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Angola detective recounts 13-year police career, community outreach and teaching role
Summary
A detective with the Angola City Police Department told a local podcast about entering law enforcement at age 29, competing for a single hire from more than 100 applicants, serving 13 years with the department and teaching a criminal justice course for area high-school juniors and seniors.
A detective with the Angola City Police Department described his path into law enforcement, the challenges of frontline policing and his role in teaching local students during a podcast interview for Season 2, Episode 11 of "Success Stories in Steuben County."
The detective said he joined the department after working another career and serving as a volunteer reserve officer. "I have been there for 13 years now," he said, adding that he is in his fifth year as a detective. He said he began his department career as a patrol officer, "the ones you see in full uniform and out driving in cars, making traffic stops, and looking for the bad guys."
The interview offered recruits and residents a look at the practical obstacles the detective faced. He said the application he completed was highly competitive: "there was over a hundred applicants that applied for 1 spot, to become a police officer." He also described the emotional difficulty of policing: "you're constantly dealing with people at their worst... They're usually yelling at us, wanting to fight us."
On how he prepared for the job, the detective said he went to college intending to be a teacher at Western Michigan University, but later switched careers. He credited meeting local officers while working for Menards and then volunteering as a reserve officer for prompting his shift into policing. "I signed up to be a reserve police officer... it's a volunteer police spot," he said, describing that experience as a bridge to full-time hiring.
The detective also teaches a criminal justice course for juniors and seniors through the Impact Institute, which he described as combining his interest in education and law enforcement: "I teach a criminal justice course now. So I got to do the best of both worlds."
He outlined qualities he views as important for officers: responsibility, integrity and respect. "To be a police officer, you have to be responsible... You have to have very good integrity... and then having respect for everybody," he said. He emphasized treating people the way one would want to be treated, even when calls are tense.
The host closed the segment by thanking the detective for participating in the program. "Thank you guys for having me," the detective replied.
