it's easy to be lazy.

Speaker 6 (23:07):
You know.

Speaker 5 (23:08):
The folks that are always loud in that in that
space are always the ones who have never done the job. Uh.
You know, I've seen this time and time and time
and time again. It's the same people over and over again.
And if they've never stepp foot in a police car,
they have. They have Cincinnati, which is where I live.
We just went through this. They just published some report
a month or so ago, you know, and they try

(23:28):
to paint the police officers with this broad brush that
you know, the cops are just a bunch of racist
and they're targeting certain ethnic groups. And it's insanity because
cops go where the data suggests they need to be
based on the crime rates. It's not the police, it's
not the cops fault that it happens to be this
neighborhood or that neighborhood. And and what what frustrates me
is go into those neighborhoods and talk to the residents

(23:51):
and see if they want the police to change their tactics.
And I would bet you that the majority of the
residents are going to say, no, we want the police
officers here. You know. We just we had a case
here in Cincinnati, was a high profile.

Speaker 4 (24:03):
Uh.

Speaker 5 (24:04):
We took quite a bit of heat down here in
Cincinnati over the summer last summer. Uh we just put
the crime rate, you know, and we had kids getting
killed in parks and getting shot at, and we had
a big fight downtown. It's just a mess. But the
folks in those communities they want cops there doing their jobs.
But these these these folks want to come from the
outside and just stir the pot and try to just
paint everybody, like you said, with a broad brush, and

(24:25):
it's it's, it's and and then and then people listen
to them, you know, then your city council's listen, your
mayor's listen. And now they want to oust the police chief.
They want to get rid of this, get rid of that,
pull down cameras, get rid of drones. It's like you,
it's this. You're going the complete opposite direction here, Like
you said, if you're gonna if you're gonna run data,
then look at what. Then actually look at the data

(24:47):
and forget the data. Go get in a police car
on Friday night between eight pm and four am and
go right along with the officers for a little bit,
and then go go do your data right. That's what
frustrates me is you know, I love this profession. Thirty
years in it, four different agencies, I absolutely love it.
And I will defend the men and women as long

(25:09):
as they always do what's good, not bad, right, not wrong.
And to your point, the over one majority of them
are doing what's right, not wrong. But you've got these
outside influence whos just want to come in for whatever
reason and try to make a mountain out of a
Molehill and it's it's insane, and then it grows legs
and then the media runs with it, and you know,
it's it's like Groundhog's Day.

Speaker 6 (25:30):
Man.

Speaker 5 (25:30):
It really yeah, boy, that's spot on.

Speaker 4 (25:33):
You know, we're getting close to time flies quickly, but
we're getting close to the end of this first segment.
But I want to really ask you about something that's
really important when it comes to the Constitution and the
concept of federalism, and that was they didn't create a
national police force, which we in my opinion, we never
want to have a national police force because who's going

(25:54):
to be controlled of it? It's a leviathan that's setting
their authority was purposely divided among local, county, state, and
federal governments. From your experience as a police chief, why
has that decentralization been such a strength for American law
enforcement unlike so many other countries.

Speaker 5 (26:16):
Well, I think communities get the kind of police that
they vote for, right And what I mean by that
is is what what New York City and New York
City and always in the headlines they're going through a
lot right now, that style of policing in New York City,
for example, would not be tolerated in some of our

(26:37):
more rural areas. Right, you know, I've I've been honored
and blessed to be able to travel the country and
I think I've spoken probably forty of the fifty states,
and one of the one of my favorite places to
go through is the state of Wyoming. And I look
at how they police in Wyoming and just how how
just man, just there're just some great people down there,

(26:58):
and I think there is no way that Wyoming style
of policing would work in New York City, and New
York City's police you would work in Wyoming in different communities,
different priorities. Yeah, we all operate in the same constitution,
which is the beauty, but every community is different, and uh,
you know, I think that's what makes what makes it

(27:18):
really great. Want in your local committee. I think that
is yeah.

Speaker 4 (27:29):
And some of those were more rural areas that they
learned how to operate without any help sometimes, So you've
got to be pretty situationally aware and know how to
talk to people because there ain't backup coming. I mean
when I was a state trooper, there is back up.
Sometimes there might be some evenings where was twenty minutes
away at the and I knew some troopers in Western
Kansas were maybe three hours away. So you got to

(27:51):
learn to, you know, be able to handle people, but
also not escalate things. Can we have you back for
the second segment?

Speaker 5 (28:00):
Absolutely? Very good, folks.

Speaker 4 (28:02):
You're listening to America's Criminologists with Doctor Curry Myers. Will
continue with retired Chief Scott Hughes after the break.

Speaker 8 (28:25):
Hi, folks, doctor Curry Myers here to let you know
that my new show, it's called America's Criminologist with Doctor
Curry Myers every Tuesday at one pm is a former
state trooper special agent share from a major county. I
will offer sharp insights into the pressing issues shaping American
society today. I'll have guests, news and my insights as
an applied criminologist throughout the one hour show. So criminals

(28:47):
and the progressive politicians that allow them to fester beware
because this show is directed at you. America's Criminologist every
Tuesday at one pm on k e T.

Speaker 9 (28:58):
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(30:25):
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Speaker 7 (30:35):
Listen to Constitution Radio what Douglas B. Gibs your weekend
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Speaker 4 (30:49):
Hey, my friends, is doctor Curry Meyers, America's criminologist. I
have a new sponsor for my show. I mean Real Resilience.
That's r a b L transformative program can and inmates
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(31:09):
It's really an important tool, Real Resilience, because re entry
isn't just released, it's a second chance done right. All right,
We're having kind of an Independence Day special. We're talking
about the Constitution, the Federalist papers, and we have retired

(31:32):
Chief Scott Hughes. That is, we've been very fortunate to
have him join us. So Scott, thanks for coming on.

Speaker 5 (31:40):
My pleasure, thanks for having me day week.

Speaker 4 (31:44):
Absolutely and so one thing.

Speaker 5 (31:49):
We went.

Speaker 4 (31:51):
Quickly through that segment because we had so many things,
good things to talk about. One thing I wanted to
ask you is that the badge derives its the already
from the Constitution. It doesn't derive it from an individual.
We don't see an allegiance to a particular person or politics.

(32:12):
You had a successful career in law enforcement, What practical
advice would you give a young officer today about keeping
that principle in mind throughout their long career, because, as
you know, law enforcement officers have different life's career lives.
Within their career period, you know, they kind of go
through ebbs and flows and good times and bad times

(32:37):
because of what they see. Do you have any good
advice for them on keeping that principle alive and well
throughout a career.

Speaker 5 (32:46):
You know, I kind of said this the last time.
Don't take things personal. Understand that you know, we're doing
a job. Understand why the founding Fallows wrote the Constitution.
I think understand the why then why we do what
we do starts to make more sense. Understand that some
people that you're going to arrest are going to be

(33:07):
found not guilty. That's neither here. Some people are going
to be sentenced more severely than others. Some might not
be sentenced at all, and that's just part of the
criminal justice system. And you know, as frustrating it as
it can be sometimes, I just think it's important for
police officers to remember not to take it personal. You know,
I took stuff personal Throughout my career, you know, new

(33:28):
times I'd be upset because I knew I had someone
dead to rights if you will, on a case and
you know, they found some technicality or whatever. And every
time one of those incidents occurred, I always looked at
it as how do I make myself better? And as
I went on in my career further and further and further,
you know, some of those quote unquote mistakes that I

(33:48):
may have made, you know, you didn't make. You start
to learn from what you were doing. And then as
I became a supervisor and then a trainer, you start
teaching that to the next generation. And that's how you
get better as as a person and has and how
you make the profession better by teaching and giving back.
So for me, it's it's it's it's understanding. It's just

(34:11):
it's just like anybody else. It's a job, and it's
already stressful enough. Don't add to the stress, right, speaking
things personal.

Speaker 4 (34:20):
Well, that's so true. I had Sheriff Chad at Chad Bianco,
who's the Riverside County, California Sheriff. It's one of the
larger sheriff's offices in the United States, And I asked
him how he survives California, you know, in the in
the politics of California, and uh, he said, I tell
my folks to just we do our job. To go

(34:41):
out and do your job. If you're worried about what
other people are going to do, then you know you're
going to get really upset. So we're going to go
do our job, and we're going to enforce the law.
And what a prosecutor will do, a prosecutor will do. Now,
luckily he had a good prosecutor, so that was helpful.
But then again you got judges, you know, and and
the court system and all things that can occur, and

(35:04):
some limitations on what they do. I mean, a California
law law enforcement officer, to your point earlier, is vastly
different on what they can do compared to an Ohio
police officer because they have so much d crem you know,
which is really affected policing.

Speaker 5 (35:21):
And the rest of the country typically says keep that
stuff out there, by the way, Oh yeah, they do.

Speaker 4 (35:26):
You know what's amazing to me, though, Chief it used
to be there was a time when California law enforcement
was a gold standard for how to behave for law
throughout the United States. I mean, I remember those days
when you look at the sixties and seventies and eighties
and even early nineties, if LA County or city was

(35:49):
doing something, it made sense and we wanted to emulate it.
We certainly don't want to do that now.

Speaker 5 (35:54):
I didn't mean to interrupt, No, no, no, I was
just going to say the same thing back when I started,
you know, up till you know, probably I don't know
fit twenty years ago. We used to always joke whatever
happened on the West Coast would eventually work its way
across the country and end up on the East coast.
But it was it was about it. There was about
a decade behind. Sometimes little things like I remember the
pit maneuver, you know, the pit they've been they've been,
They've been doing the pit maneuver out on the West

(36:16):
coast for for forever. It's still working its way across
the country getting over here to the East coast. But
to your point, a lot of law enforcement tactics like
the swap team for example, you know a lot of
those swaps, you know, yeah, yeah, and now it's like no,
keep them, keep keep what stuff out west, Like we
don't want that working its way across the country because

(36:37):
we've seen what it does to to communities, you know,
and that and that, and that's the sad part, right
is it impacts the communities, uh more than it does
anybody else. Yes, it certainly, you know, destroys morale and
culture and subtle organizations. And then when you tie the
police officers hands to what we talked about before, it
just makes you not want to do anything, kind of
throw your hands up or go find a job in

(36:59):
a different eight where you're supported in your back. But
at the end of the day, the communities are the
ones that suffer. Communities suffer, businesses suffer, people stop going
to events, and again, it's just this, it's just this
snowball effect. We had a little bit of that here
in Cincinnati again, like I said, a little a little
while ago with a high profile beating that occurred on
a downtown street. And you know, it took a while

(37:21):
from to kind of to kind of uh, get get
get back to go, get back going again. But one thing,
one of the things that came from that was the
police chief was terminated. Yeah, because you know, a fight
on a fight that happened two o'clock in the morning.
They you know, one of the reasons they went after
the police chief. But anyhow, I don't want to go back.
But we talked about before.

Speaker 4 (37:39):
But yeah, right, yeah, yeah, you know, one of the
important parts is checks and balances. It's not simply a
constitutional theory. There's daily realities in policing in America. Officers
answers to supervisors, but we also answer in fact in
many ways to prosecutors, judges, juries. I used to tell
my students report writing is extremely important, and you better

(38:04):
have a lot of information. You better take your time
to write it because you never know when your report's
going to be appearing before the Supreme Court of the
United States. It could happen and ultimately the constitution, so
everything we do is aligned with that. How do those
constitutional guardrails actually strengthen policing instead of limiting it?

Speaker 5 (38:25):
In your opinion, I think a lot of people look
at oversight as punishment sometimes, and I would say that oversight.
I think the oversight protects the officers just as much
as it protect the public. I'm okay with having a
system of checks and balances because of that reason. A

(38:45):
lot of the case law that we have that guides
police officers today, both good and what we wish we
didn't have. Some of the case law that we have
that we wish wasn't in place, was in my opinion,
because there were no checks in Bounce says no one.
No one looked at what that officer did or didn't do,
or thought big picture, hey, how could this impact law

(39:07):
enforcement down the down the road because like everybody else,
no one thinks that this this shoplifter is going to
turn into a Supreme Court case. And you know howevery
years it takes gets to the Supreme Court up. You know,
no one ever thinks that. They always just think, oh,
this is just another arrest, this is just another traffic ticket,
another traffic stop. But you know, one of the one

(39:30):
of the best case laws that we have came from
Ohio called Terry versus Ohio, which you know, which a
good cop on a on a detail looking for you know, uh, thieves.
Long story short, sees a guy acting suspicious in front
of a department store or excuse me, in front of
a business and long story short, cop goes up, talk

(39:51):
to him, there's a pat down on him, finds a
gun and you know that officer now. Granted, if you
find the original report that he wrote, it was about
four lines. But I came, I conquered, conquered, Yeah yeah,
yeah yeah, it's all criminal arrested. Same. But because of
that case law, that has saved a lot of cops lives,

(40:13):
because you're now able to if you can articulate reasonable
suspicions that someone might be armed, you can go, you
can go pad them down. So all that to say,
I'm good with checks and balances, I'm good with oversight.
Uh again, don't turn it into a negative. Look at
it as a way to kind of protect you so
that if you find yourself in that hot seat, if

(40:34):
you will one day down the road, you're gonna be
in a much better position. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (40:38):
I even tell police officers when I was on the job,
even if I see them now, I go, you know
in actually it's it's hard to believe this, but defense
attorneys are there for a reason, and you and I
used to treat them with great respect because they made
me a better police officer. So I would I would
instead of being mad, I would listen. And I still

(40:59):
got mad on a few occasions because there are some
that all right, we're bad, bad, people. They just were
bad people. But ultimately I always stopped and listened and
I tried to go, Okay, how does this person ask
a question or what do they do? So I could
anticipate that in the future and maybe even cover it
in a report or something like that. I tried to

(41:20):
learn to use it as a teaching tool on being
able to answer those questions a little bit ahead of time.

Speaker 5 (41:28):
Well, yeah, and to that point, Like like we said before,
I don't think young cops think. I think I think
there's probably still a there's still some out there who think, well,
the defense attorney's the bad guy. Don't talk to them,
and they're and they're they're to your point, there's probably
some truth to that to some degree. You know, some
of them are just bad people. And but that's in
every profession. The ones that are approachable that you realize, hey,

(41:49):
they're just doing their job, those are the ones that
is a young cop. You go up and you talked
and you say, hey, you got me on this one.
What would what do you suggest I do to make
me better? Right? Yeah, what can I do make myself better?
Down and asked that question. But some of that's probably
you know, perception on how they're viewed and if if
if they've got a reputation in some of the old

(42:11):
cops don't talk to the defense attorneys or the devil,
you know what I mean.

Speaker 4 (42:15):
Yeah, yeah, Well that pride will get you in trouble.
I mean, pride has always gotten humanity and you know,
in trouble. But yeah, I agree with you. I mean,
they can be a volume of information and most of
them will. That's the reason I usually, you know, talk
to them. I went up and I was friendly because
I mean, I'm a police I'm a police officer for
them too. I mean that's not you know, I mean,
it's so I've got to talk about this because it's

(42:40):
it's kind of it shows you kind of where we're
at constitutionally, and many times so throughout American history, law
enforcement has often found itself working during periods of political disagreement.
But I have to tell you, Chief, I've never experienced
in my life or even as a researcher and a
criminologist and story in, I don't know where we've had

(43:02):
the blatant ignoring of laws that have occurred in this country.
Where and I'll say federal law enforcement and immigration for
an example, immigrate federal agents. It's it's very difficult for
them to be local police officers and go in and
do work if they don't have a partnership with local

(43:25):
policing or the local sheriff, because it's not there. The
local police knows their jurisdiction better than anybody. And it
used to be back in the day that if you
would assist federal agents. Yes we didn't and we didn't
investigate immigration law, but we certainly partnered with them and
helped them if they came into town and said here's

(43:47):
things to avoid. You know, we're going to go out
and be with you so we can handle traffic, or
if something happens that has been completely blown out, and
we had jails where we could have held people in
jail so people could have picked them up in jail
instead of having them roaming around the city. We don't
have that in most of Blue state America anymore, and

(44:10):
it's become extremely dangerous as a result. But we have
governors and mayors who are actually are actually ignoring federal law.
And it used to be because of that partnership that
we had that we're all different branches of government, locals, county, state, federal,
that we would help each other, and we're not helping

(44:31):
each other like we used to. And that's a that's
a major concern of mine.

Speaker 5 (44:37):
Yeah, you know, I I look back in my career.
You know, we worked with the ATF a lot. We
worked with the DEA a lot, We worked with the FBI. Uh,
you know, I view ICE or Immigration or HSI. You know,
they're all on the same boat. And again, you know,
we it's all politics. It's all being driven because folks
are trying to push a narrative. And unfortunately, in some

(44:58):
of these some of these juris diictions you have back
to my week leaders, you have weak police chiefs who
won't stand up for themselves, they don't understand the constitution themselves,
or they maybe be trying to push a personal agenda,
and there's no place for that in law enforcement. If
if the United States Marshals call my guys tomorrow and say, hey,
we're going to be doing a search warrant on a
child rapist. We're gonna have cops volunteer to come and

(45:20):
help the person, it should be no different if ICE
called and says, hey, we've got to go pick up
an illegal alien who is wanted for X, Y and
Z and whatever country. Okay, we're here too many Again.
Politics has just gotten in the way. It's it's blurred lines,
and then again then it trickles down. It gets to
like the officials. Now they liket the officials and are

(45:42):
running these platforms, and they're going to put their local
police officers in the middle of it. And that's not
fair to the cops to put the cops in the
middle of this, because quite honestly, if a FED or
a local calls for help, I don't care who the
first person is there to back me up. I just
want somebody to help me. One of my favorite stories,
I tell I'm going to pursuit going down in their

(46:03):
state in Cincinnati, and we take an exit ramp and
the guy crashes and he runs on foot and I
run on foot, and coming next to me as I'm
chasing this guy down the middle of the road, is
this like Toyota camry with like red and blue lights
flashing in the grill, And I thought, who in the
heck is this? I get the guy in custody. It

(46:24):
was a United States Postal inspector who I happened to
pass during the pursuit, saw what was going on, got
in behind me, couldn't keep up because he was in
a camry, And once the guy crashed and bailed, he
was my first guy on scene to back me up.
I could care less that it was an ice agent
or a postal inspector. I just needed somebody there with

(46:44):
a badge and a gun and a pair of handcuffs
to help me. And that's to your point, like that's
what we're supposed to be doing. I feel sorry for
these locals and the FEDS and some of these jurisdictions
where they just can't work together because at the end
of the day, you know some one and they has
is you know they're gonna get hurt, and and that's
so fun. These people are these are these are These

(47:06):
are dads, their moms, their brothers, their sisters, their husbands,
their wives who are just trying to do their job.
And you shouldn't you shouldn't tie their hands or put
them in jeopardy because you don't agree with something at
a different level. That's that that needs to be handled
somewhere else. Until that happens, then you need to back
these men and women and let them do those jobs.

(47:26):
They swore to take.

Speaker 4 (47:28):
And it goes back to Madison's concern with factions. I mean,
we are we're allowing that to happen as a result
of that. And again Madison warned us of of that
particular danger, But the founding fathers also warned us about
concentrated government power, and they feared that more than the
absence of government. So they were concerned about growing the

(47:50):
federal government too big. I'm doing a history of American
law enforcement right now special and talking about some of
the first federal agents in law enforcement that existed. Postal
Service was one of those. It was in the constitutional position.
It was actually started by Benjamin Franklin at Hawk, so

(48:11):
he had it so technically it was, but the first
constitutional federal law enforcement in the US Marshal Service, and
then Customs, and then for reasons, you had to have
marshals go out and serve warrants, and you had to
have Customs be able to retrieve moneies, be involved in tariffs,
you know, all those kinds of things. The concern that

(48:32):
you know, we we I think there was probably in
someone the neighborhood of five hundred federal laws at that time.
Now we have close to five six, seven thousand federal laws,
criminal laws that are on the books now. Is there
any concern that this, you know, kind of a national
we're ending federalism and growing into two more of a
nationalist figure because we maybe started seeing.

Speaker 5 (48:55):
It with DHS.

Speaker 4 (48:56):
I love DHS agents, it's nothing I don't. I have
nothing ill about their work. But I think the founding fathers,
I'm not sure if we grew something too big because
now it's a huge leviathan, and sometimes I'm not sure
what their mission is because we still have other, you know,
groups and organizations that have certain responsibilities. And then you

(49:18):
know TSA. I mean there's there's some on the left
that wants to push TSA out onto highways to be
able to use for bus stops, railway not just airports,
to do security, but TSA to go out and you
know what, what's to keep them from there being TSA
state troopers out on federal highways because it's a federal
connection and it's you know, so these are the leaps

(49:41):
that can occur. Do you have any thoughts on how
we maintain that kind of balance when it comes to
what the founders in vision for law enforcement?

Speaker 5 (49:50):
Well, I think my thoughts would just be, I think
the system we have it's working. I think the men
and women who are out there doing their jobs now
at whether it's the state or local, county, state or
federal level, are are doing the job. I think we've
already got systems in place that that that account for
those examples you gave. You know, we've got fifty state
police or state troop organizations already out there. They're doing

(50:12):
a great job. You know, TSA has already overworked, understaffed.
In the airports, You've got some airports that are using
you know, they're not even using TSA, they're using private security.
We saw that the light with the with the latest
shut down. So yeah, my thoughts, my thoughts would be
just keep Let's just keep this thing where it's at.
I don't think we need to grow it any larger.

(50:32):
We've already got. We've already got uh a lot of
folks out there doing doing the work. Let's let's enforce
the laws that we have on the books now, and
perhaps we can see crime and other criminal elements start
to decrease. I think that's probably maybe another another conversation
needs to be had is that you know we don't

(50:53):
necessarily need more.

Speaker 2 (50:55):
We need to.

Speaker 5 (50:56):
We need to we need to uh discipline or hold
those that are doing it now accountable. You've got some
jurisdictions around this country where nobody's going to jail. If
they do go to jail, they're getting right out. They're
not holding folks. Nobody's going to prison. We're doing rehab
this and I and listen, I'm the first one to
say if they can be rehabed, that made better perfect.

(51:16):
But there's some people, quite honestly, that just need to
be locked up. They need to learn their lesson, and
if they're not learning their lesson, I think that becomes
maybe a bigger problem. So I think the laws are
on the books, the Constitution says what it says. Let's
get back to letting cops be cops, jails do what
jails and prisons are supposed to do, and maybe we
see some of this crime rate go down.

Speaker 4 (51:37):
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 5 (51:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (51:38):
Let me ask you a question about schools. For years,
law enforcement officers would exist in the school and be
there as now I but they were part of the
police department. I don't know about you, but I'm a
big believer in jurisdictional responsibility where if you have a
school and a jurisdiction of a city, I personally think

(52:00):
the city should play a role in that school. You know,
I'm having an independent police force within a school district.
I don't know. To me, you're you're not serving You're
serving a person as opposed to you know, the constitution.
And we've kind of allowed this to get out of hand.

(52:21):
I don't want to put you on the spot. But
at the same time, how do you feel about having
multiple jurisdictions that have local responsibility or a particular responsibility
in that jurisdiction that maybe just for a school or
something that's a niche thing and that doesn't really follow

(52:43):
what the police are trying to do or in some
ways works against them.

Speaker 5 (52:49):
Yeah, so that that concept's foreign to me here in Ohio.
I'm not person out aware of any independent school district
police departments. I knew they do exist. I've had some
in some courses. I was always very proud of our
s R program that we had in high jurisdiction.

Speaker 4 (53:07):
We we got political again, you know, get policing out
of schools.

Speaker 5 (53:11):
Yeah, we were lucky here. We were lucky that you know,
we we we had a great relationship. We kept we
uh we you know, like our school administrators. We had
a contract that said, look, this is what the cops
can do in the schools. This is what they can't
do in the schools. They're there to be police officers first,
help with the school stuff. Secondly, their number one proities
is the safety of those on the campus. And they're

(53:34):
going to be cops first. They're not school employees. Are
cops first. And they knew that and they understood it,
and we had a we had a great relationship with
our schools.

Speaker 4 (53:43):
Yeah, that would be my preference. I'll just kind of
leave it at that because I think that that works best.
What responsibilities do you believe in a company the authority
entrusted to American law enforcement going going forward? What what
if you wanted to give advice to a police officer.
What's some of the most important authorities that they have

(54:03):
that you want to make sure that they understand.

Speaker 5 (54:08):
I think this next generation will inherit the profession that
we leave behind, and I think it's important that to
go back to what I said before, I want a
lot of power with that badge. When you raise that
right hand and you took that oath. There's a lot
of power that comes with that. So you need to
keep up on your training, keep up on your mentorships,

(54:28):
don't be afraid to reach out and seek advice, and
just always go out there and be the best version
of yourself that you could possibly be.

Speaker 4 (54:36):
Amen. And the other thing I recommend is don't forget
your mind, spirit, and body. I think people may focus
on one or two, but they don't focus on all three.
Continue to improve your mind, not only academically, but make
sure that your mind is working okay and you don't
have any issues your body stay physically fit. This is

(54:56):
becoming more and more difficult in today's world where we
don't focus a lot of that and then have a
faith life, because if you don't do that, you're going
to forget who you're serving. Chief, thank you so much
for taking the time to be here today. I really
appreciate you, and God bless and thank you for your
great work. And you had a wonderful career and we
look forward to having you back on the show sometime.

Speaker 5 (55:18):
I appreciate it. Thank you very much, sir.

Speaker 4 (55:20):
Always a pleasure, my friends. I'm retired Sheriff Curry Myers,
and this has been America's criminologists. Stay safe, stay informed,
and remember to check out my work on substack at
doctor Curry Myers dot substack dot com. Stay safe and
Happy Birthday America.

Speaker 2 (55:36):
Love you, Shadow Susan Sails of the law.

Speaker 3 (56:03):
In the atmosphere, ankles are crowding and fringing the change