It was different in the old days, a far less politically correct
era when the line between good guys and bad was much more clearly
defined.
It was different in the old days, a far less politically correct era when the line between good guys and bad was much more clearly defined.
The bad guys – the likes of Al Capone, John Dillinger and Bonnie and Clyde – were very bad indeed. The good guys were easy to spot: They all wore blue coats adorned with huge copper buttons (the source for the word “cop,” some say), put their fabled flat feet in spit-shined black Oxfords and twirled a billy club as if it were an airplane propeller.
Through the first half of the 1900s, legend has it, most cops were Irish and many criminals were Italian. As far as diversity goes, that was about it.
Times have changed.
As American demographics became more diverse, police forces followed suit, actively recruiting from different cultures to address the needs of the public they serve. At the same time, efforts went into better screening of recruits and better training of those accepted to the force – partly so an era marred by corruption in law enforcement would not be repeated.
“It seems pretty obvious, but some people tend to overlook the moral aspect of being a police officer,” Hollister Police Capt. Bob Brooks told the seventh class of the Hollister Citizens Police Academy at its second meeting Wednesday night.
“We want officers to be able to adhere to the moral standards society sets for itself,” Brooks added, speaking less of a group of devout officers than of a force which simply plays by the rules, in and out of uniform – and starting before they put on a badge.
For example, Brooks said, the HPD isn’t likely to hire someone with a Chapter 11 bankruptcy on their record. “The way we see it,” he said, “that person isn’t holding up their end of the deal.”
And if they don’t hold up their end away from the job, they might not do it while on the beat.
To be a police officer in Hollister – and in virtually all California cities – applicants must:
be 18 years old or over (Brooks said, though, that 18-year-olds are virtually never hired);
have a high school diploma or G.E.D.;
have no felony convictions (“Those are the people we’re supposed to put in jail,” Brooks said);
be in good physical condition;
be a U.S. citizen or be able to attain citizenship;
be of high moral character.
Even with the somewhat ambiguous “moral character” item, the list seems amazingly basic. But many applicants don’t even get past the application.
“If you can’t do this, you’re not going to be able to fill out the reams of paperwork that lie before you,” Brooks said. “You’d be surprised how many people drop out at this point.”
And it’s only the beginning of the process. If a would-be officer gets through the application, he or she goes through an initial screening by the city’s personnel department. Then there’s the biggest step – the oral board, an interview before a Hollister police officer, an officer from another department and a private citizen.
“This is where the evaluation process really starts to weed out,” Brooks said. “The oral board will wash some people out.”
The board asks specific, yes-no questions to test decision-making ability and situational opinion questions to test applicants’ rational process.
Applicants must also complete a Personal History Statement before the oral interview. Provided by P.O.S.T. – Police Officers Standards and Training – this is compared with the answers on their application.
Meanwhile, a private investigator researches an applicant’s background, talking with anyone he can find who knew the applicant – family, friends, acquaintances, friends of acquaintances – even teachers.
“This is where we find out how truthful a person is,” Brooks said. “You can lie on these things (applications and history statements), but we’ll find out.”
If an applicant gets this far, it still isn’t over. Conditional employment is offered and the applicant undergoes physical and psychological exams. No stone is left unturned.
“Patrol’s the backbone of any department,” Brooks said. “It’s vital that any police organization takes the time to do this.”
The idea behind diversity in hiring, Brooks said, is to maintain the force’s representation among the different segments of the community and to adapt to change.
“When society says ‘We want this done,’ we can generally find someone in the department who can work with those people because we have a diverse group of officers,” he said. “This isn’t necessarily a conscious thing; it’s an organization responding to the community’s needs.”
A mother hen’s attention to recruits
Hollister native Dan Winn began his law enforcement career in 1992 as a dog catcher. His station in life has since improved a bit.
“I really am an officer,” a casually dressed Winn told the class with a delivery not unlike that of comedian Drew Carey, whom he resembles – and he knows it.
A Field Training Officer with the HPD, Winn takes under his wing the recruits who survive the department’s grueling application process. It’s a double-dip job: In addition to his regular patrol, Winn, one of three FTOs assigned to each recruit for a period of at least 11 to 12 weeks, is the guy who helps them evolve from recruits into police officers.
“We’re a safety net and guide,” Winn said. “That’s the way I look at it.”
In addition to Winn giving a mother hen’s attention to his recruits, the job gives him more paperwork to do than the average cop – and the average cop is loaded with it.
Every day, an FTO fills out a Daily Observation Report on a recruit. One side of the form lists 31 categories, from “general appearance” to five different aspects of knowledge of police work to 20 under “performance” – in driving, writing reports, investigations, control of situations and even use of the police radio.
Daily, in each category, recruits are rated from 1 (not acceptable) to 7 (superior).
“Seven is next-to-god activity,” Winn said. “That’s almost impossible to get.”
There are also the dreaded “NRT” boxes, which recruits avoid at all costs. “NRT” is an acronym for “Not Responding to Training,” a virtual guarantee of a job – in another field.
FTOs want to avoid NRTs as well. “Our goal is not to fail anybody,” Winn said. “I’ve lost sleep trying to figure out how I can get a point across to a recruit.”
On the back of the Daily Observation Report are spaces for detailed evaluations. FTOs are asked to list the recruit’s most and least satisfactory areas of performance and to add comments. At the bottom of the form are the FTO’s guidelines. They include:
“Set the stage/scene”
“Critique performance/not the person”
“Report facts/avoid conclusions”
“Check spelling/grammar, etc.”
“Think remedial”
“Remember your audience”
“Don’t predict”
When it’s determined that a recruit is ready to fly solo, he or she is “shadowed” for a week by a plainclothes officer who observes and notes – and hopes.
Like the mother hen, an FTO is never quite ready to kick a recruit out of the nest.
“You hate to release any of them,” Winn said. “But you know it’s the best way for them to learn.”
75 sets of extra eyes and ears
Officer Paula Muro’s computer-generated video presentation on crime prevention was the victim of hardware failure. So the HPD’s Crime Prevention Officer – you may have seen her in a regulation patrol car, on a bicycle or in the HPD’s red Ford Mustang D.A.R.E. mobile – winged it.
A proponent of the Neighborhood Watch program, Muro encouraged citizens to notice things, as police do, that seem out of the ordinary.
“You see something and you say, ‘Was that a bad thing?'” she said. “If you ask yourself that, you need to call (the police).”
Muro takes sleuthing to new heights. She’s been known to get into baseball games with kids at Calaveras School and put on skates, helmet, knee and elbow pads and take a few turns – and a spill or two – in the skate bowl at Veterans Memorial Park. Such activities, she said, allow the public to see her as “a regular person” – one to whom they’re more apt to report things they’ve seen or heard that could turn out to be unlawful activities.
“You’re our extra eyes and ears,” said Muro, noting that 75 Hollister neighborhoods are involved in the Neighborhood Watch program. Its purpose is to teach citizens how to spot suspicious activity and what to do when they see it. It’s neighbors helping neighbors to make their community safer.
HPD’s Crime Prevention Unit also offers a business crime prevention program, school, child, senior citizen and personal safety seminars and National Night Out – “the big mama,” in Muro’s words, a crime prevention fair on the first Tuesday in August.
“We provide information for the public,” Muro said. “We’ll bring it to them.”
For information on Neighborhood Watch programs, call the Hollister Police Department at 636-4076.
