Email
Print
Expanded jurisdiction makes city, county safer
ADVERTISEMENT
Published: March 23, 2009
I would like to express my opinion about the recent article in the R&L concerning a legislative proposal to revoke countywide jurisdiction of Statesville and Mooresville police officers. This power was given to both agencies in 1971 to help with investigations of crimes that occurred in the city limits of each city. Each one of us knows that crimes committed within the city are not always committed by a city resident; sometimes, believe it or not, that person may actually reside in the county. Officers have been able to go into the county to locate, interview and arrest the person for his criminal activity that occurred in the city.
This power has never been abused by officers and it is still a valuable tool that is still needed more than ever. The Statesville Police Department has always been a leading agency in the State of North Carolina. Often times we have trained our officers so well that they have moved on to bigger agencies or taken leadership positions with other agencies just because of the training they have received with our department. The citizens of Statesville and Iredell County should be proud of our department and the high standards that we always try to meet.
Why, after all of these years, is it now such a safety concern with Sheriff Phil Redmond that we stop having this power? I have known Sheriff Redmond for many years, I respect him as a leader of his department, and he has brought a sense of professionalism to his department that had not been there before. His deputies and personnel are some of the finest officers in this state. And for the most part we have had a good working relationship with his deputies that I hope only improves with time. Why does this seem to be an issue after 38 years of a successful partnership? There has not been one incident that we have had involving an officer safety issue between our officers or sheriff's deputies.
Yet under the leadership of Chief Tom Anderson, we now seem to be under attack from Sheriff Redmond. Could this be a result of the drug interdiction program that Chief Anderson started?
This reminds me of the child who has a toy in his possession and is unwilling to share with anyone else. Is the sheriff afraid that the Statesville Police Department may get a larger bust than his deputies? I believe that the end result should be the most important issue to consider — that we are getting drug traffickers off the interstates. We are supposed to work together and I believe our officers are communicating with the deputies on a regular basis about any activities we are involved in.
Citizens of Statesville and Iredell County should be happy that both agencies are working together to catch the people who are transporting drugs through our city by way of interstates 77 and 40. The last time I checked, both of these came right through the city limits. Granted there are times that officers must follow vehicles for a certain amount of distance to observe the actions of the driver and look for any violations before he can stop that driver. Additionally, our officers have elected to sit at other locations in order to apprehend violators of our drug laws and motor vehicle laws. Does the sheriff have exclusive rights to interstate traffic or should just the highway patrol have that right? I say no. I would not expect the sheriff and his deputies to stay off the interstate and only hand calls in the county.
Maybe we need to go to a county police department and let the sheriff just run the jail, court system and serve civil papers as stated in the North Carolina Constitution. Then all of the deputies and police officers could work together as we should and have done for so many years. I hope that the citizens of Statesville and Iredell County contact their representatives in Raleigh and oppose this proposal.
Please let the officers continue to work together as we have done for so many years.
Email
Print
ADVERTISEMENT
Advertisement
