By Tony Brockmeyer
At a special meeting of the St. Charles City Council Tuesday evening, City Administrator Allan Williams, brought forward St. Charles County Sheriff Tim Swope as his choice to be St. Charles Police Chief. The appointment was approved by the Mayor and the City Council and Swope will assume his new duties Monday morning.
St. Charles County voters decided they wanted a new leader in the Sheriff’s Office. In November of 2002 they elected Tim Swope to be that leader. Sheriff Swope took office in January of 2003.
Tim Swope has three children. Sheriff Swope is a 1984 graduate of St. Charles High School and attended college at Central Missouri State University – Warrensburg on a baseball scholarship. He played peewee football at J.F.L. and the Boy’s Club. In 1982-83 he was a member of the St. Charles High School Pirates who won the State Championship in football. He also played baseball and coached for American Legion Post 312 in St. Charles.
Sheriff Swope’s education includes thousands of hours of training with the U.S. Department of Justice, Drug Enforcement Administration; Cook County Sheriff’s Department; Chicago Police Department; Atlanta, Georgia Metro PD; Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department; Indianapolis PD; Arkansas State Police; Illinois State Police; Los Angeles PD and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. He also attended Lindenwood University.
Sheriff Swope has numerous commendations for exemplary performance in the line of duty, including the Sheriff’s “Award of Excellence”. The Sheriff promoted him in February 1997, to Sergeant over the highly successful Drug Unit, having served as an undercover investigator. He was appointed Team Leader for the St. Charles County SWAT Team and in August of 2000 was appointed acting Lieutenant within the patrol division. He was deputized by the U.S. Department of Treasury and served on a Federal Task Force, which investigated organized crime in the metropolitan area. Sheriff Swope received a meritorious service award for his work on the task force.
In the March 22, 2003 edition of the First Capitol News we published an interview with Sheriff Swope. We have excerpts from that interview that we feel are pertinent and present them here:
First Capitol News (FCN) How did you get involved in law enforcement?
Sheriff Swope (SS) Years ago when I was in college, I was playing baseball on a scholarship. As many young men do who played sports back then, I had delusions of grandeur about becoming a professional athlete. Then I realized that it probably was not going to happen, so I came home from college one summer and one of my friends, Ronnie Lloyd who was an officer at St. Charles City police department, asked me if I would like to ride with him. From the minute I got in that police car with him I was hooked. It was something that I knew I wanted to do. Soon after that, at 20 years old, I went into the academy. A month after my 21st birthday I was a policeman. That’s all I have been doing for the last 16 years.
FCN Have you been with the sheriff’s office the whole 16 years?
SS For about 10 months I was a police officer with the Warrenton Police Department. I learned some aspects of law enforcement that you don’t get in a big department. At a small department you have to kind of do it all. It also gave me a sense of community. I was from St. Charles and St. Charles was not a metropolis by any means, but I had never been in a small town like that and it really gave me a sense of community. I learned that there is a lot more to police work than just writing tickets and arresting people. It is also developing relationships with people that you work with and around. I had a dream of working for the Sheriff’s Department. A very good friend of mine, Tony Bishop, who still works here with me, his father, Pete Bishop, was a deputy with the Sheriff’s Department for years. He worked undercover, worked throughout the department. I knew that as a long-term goal I wanted to be with the Sheriff’s Department. At the time the Sheriff’s Department was mostly hiring people to go to work straight into the jail as opposed to going on the street. I was just lucky enough that at the time I applied they were short some deputies on the street. I didn’t have to go to work in the jail but went straight to the street and have been here ever since.
FCN Throughout your career with the St. Charles County Sheriff’s Office what different assignments or responsibilities have you had?
SS I was a patrolman; I got involved with the SWAT Team after a couple of years. That was something I really enjoyed. Honing my skills tactically. Being part of a unit I took a lot of pride in. After being on the SWAT Team for a couple of years I had to make a big decision. I had an opportunity of going into the drug unit working undercover but I would have to give up the SWAT Team to do that. I did, it was a difficult decision. One I have looked back on and thanked God it worked out for me. The majority of my career has been spent in drug enforcement. Either on the local task force or assigned to a Department of Treasury Task Force in St. Louis where we investigated organized crime and large-scale drug operations. I was also involved in the intelligence division in the Sheriff’s Department and was the Commander of the Sheriff’s Department Drug Unit. Then I came back to patrol and worked as a shift commander and as a team leader on the SWAT Team again. As I found going in and out of the drug unit and back to patrol, it is a good job being a patrolmen in uniform. It is structured but there is a lot of diversity. As in any job there are days when it is slow or fast, but as a policeman, if you are not handling a lot of radio calls you get out there and work hard and catch criminals. That’s what I enjoy.
FCN You have only been the Sheriff for a short time. Have you had any surprises or things that you didn’t expect?
SS My biggest surprise was the amount of administrative work. I knew coming in it was going to be tough. There is a tremendous amount of paper work that I am not efficient at yet but I know in six months I will be able to whip through these things without giving them much thought. But right now I have to read through everything, sometimes two or three times, just to know what I am signing. Soon I will be more efficient, but right now it kind of bogs me down. Because of that I am working 12 – 13 hour days but I enjoy it. I have had a couple of occasions of going to DARE Graduations and that was a part of this department that I had not seen before. I was really taken aback on how fulfilling it was to watch the kids go through the program. I had no idea of what kind of event a DARE graduation was. I though it was just going and handing out a certificate and the kids going home. It’s not! It’s really an event and we are very proud to be a part of that type of program and other ones that I had no idea of.
FCN Besides patrol duties and drug enforcement what other areas is the Sheriff’s Office responsible for?
SS We have a little over 200 employees, approximately 150 sworn deputies. Obviously patrol is one of our functions. Patrol and investigations. We are also involved in court services, court security, civil process, the community education program, and communications, which has 22 employees. We run the county range and the training center. There is forensics and identification, crime scene investigation, records management and personnel. There are many, many different divisions within the Sheriff’s Department. That is a good thing for the people who work here because they have a lot more avenues to pursue for their career. In many departments you don’t have that flexibility. You work the street and that’s all you do. In here our personnel has the opportunity to move around quite a bit more. That’s a good thing for all of us.
FCN You ran against, and won the election over, an opponent who was evidently entrenched with the political system that is in power here in the County. It appears a number of County politicians who have nothing to do with the Sheriff’s Office now think they should be the ones running it. Has that caused you any problems?
SS Change is difficult sometimes. I will give you an example. Changing our cellular phone system from one service to another was more difficult than I would have ever imagined. It’s just a phone but the bottom line is that it is change. Sometime it is hard to see past that. All of that is behind us. We are all on the same page. We are all pushing towards the same goals. Getting more officers on the street. Having a better department. Providing better service to the residents of the County. I know we will all come together and try to meet all the goals we have set. I would also say the charter spells out that the Sheriff is the lead law enforcement officer in the County which is a great responsibility. One I know is on my shoulders now. But one I knew going into this I would have to undertake and I am willing to do that. I am a young guy. I am only 37 years old now but I do have vast experience in law enforcement, specifically this department. I am going to bring some new ideas here and hope ultimately the people will accept those ideas and know in the end they were best for the department and the community.
FCN If the County Council said, “Sheriff, money is no object.” Is there any type of equipment or personnel you would like to have?
SS If money was no object, and I know it always is, I think we could double the amount of officers we have on the street and still find room for more. That is what every department in the country is struggling for and will always struggle for. There is so much more that we can do proactively as opposed to reactively. Proactive law enforcement is now. It’s the future. Getting out and stopping crimes from being committed before they happen. Catching them in the act of committing crimes. That’s proactive law enforcement. I am going to strive to get the whole department involved in a much higher level of proactive policing.
FCN How much of a coverage area are you responsible for?
SS Almost 600 square miles. There are over 300,000 people in this County. That is not only the unincorporated areas. We provide services to the entire County. Services that we are obligated to provide. If a municipality calls us for traffic enforcement or to provide forensic or ID for a homicide. To provide a fugitive unit to go out and arrest some bad guys or to provide a SWAT Team to serve a high-risk search warrant, that’s the obligation of the Sheriff’s Department. It is something that we take great pride in.
FCN What would you say to any young man or woman reading this article that is thinking about a law enforcement career?
SS Understand it is not what you watch on TV. It is really a lot more community oriented. Not just in this community but all over the country we need to make an investment as law enforcement within the community. There is nothing truer than we are public servants. If we drive down the road and see somebody broken down on the side of the highway, it’s our job to help the people out. That’s a basic part of our job that may have been forgotten over the past few years, but one that is very necessary for us to provide for everyone. For a young man or woman coming into this field it is exciting. It is an exhilaration to find a criminal and chase them down. To arrest somebody. It is also self-fulfilling just helping people out. If someone has a question or if they need some help with some family problems we help them. It takes younger officers a little bit of time to learn that, but once they do, I think the job is great. Ninety nine percent of the people we deal with are good people. That one percent is usually bad people and they go to jail. As a police officer you have to realize that most of the contacts you have are with good people and if you are in the mood of constantly thinking that everyone is on the other side, you are not going to last long in this job. Most of the community is behind us. That is not to say that they are in every part of this country but in our area we are lucky enough to have their support. In a metropolitan area if we are lucky enough to have a community that supports us then we are grateful for that and we want to continue that sense of working with the people to make this a better community.
FCN Is there anything you would like to say to our readers I haven’t thought to ask you about?
SS We are committed as a department as we move into the future, to not become stagnant. We have a lot of good men and women here that work their tails off. They should be recognized for the good job they do. We will continue to provide excellent law enforcement services to our residents.
