Update on my internship

[Mr_M_Kelly]

Hay gang, I had to start recording journals for my internship coordinator(for school) and status reports for the volunteer coordinator anyway so I decided to share it with you. This is not the same thing that I turn in to my internship coordinator. I write her journals in a marble copy book. The following is what I will turn into the volunteer coordinator


MAY STATUS REPORT


5/13/03-This was my first day onsite. I first received a tour of the facilities by Sgt. Keys. Nearly all day I worked on ISSR’s for accreditation (for CALEA). This was mandated by Sgt. Keys.

5/14/03-Again I worked on ISSR’s (accreditation for CALEA) for Sgt. Keys. I did this for half of the day. For the second half of the day, Lisa and I compiled books for a draft of the Emergency Management Plan. This is a book of what to do in case of earthquake, biological attack, terrorist act etc. To finish up the day, I updated all of our training records for officers. I went into the training database and added any recent training that officers had received.

5/16/03- I started off by finishing up entering any new training completed by officers. Next, I did more accreditation work for Sgt. Keys. I made sure all of our files for CALEA were in order. If anything was missing in our files, I would fill it with the necessary information. After lunch I started on making mailers for background and work history checks for 2 prospective HPD applicants. I sent out literally dozens of envelopes to the applicants references with a PHQ, to former employers for their information and to local police departments to ascertain whether or not any of the applicants have ever been arrested or in any kind of trouble with the law.

5/19/03- I updated files for accreditation for about 2 hours. After that I began work for Detective Coulter. I began work by reviewing property theft reports with evidence we collected from an alleged “chop shop” from that weekend. At about 2pm, I went to roll call to observe what that was all about. After rollcall, I went back to work for Det. Coulter. I was looking for patterns between previous MO’s (Modus Operandi) and evidence seized.

5/21/03 I came to work at 7:30am so that Lt. Anzengruber and I could go to Crystal City for a job fair for NCOA. I was at the fair from about 9am till about 2pm trying to recruit persons for employment with both the HPD and with the town of Herndon.

*side note(not inluded into the report I will turn in )* When I got into the squad car with the LT. that morning I said I know a good place for lunch about 2 blocks from the hotel. When he asked where, I said Crystal City Restraunt, a high class exotic dancer restraunt ( not exactly a strip club because the girls have to wear pasties and keep their bottoms on in Virginia). He called my boss, his Sgt. and everyone else he could saying " do you know where Red wants me to go for lunch" and said, "who hired this pervert anyway" etc. It was preety h-larious. Now all the road dogs (most of the department is fairly young) want me to critique all of the strip clubs in the area.

I collected about 10 applications for review and had interest for many more. I returned from the fair at about 2:45pm. At 3pm I went to a First Response and Active shooter training given by the Fairfax County Swat team. I learned of what officers should do if they are first to respond to a school shooting and both how to set up a perimeter and enter the building. The seminar has honestly been the highlight of my Internship thus far.

5/23/03- Today I was working for my boss, Officer Dex Morgan. He had me go through the evidence log for 2002 and 2003. I wrote memos for all officers or admin’s that had evidence stored in the evidence rooms. The memos were sent out to determine if the officers had any need for the evidence or if it could be destroyed or returned to it owner.

5/26/03- I started off the day by calling our equipment suppliers to round up prices for batons. I then finished the inventory and property log for 2002. This took the reamainder of the day.

As I was leaving the station for the day, I saw a few of the motorcycle cops set up running radar right across from the police station so I went out and hung out with them. The guys showed me how the radar gun works and even let me shoot a few cars. It is funny as ****e to see cars slam on their brakes after they see a cop standing in the roadway. This is the new highlight of the internship thus far.


Overall, I enjoy the internship very much. The whole department is very nice and appreciative of my work. I am definetly an asset to their organization because I definetly earn my keep every day.

Though I like the internship, I get discouraged by some of the dumb stuff I see our department doing. There is endless, unnecessasary paper work for EVERYTHING we do. For instance, instead of me having to write up like 1,000 memo's for all of the property from 2002, during roll call, the Sgt.'s should just say, go see Dex and Mike to free up some room in the property room.

Also, the IT guy for our department is a civilian. I think he is an idiot and does not know what he is doing. For instance, we have a program called PISTOL that has records for all of our property, all traffic and criminal cases, and can perform various other tasks. I needed permissions to do some work for Det. Coulter the other day and Tom, the IT guy was kind of giving me guff about why I needed access and called all of my bosses and even the Captain before he would give me permission. I think this was stupid. I am an employee for the police department. I am assigned work everyday and if they want me to complete it, that joker needs to give me resources.

Eventlually everything was squared away and I got access but Tom's attitude was frustrating.


regards,

Mike