In 2005 Game Commission WCOS and Deputies prosecuted 8,225 charges and issued 9,433 warnings. We were successful with the prosecution on 7902 of those charges for a 96.1% conviction rate with $1,362,555.25 in fines being imposed.
I also have the number of citizen complaints that were filed against Game Commission Officers during 2005. During that time there were a total of nine complaints submitted. Three were still under investigation with no conclusion at the time the information was released. Of the six remaining, only one was sustained with the Officer having acted in appropriately. One didn’t have enough facts to establish one way or the other and in the remaining four it was found that the Officer had been exonerated of any wrong doing.
Now I throw out a challenge to all of you. Find one other law enforcement agency in this state, or for that matter any other state, with as good of record per law enforcement contact where people are actually getting investigated and charged with a crime.
If you can find one be sure to come here and tell us all about it, but I don’t think you will find any with as good a record.
That works out to an average fine collected of about $172. Maybe the reason that there arent more complaints is that most simply pay their fine because its not worth their time to fight "city hall".I cant think of too many who wouldnt lose more than $172 if they took off work to travel many miles in some cases, to even bother with a hearing.Even amerelyaverageattorney costs more than $172 per hour
In my 49 years on this earth, my personal experiences with any law enforcement officers at all has been either traffic stops or being checked by a WCO or PFCB deputy or their deputies while hunting. boating or fishing.
In the case of traffic stops, some of which I was guilty ofand I got a ticket for, the officer was courteous and professional every time except once.
In the case of fishing and hunting stops,however, theVAST majority of stops haveresulted in my walkingaway talking to myself because of the accusing "Barney Fife" type of attitude from the officers involved
I find it peculiar that while I've never been charged with any game law violation of any kind, I've come away from virtually every encounter with the PGC or PFBC completely exasperated by the unprofessional behavior or the "guilty till proven innocent" attitude. I will say that all of the jerks have been deputies and not "regulars" The attitude of the paid officers of either was several notches above their deputies but not anywhere near as professional as the average traffic cop.
The reason we have so few complaints is because we have a longer and more intense training period then any other law enforcement agency in the state. We have updated legal training, for both WCOs and Deputies every year, which covers changes in legal methods and the most recent court opinions dealing with legal procedures. We have regular and highly structured training for all of our officers, including the deputies and that even includes mandatory verbal communications training.
I'm sorry but from what I've seen, the PGC's deputy force is ill trained, unprofessional, and generally full of negative attitude from the getgo.
My impression ofPGC deputies more than once has been that this guy must've been bullied as a kid and now he's got a badge and by damn he's gonna get even with the rest of the world.