(As originally published on Sept. 4, 2018)
Moments after Jerrod King was named chief of the Alexandria Police Department, he said change would be coming.
Now, three months after taking office, some of those changes have been made. More are on the horizon. And King is looking to the future.
Law enforcement has changed dramatically within the past five years, he said during an Aug. 9 interview.
“I have to be looking a year ahead to stay modern," he said. "That’s a challenge for every executive for police departments.”
'Not lip service'
King sits in the chief's office that he's made his own by now. Framed Notre Dame photos are on the walls, along with a U.S. flag replica given to him as a congratulatory gift by his a group of his close friends.
He jokes that he's an LSU fan when he has to be because his 20-year-old daughter, Alexis, goes to school there, but his heart is with Notre Dame. He mentions more than once that he's a "high-energy person" who is eager to be involved with citizens and within the community.
On his desk sits a die-cast model of the patrol car he drove on the streets, also given to him by friends. Those friends, who aren't in law enforcement, keep him grounded, he said.
Just before the interview started, he'd been writing commendation letters for officers, he said. He's told his officers he wants them to solve problems, not merely write reports.
King explains what he means by retelling the story of a recent "shots fired" call. Officers arrived to find no one at the scene. So, instead of just writing a report and leaving, officers began knocking on residents' doors.
Based on what people told them, officers were able to identify a suspect who had been shooting the weapon in his front yard. King said the officers spoke to the suspect, developed enough probable cause to arrest him and recovered a AR-15 that had been reported stolen in California.
It's that approach he wants to see from all his officers.
“And they bought into it,” said King.
He wants them to adopt a new way of policing, a “true community-involved department.
“Not lip service. Not saying we do it, but really engaging with the community.”
He also wants his officers to always remember that they are public servants, guardians to protect the community against what he calls the 2 percent of true violent criminals.
To explain that, he uses an acronym — HELP, or Honor, Empathy, Loyalty and Professionalism.
You honor those who came before you and the core values of this country, he said. You show empathy to those you deal with, even if you have to arrest them.
“Even though we’re arresting somebody, that’s still a human," said King. "That’s still somebody’s brother, mother, father, son, daughter. They still have families.”
You show loyalty to citizens who “bestowed a tremendous amount of trust in law enforcement to do the right thing, so we have to be loyal to the citizens and loyal to the trust that they’ve given us. We can’t violate that.”
And professionalism is how you talk to and treat people, he said. Without that, all your arrests don't count for much.
“We get one chance to be professionals, and when we quit being a professional … that degrades the trust that the community has placed in us.”
What's new at APD
The department already has started using a power -shift concept, putting more manpower on the streets at peak times. It's also implemented an automatic telephone system that frees desk sergeants to better monitor activity in the city instead of transferring calls, he said.
And the department is moving toward a priority-based dispatching system, one in which calls for a crime in progress or life-threatening situations will get help from the closest available unit.
Non-emergency calls, like complaints about barking dogs, will be dealt with when an officer is free. King said he doesn't want to send an officer across town on such a call, forcing that officer to leave an assigned neighborhood.
“We have to deploy our resources for what protects citizens the most,” he said.
It's a process that takes a lot of review, and it's not yet set in stone.
Challenges for the department
When King took office, he began working toward a goal that will become reality next week.
An Alexandria officer will be based full-time with a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives task force, something that King believes will make a big difference with violent gun crimes in Alexandria.
With that, expect to see more federal prosecution for those accused in violent gun crimes that happen within the city, he said.
"The good thing is a lot of the cost is funded by the ATF," said King. "We pay the salary, but ATF pays for equipment, training, overtime for this officer. We’re gonna get some of these violent offenders, these gun crime offenders. And we’re gonna get them off the streets, and we’re gonna get them federally prosecuted because that it another problem for us.”
King called it a game changer for the department. Alexandria officers already serve on task forces with the U.S. Marshals and FBI. He said his next goal is to get an officer onto a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration task force.
Adding an officer to the ATF task force will give the department instant access to the National Ballistics Information Network System, too. The database can help to test shell casings and guns recovered at crime scenes.
King said it could tie a gun recovered during a traffic stop to an unsolved homicide in another part of town.
“That gives us another tool to find these offenders and prosecute them.”
Another challenge that King has talked about publicly is the opioid epidemic that has hit locally and nationally.
Alexandria has recorded 14 opioid-related deaths through the end of July. Since he's been chief, there have been 60 recorded overdoses, he said.
King says the opioid problem is different than past drug epidemics because so many people who now are hooked started off with prescriptions for legitimate medical reasons.
They became addicted to the powerful painkillers, but their prescriptions ended. So they've turned to things like heroin and fentanyl to fill the void.
On a recent call about a fatal overdose, King went to the scene to meet with the family.
“How do you comfort somebody like that?" he asks. "It hurts me, and it hurts me deeply to have to be there and see that because, regardless of whatever problems they have, that’s still their family member and now some drug has killed them.
"And these drug dealers don’t care. They’re here to make money. They don’t care who it destroys. They’re a scourge on our society.”
It cuts across all lines, he said. He's seen police officers become addicted who have lost everything, he told a gathering last week.
Because opioids are so powerful, Alexandria officers and K-9s are equipped with Narcan kits. The drugs can be absorbed through the skin, possibly triggering an overdose.
The department, under King, is continuing to charge dealers with second-degree murder in fatal overdose cases. He acknowledges that these aren't easy cases to prove in court, but he credits his narcotic officers with doing their jobs well.
Another such arrest might be coming, he said.
The last challenge facing the department isn't a new one. Recruiting has been tough for years, but King said he will not lower standards just to fill positions.
He said it's a "very tough profession.
"Nobody calls the police when they’re having a great day. … They call us when their life is upset.”
Police officers are humans who suffer the same problems as everyone else, said King. But they've accepted the responsibility to help others with problems.
“That says so much about the type of person who is a law enforcement officer today. Sometimes we get overly criticized for things we do. Sometimes we make mistakes," said King. "We screw up. And when we do, I promise … we promise, as a department, we will address that. We will handle that in the appropriate manner.
"I will not allow an officer to tarnish the good work, the excellent work, that the vast majority of officers do. I will not allow an officer to tarnish the reputation of officers who have given their lives in the line of duty. But thankfully I don’t have to do that a bunch because we have really good men and women who are dedicated and come here everyday and try to do their best for the city.”
King said he has no doubt that Alexandria can be the best police department in the state. He said they're good, but they always can be better.
“We are hiring qualified people, but we could use more," he said. "We struggle with that. If I had my full complement, I could do more things. But I don’t.”
Getting here
When King was named chief, he wasn't alone. He took with him the memory of a good friend who died before he got to fulfill his own dream of becoming chief.
King was with Officer David Ezernack on Feb. 20, 2003, as the Special Response Team they both were members of tried to serve search warrants after another officer had been ambushed.
Both Ezernack and Officer Jay Carruth were fatally wounded that day. And King has thought about what Ezernack, whose father once was police chief in Alexandria, told him: that one day he would follow in his father's footsteps.
“That was very humbling to me because I felt like he couldn’t get it, but I did," said King. "I get choked up now thinking about it.”
King also spoke about the other candidates he found himself competing with for the chief's spot.
“To be selected above them, and to be selected to lead a police department that I love, that I’ve dedicated the greater portion of my life to, to serve this city, it was very humbling. It was very emotional for me. … Those were real tears.”
Jerrod King was named chief of the Alexandria Police Department on Wednesday (May 30, 2018).Wochit
Not a bad accomplishment for a Detroit native who knew he wasn't mature enough for college after graduating high school in Arizona. King's path took him to the U.S. Army and a stint as a military police officer and investigator in Germany, Central America, Virginia and Fort Polk.
When he got to Vernon Parish, he began exploring the area and Alexandria. As he did, he met his future wife, Connie.
Soon, he left the Army with an honorable discharge and joined the Alexandria department where he'd serve in a variety of positions over 22 years — patrol, community policing, street crimes, as a founding member of the department's SWAT, commander of the Honor Guard, a founding operational commander of the mobile field force unit and at department's Training Academy.
He got the chief's job on his second attempt. He first applied in 2011 and, while he didn't get the job then, King did get valuable feedback from the selection committee. He had performed well, but was lacking a college education.
He immediately enrolled, eventually earning his bachelor's and master's degrees in criminal justice.
“So I knew what I wanted to do. Eight years ago, that set me on this path,” he said.
But King became interested in law enforcement at age 16. He was involved in a fatal crash caused by a drunk driver while he was back visiting Michigan that summer. Stunned, an officer stayed with him at the scene and police headquarters until his parents arrived.
“I remember very clearly, standing in the middle of a busy highway … and I remember just being in shock. And this policeman came up and sat me down, and he stayed with me the entire time," he said.
“That made an impact on me. That’s what I want to do.”
'A calling'
The incident stayed with him after he got his badge, too. King was honored two years in a row by the Louisiana Highway Safety Commission as the state's top cop in DWI enforcement.
“I took that job very seriously," he said. "I did it with professionalism, zealous to do a good job with it because of my personal experience of being affected and seeing the tragedy that drinking and driving causes.”
He views his job as a calling, he says, describing himself as a "high-energy person" who promises to be involved in the community while chief.
He echoed Roy's comments during the selection process about how there's no greater decision to be made in a city than the choice of police chief. He called it a tremendous honor.
"This position will humble you very quickly, and you feel very responsible for what happens in this city and this region," he said.
“I feel that responsibility. Everything that happens in this city, happens in this region, happens with these police officers, I feel responsible for. And I am. I am responsible for it.”
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