ALC-Game & Fish/State Police
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Committee members go ahead and have your seat the chair Caesarorum this meeting is called to order First up on the item of on the agenda today is Arkansas Statelice if you would coloonel if y'all go ahead and make your way to the table
and while they're making their way to the table let me turn to my co chair senator you have any opening comments she's good OKok ar el appreciate appreciate y'all being here today thank you for like I said I know it's late in the afternoon I appreciate you taking time to appear before this committee before before
we get started let me let me just try to set the stage for what we're you know that to put the discussion will be today you know back in at the beginning of the session in 2023 you and I we had a discussion about the uptake in the number of people that were fleeing from law enforcement here in the state of Arkansas how those numbers were going up and I remember one of the concerns was is that you know with this increase and the it seemed
like how many people now when they the blue lights come on behind them they took off and they flee from the officer and I remember in that discussion we talked about how if someone was standing on a Walmart parking lot with an AR-15 and they were spraying bullets everywhere that that individual would be charged with a felony. However, in comparison, if someone takes a 5 or6 1000 pound of steel rubbering glass and they turn it into a deadly missile and they
jeopardized so many lives by busting through intersection passing on curves or on heels or double yellow lines those individuals were being charged with misdemeanors from fleeing from a law enforcement officer and I remember a statement that you made it was that a lot of these individuals once the law enforcement t took them into custody their biggest concern was not the penalty that they were facing but it was more how much damage had occurred
to their vehicle and you know at that time fleeing from a law enforcement officer as you and I discussed and when in the comparison I just made it was a misdemeanor and as serious as that fence is so we with your help we sponsored legislation and we were able to make fleeing from a law enforcement officer alas D felony so with that backdrop and I might go ahead and also add that I know in this past session 2025 we also had an issue with the
fact that individuals fleeing from law enforcement officers realizing I guess the penalty now that they would face and that being a felony they they werexxing and some of them were xxing the vehicle while that vehicle was still moving and obviously for those who may not understand why they were doing that that was so that they could put more distance because that trooper he's gonna have to stay with that bee here because now you've got an unoccupied uncontrolled vehicle that has to be secured and so the troopers's got to stay with that and the
individual that ros out of that vehicle the old tuck and rolls we used to call it and hits the ground that just puts more distance between him and the troopers so to try to combat that we with your help we sponsored a bill and was able to get it passed you know with the help of my colleagues to make enhance the penalty if you exit the beck while it's still moving so the reason that we're here today is I know that's been a couple of I felt like a couple of key pieces of
legislation to try to do something to combat the number of people that were fleeing from our officers in this state and so what I'm looking for today and I I hope you you've got these numbers or you know that's gonna be positive is that did those type of leg is l ations have a positive impact on the number of people that are fleeing and I I know you had a program and public service announcement I really was impressed with that where you work with the
prosecutors and I believe I remember hearing your statement I may not say it exactly the way you did that'd probably be impossible to say things exactly as articulate as you do but still I remember the comment was that if you flee from one of our troopers with the prosecutor standing behind you you said we're gonna put you in the ditch and they're gonna put you in jail I thought that was pretty effective and so with that backdrop that's why you're here today to give us some numbers to kind of help enlighten this committee if
that legislation was useful that working together on legislation if if it's had a positive impact so with that if you could share some of that with us the number of people now that are fleeing from troopers as compared to before that legislation and if those numbers are up or down so if you would just identify yourselves and to the committee and then your recognized to start your discussion or answer those questions thank you colonel. thank you Mr Chairman my name's Mike Hager I'm the director of
Mike Hager
Unverified
8:04
Arkansas State Police and secretary of Department ofublic Safety. jason Aaron lieutenant colonel over
Speaker 21
8:11
field operations Philippodron umm a major of the highway
Speaker 23
8:16
patrol division Mr Chairman if you'd allow just to kind of start
Mike Hager
Unverified
8:21
the conversation have an opening statement that I'll read and it touches on some of the things that you brought up thank you for the opportunity to be here today and talk about a topic we care a lot about I know
the general public in this body also care about the subjects of pursuits and TVs specifically Chairman Tos and Senator Wallace sponsored Act7342023 inc 82022 of last year which enhanced the punishment for fleeing in a vehicle Unfortunately pursuit videos from Arkansas Statelice are wildly popular and keep YouTuber Youubers's channels active. though most people who watch our pursuit videos focus only on the trooper and the suspect they lose sight of all the innocent civilians whose lives are or
whose lives are at risk because suspects flee from law enforcement those innocent civilians are our priority we have their safety in mind when we instructed our troopers on day one to end pursuits as soon as possible we had their safety in mind when we came to you the legislature and asked for laws that would make fleeing from law enforcement a felony We had innocent motorists in mind when we worked with our prosecutors to make sure that fleeing suspects were held accountable but as a result of our work with you and the prosecutors and after a robust campaign using social media and public service
announcements we have seen the number of pursuits decline 29% from 2023 through 2025. we had 180 fewer pursuits last year than we did in 2023. that means 180 fewer opportunities for innocent civilians law enforcement officers or suspects to be injured or killed because of a suspect's selfish choice that you or to flee from troopers during that same time we've increased the number of troopers by 120. I'd like to take every
opportunity to thank this legislature for their support we could not have added those troopers without your commitment to public safety putting more troopers on the highway has resulted in a de decrease in crashes and also in crashes with fatalities it's also resulted in an increase in hazardous and criminal arrest drug seizures and DWI arrest you might expect that increasing the number of troopers proactively enforcing the law would also mean more pursuits but that has not been the case due to large part to what you
just summed up perfectly. again we welcome this opportunity to talk about our pursuits and TVBs we believe our approach to this problem is effective and that those
Chair
Unverified
10:47
numbers bear that out and with that I'd be glad to answer any questions that you guys
have. any question from committee members Senator Flowers would just hit your button please
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
11:13
you recognize him thank you thank you colonel for the report. What's
Mike Hager
Unverified
11:21
a TBI? ' m sorry that's a tactical vehicle intervention.t yes as in victor yes ma'am thank you yes ma'am it used to
Speaker 12
11:32
be called pitt pit maneuvered it's still hard for
me to get used to saying TBI I'm sure there was some reason to change the name of it but I still refer to them as pitt and
you know I can I can tell you colonel is sure every legislator in here can that as we travel outside the state to different conferences conferences that once people find out that we're from you know the legislature here in Arkansas you know the conversation before long turns to the fact that they watched the state Arkansas state police on the videos and I'm sure y'all hear that a lot and they're impressed. I mean you know the comments I hear just y'all just don't play in Arkansas and you know it's serious business and
and we don't and I appreciate your statements a while ago and let's see if we've got any any other
committee members have a question saying none senator hold
Chair
Unverified
12:35
up. you're recognized you're recognized thank you thank you I'll ask
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
12:40
curious do you have a idea or indication
of where more of these TVs
Mike Hager
Unverified
12:53
are happening in the state would say overwhelmingly in our population hubs I think Troope in the that covers the LittleRock area roopd that covers East Arkansas and roopl which covers northwest Arkansas I believe are our top three troops that we're seeing the pursuit numbers in and in terms of prosecutions has
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
13:19
that been more prevalent since we've passed this legislation that you speak of ma'am
Speaker 47
13:24
and that's a continuing process that with us working with our prosecutors but if you
Mike Hager
Unverified
13:29
remember in March of last year all of our elected prosecutors stood with us at our driving track in North LittleRock and they made the commitment that not only would we pursue these charges but they would prosecute these charges to the fullest extent and we believe that that message has
resonated we've had several occasions over the last year where prosecutors have reached out to us and we're proud of the fact that they had received significant prison sentences based on pursuits that we had made arrest on so we think that message is getting out there unfortunately it's a common tactic within law enforcement and prosecution for a lot of reasons where cases are sometimes f played down some charges are no pros and there was an unintended consequence that the message had been
received by the criminal element that I may as well run even if I get caught I'm still gonna catch whatever felony charge that literally 90+% of the time is the case the reason people are fleeing they knew they were going to catch that charge anyway but in addition to that they they need to know there's a consequence for fleeing and what was happening was that through deals that were being made by the prosecutors with the
agreement of law enforcement and a lot of those charges were being p played down to misdemeanors or being norossed altogether is a matter of just kind of wrapping that case up and unfortunately that was an unintended consequence and and unintended message that went out to the criminal element that I may as well run. there's there's really no reason not to. I'm gonna face my charges anyway if I get away I get away. If I don't get away they're gonna do away with this charge anyway so that was a problem that we had to overcome and we met with our prosecutors and they stood with
us they assured us that they were going to pursue these charges aggressively and we trust
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
15:31
that they have well was just thinking when you said that about
pleading it down just likedWI cases some of that the the penalty is mandatory you you don't get to beat it down and I'm wondering what your opinion is on a possibility of that
being placed in law in terms of TVs ironically, that's
Mike Hager
Unverified
16:00
kind of what started the the conversation with the prosecutors is in the 2025 session, we met with the prosecutors association and we made our intentions known that we were going to seek language that mirrored DWI statute to where if you were arrested for felony fleeing that you had to be adjudicated for felony fling and that it cannot
be pled down and it cannot be gnawrossed for a variety of reasons prosecutors are very concerned about their discretion and I completely understand that it can't be a tactic that's used in in some cases so there was concern on their part about us running that legislation so as a result don't don't want to say there was a compromise but we agreed that if they would stand with us and they would ensure the public that they would pursue these charges to
try to get this problem under control that we would not pursue that legislation so at some point we're going to go back we'll tally the numbers and we'll look to make sure that there's been an increase and make sure that those numbers bear out that commitment and before we go into the 202 7 session that conversation will be had about whether or not to pursue that legislation and the
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
17:20
last thing Mr Chair I would think Colonel that a lot of the persons arrested
and are fleeing also have other charges that are being filed against them so it's like give and take but I'd like to know if they're ending up pleading to the crime that's has a stricter and tougher penalty than theI I don't know what the is that a classd
Mike Hager
Unverified
17:58
felony or it begins at a class d felony depending on the pursuit and the outcome of the pursuit those charges are enhanced if there are for instance people that are injured it to reference Mr chairman's bill that they sponsored last year someone vacates a moving vehicle that also upgrades to the felony charge by one class so there are a variety of things that could change that from alas D to make that a
higher class felony so it just depends but you know and to your point that's if someone is facing a firstgre murder charge and they flee and they're willing to you know plead guilty on firstdegre murder if we remove a fleeing charge I mean that obviously that's a concession that we'd be willing to make. but if someone is facing a narcotics charge a weapons charge they have felony
warrants which is a lot of what we see and the reason they're fleeing those are the top charges that we do not want to encourage people to take the chance and run because that's that's where we ran into that problem we have to let them know that there's going to be a consequence for fleeing from law enforcement because the stakes are are just simply too high. thank you chair thank you colonel thank you ma'am
Speaker 53
19:24
Senator Hill, if you're recognized for a question
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
19:33
thank you Mrir over here colonel if you would would you please shed a little light on the pit maneuver that was done on the wrong car for us. how how's that family doing now been to I don't know for a fact that it was a mother or young child and a and a husband that we're all in the car and were any of them seriously hurt and I know the altar that was in in pursuit has been terminated but I'm looking farther now to the citizens that were were involved in that what's what's
the status of that and what
Chair
Unverified
20:07
all can you tell us? So I can tell you that we've made contact
Mike Hager
Unverified
20:12
with that family immediately after this incident came to light and there were no injuries in the vehicle the family is maintained that they want to stay out of the public light they've asked for us to to help them with that as much as possible and we've honored that as much as we possibly can as far as the action itself it's
unexplainable if you've seen the video I wouldn't even offer and an excuse for a reason I have no idea all I can tell you is that that was the last enforcement action that that trooper ever took. so that's it's such an outlier it literally is less than I believe it's0.01% that that's ever even happened. I can
only recall one other instance in my career that that's happened totally different set of circumstances there's more chaotic situation but unfortunately it did happen it is absolutely inexcusable. you know and we've said a lot of times that as long as human beings are doing this job, the humans gonna show themselves eventually and it happened that day and we've made a mistake that we can't excuse but
Chair
Unverified
21:29
all we can do is respond to it after the fact thank you thank you sir
en ator Johnson you're recognized for
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
21:56
a question otherther one the other white thank you Mr Chairman I appreciate being able to ask questions though I'm not a member of the committee colonel last session I sponsored legislation to put some clarity and some emphasis in the driver training manual about the the dangers to construction workers on our highways did that at the request of of both
the highway police and and the people in the construction business including one big one you know in in our hometown I I didn't realize how much problem it had been but we did get that bill passed and we put it in the manual so these young people are are emphasized to them that not only they but but these workers are in danger when they're speeding in in the construction zones and all that should we look at some kind of
additional language in our training manual and our courses to emphasize to these young people you know please don't try to flee a police officer because you will become a felon is should we look at some additional way to to to emphasize that and as we say teach them the right way when they're young and they'll hopefully stick with it their live. Thank you senator for
Mike Hager
Unverified
23:13
the question. Thank you for sponsoring that legislation I'm certainly all for that
we've been very proactive in our campaign through social media and public safety announcements and things like that about the dangers of fleeing and the consequences of fleeing so anything that we could do to try to help our our be more proact ive to help with that cause I am absolutely for it the people that produce and print and edit ourdO manuals we'll probably cringe at that idea but that's ok there's there's always new additions that are being made and and I would
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
23:53
certainly not be opposed to that at all well we'll be talking about that for the 2se session thank you colonel
thank you Mr Chairman. seeing no further questions colonel thank y'all for being here today and it's good to know and I think it's encouraging to know that legislation can make a difference and I appreciate you always bringing it to to this legislative body to so that we can address that and it's good to know that it's saving lives and hopefully it looked like it's reduced the
number of pursuits so that's encouraging so thank y'all for being here today and y'all can be excused good to see you again. you have another question senator? Well yes sir I was
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
24:51
trying to catch a I thought colonel and then we're gonna do
the do the next part as well are they good are they doing they are actually going to be other business that someone else do that so you want me to do the other business with him now or wait till the end and call him back up? oh they're leaving yeah that's the reason I was wanting to do it now we wouldn't leave I'm sorry
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
25:10
because somebody catch the state police to come back to the tableelger's still there if he's gonna hang around I'll ask it at
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
25:14
the end I don't know if he's gonna hang around or not but go ahead and
ask him now carl sorry about that. I didn't say Senator Hill and I
Speaker 74
25:31
apologize to get to you before you left after not turn around and running out the door when I was excused so I know you're out of breath now trying to get my No I actually
Speaker 38
25:38
have to say we have a cliff out yeah mine is totally different
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
25:41
than ppi maneuvers and stuff on this one wed I know we've got
a lot of members here and a lot of people don't know the difference I just kind of want you to explain what the the difference between the what y'all do as the state police site and what the foundation does and the benefits from that because we have a lot of members that do not
understand the difference between that and y'all have that and also know the game in fish do the same thing and they have a foundation too would you kind of kind of just give us a a quick quick overview of that what's the difference and what what's the what's the purpose of the foundation everything
Speaker 27
26:09
just so everyone know Sure it'll be highle at
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
26:12
best but is there any lobbying involved with the with the foundation side of it as far as
Mike Hager
Unverified
26:17
I'm aware no sir no sir not that I can think of I hope I'm not saying that wrong but the state Police
Foundation is a group of supporters of the state police and it's a largely made up of of businesses and business owners and just members of our state that are supportive of the mission of the state police they raised fines that do a number of things one is a scholarship program for troopers' kids and they have a is it Hearts for heroes? I'm gonna be in so much trouble from Elizabeth anderson for not being
able to just spit this out the Hearts for heroes program is is something they do where if we have a trooper that's affected by like a natural disaster they've lost their home in a fire a a tornado or something like that the foundation will come in immediately and give that trooper and his family relief. if we have a trooper whose family members in the hospital the foundation will frequently put their family in a hotel they'll pay for their expenses while they're in town there's also a did Iment the scholarship
program for the true OK and in addition to that some of the more notable items are things they've done for us in the way of training in in our facilities I think a lot of you joined us last year at the reception at our driving track that facility was almost 100% solely the product of the stateliceoundation and as we tell people all the time is this body knows all too well we're we're all competing for tax dollars and we're all
competing for funds and there's only so much to go around and we're extremely blessed that the foundation has stepped up and some things that we were not able to do within our budget the statelice Foundation has stepped up and they've provided that need for us so cannot say enough things enough positive words about the foundation they have been an absolute blessing and a godsend to the state police thank you sir and the reason
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
28:26
to you just so that all members
know that there's a lot of things that go on behind the scenes that you have a lot of great people working for y'all. they do a lot of very good things and I don't think they get enough credit for that nor do I think y'all get enough credit for that and I just want to make sure that all the members of this committee know that you have people working behind the scenes that do a great job supporting y'all so thank thank you for that brief brief summary on
Speaker 47
28:48
that sir and since you give me the opportunity I do have to as my son would say give a shout out toelizabeth anderson, our executive director and where's she
Mike Hager
Unverified
28:55
from? I'm sorry our president elizabeth is from magnolia originally they bele they live in from now
Speaker 27
29:01
Lone Oak County there you go your district I know that and
Mike Hager
Unverified
29:06
I think yeah that that's about it I know she's inlonnoak County but anyway then our executive director is Emily Hamilton and then alsoydney is a member of the found or a an employee of the foundation and I cannot say enough good things about the work they do for us they are truly a god a godsend thank you for the opportunity to talk about it.
Colonel thank you. sorry I I didn't seesenator hell apologize for that but
I've see no further questions so if y'all can be excused and thank you for being here today committee the next item on today's agenda is we're going to have a discussion from the commission on law enforcementandards and training and director Chris Chapman if you would make your way to the table
Director thank you for being here today if you would just state
Speaker 84
30:14
your name for the committee Yesirri Chapman, director for law enforcement standards
and training for the state of Arkansasppreciate your attendance here today and I think what we'd like to discuss today or scu discussion today if you would just kind of walk us through and help us to understand you know I know one of the concerns over the years has been that a law enforcement officer that may be employed at with one agency
gets in some type of trouble with that agency a disciplinary a ction or whatever the case may be and they resign or they leave that agency and they go to another one and I know that was always a real concern in law enforcement that there was no check and balance as to be able to make that agency that was seeking to employ that individual aware of the fact of some possibly misconduct at the agency that they were just leaving from and I know that
y'all taken on a task ofit to be able to follow those type of situations and make sure that any hiring agency is aware of any issues that that officer may have had prior to that so also just with that if you would just kind of what you put in place to make sure that they don't I guess to say slipped through the cracks you know and remain to be in law enforcement or some agency hiring them without knowing about it and also officers that have their
misconduct has risen to the level of the possibility of decertification I think it'd be very enlightening to this committee if if you would walk us through the process as far as someone that has you know conducted themselves in such a manner that it warrants the review of the commission for decertification and that process is it would move forward in that event so that's if you would if you just take it from there
and try to you know we're just kind of opened up for discussion and I hopefully that'll kind of get you going in the direction we need to go absolutely
Speaker 87
32:23
so I appreciate the opportunity to have the conversation I will say that over the last three years under this administration we have taken those those aspects that you've mentioned very seriously not to negatively talk about the way we used to do things but we do things very differently now the accountability portion of the law enforcement standards for the state of Arkansas should be very serious to all of us and
those bad actors should be removed from the profession so we take that very seriously so just as an overview there's 9 reasons under the rules and regulations the standards for the commission on law enforcement standards and training that you can be removed have your certification pulled so we monitor those anytime an officer is separated from an agency regardless of what the reason is they have to complete a separation form and send to us and so before they can be hired that paperwork has to be processed if they are separated
from one of those 9 offenses those those those rules that we can decertify for it immediately creates a situation where we call that agency and discuss the reason for separation if it meets a decertification standard and they did not check the decertification box then we ask them why we make them provide an explanation and there are times where they commit one of those acts that it just doesn't rise to the level of decertification but to prevent them from going to another agency without that
information being disclosed we now have a system where we flag that file so that individual officer even though he's not decertified he committed an act that falls under one of those categories there's a flag placed on that file if he goes to another agency and they want to employ him they're not able to add him to the roster and complete the paperwork without calling us receiving all the information that we've gathered from the the separating agency and having full disclosure of why that officer was separated we've seen that work there have been
officers that were separated their flag their files were flagged agencies attempted to hire them they were required to call us that information will disclosed and then they have full responsibility for either hiring or not hiring that officer we've seen agencies pass on officers for their conduct in the past that didn't exist so they could they could go from one agency to the other without consequence they could be separated from one agency go to another and we've seen that we in your career I'm sure you've seen it they they would bounce
from agency to agency to agency and each time they were committing an offense that should have been either caught or potentially decertified so we've created a system that that helps solve that problem so if they do ask for decertification I'll just kind of give a very short overview of the process it is a a a legal process an administrative hearing is set anyone any law enforcement officer within that jurisdiction whether it be the sheriff the chief and investigating authority or myself in the worst case
scenarios can request decertification upon review if it meets the standard. if the request is made that we set basically a probable cause hearing a hearing for the commission to look at the facts to weigh the evidence and determine if it moves forward to a decertification hearing if it moves forward to a decertification hearing that date is set the officers witnesses we have a full legal team that preps for that case and then that officer is basically uh, goes through an administrative trial before the
commission to see if they keep their decertification you had asked for some numbers I'm I'm very proud of this so the previous three years before this new administration there were 158 requests for decertification in the three years not including this January we went from 158 to256 now a lot of that is due to education our relationships with the sheriff's association and the chief's association us being in front of them talking about the importance of this explaining educating the purpose
behind what we're doing has increased that so we're holding more officers accountable so right now as we sit in our last month's meeting we heard 28 new requests and so we have 147 officers pending decertification hearings that puts us out about a year and a half on some of them so we were at a4.5 year delay in some of these hearings when we took over we reduced that to a year and a half but currently we're sitting at 147 officers
waiting to be heard by the commission. so this
it's working thank you for that overview and I know I attended a public safety conference last year and regarding in the one of the topics was decertification and applaud you because Arkansas the process that we had in place and the way the way you were handling it here it was just kind of a a role model for other states to be honest with you to follow they didn't have
anything and to safeguarding exactly from one officer you know from an officer being able to move from one age agency to the other and you're right that used to happen quite often and pretty disheartening to good law enforcement officers to be able to see that let me ask you this director if if you have an officer that is under with an agency that's under investigation and that officer resigns before that investigation is completed
does that open investigation I'm just curious does that open investigation and he seeks employment somewhere else how is that handled with an open investigation again
Speaker 87
38:07
sir thank you for that question because that's asked a lot so that is one of the nine categories that can create a decertification or a flagging process they resigned during or under internal affairs investigation or a criminal investigation so again every agency regardless of the reason for the separation have to complete that separ
ation form so if that box is checked again we're calling we're requesting that information and again even if it doesn't rise to the level of decertification now granted I now have the option if the agency doesn't want to do it and it's a a severe circumstance then I can request that decertification after consultation with the legal staff and and we haven't had to use that let's say nuclear option yet because most of the time we're able to have conversations and and convince them that that's the path to take but again
if they resign that flag that file will get flagged and so if they try to go to another agency full disclosure we're going to give them that information that hiring agency is gonna have to consider that take on the liability and the potential risk of hiring that officer for miscon that has been under investigation for misconduct for whatever the reason may be but they're gonna get full
Speaker 92
39:18
disclosure of what I know in the past you didn't have
the authority to I don't think you did to be able to
request you know someone to be reviewed for decertification so that authority was it granted to you I'm glad you have it that that is great news to me is it was that granted to you through legislation or something we passed or was that something entirely that you were able to do so the rules were
Speaker 87
39:48
let's just say gray left up for interpretation so when I took this position I requested an attorney general's opinion his opinion was that as the director for the law enforcement standards and training division that ultimately I had the
ability to do that again we haven't had to use that that ruling came out or that opinion came out 2.5 years ago again the relationships that we built with chiefs and sheriffs and prosecutors across the state oncece we start having these conversations and talking about the severity of the issues and and the potential you know down flow of what may happen most of the I would say that 95% of the the officers that need to be heard for decertification or moving in that direction. So our sheriffs and chiefs and prosecutors are stepping up to the plate and holding people accountable and
again a lot of those education on our staff's part so what a lot of people don't realize is we now have a compliance team that actually is auditing every agency in the state of Arkansas we're conducting about 250 agency compliance checks per year and it's not punitive what that is is we're going in and checking the records making sure they're they're holding themselves to the right standards if they're not we're helping them get into compliance and again if we're seeing agencies that are compliant then they're holding their own officers accountable so we're
seeing agencies do a better job on that side as well but again that's proactive it's very intentional on
Speaker 86
41:10
our staff's part taking on extra responsibility but we believe that is our our job sir
andrector C correct me if I'm wrong but it's the commission that's the number of it's the commissioners of the law enforcement standards and training it's that group of commissioners that the officer appears before for consideration of the certific decertification is that correct that is correct sir they're our hearing body. they they are
Speaker 87
41:36
our division our staff presents the case so we're the prosecutors so to speak and we present that case to the commission and the those individuals make the determination on whether that officer keeps his certification or not, sir. how often do they
meet? how often does that commission meet? We we
Speaker 95
41:51
were meeting we meet every other month when we took over we were doing one day hearings based on
Speaker 87
41:57
a current workload we meet every other month for two days worth of hearings so we have 22 days of hearings per year sir we could
easily do 18 it sounds like it ok I've got a couple of questions here director senator Blake Johnson you are recognized for a question Sori, you said that
Speaker 99
42:26
you're a year and a half out on those hearings so what
Speaker 88
42:39
So his question was and that's a great question
Speaker 102
42:52
because hit balls and balls in his court
Speaker 87
42:55
ok so I heard the question so you asked what that officer's doing during that year and a half period so again let's go back to that flagging system because they were separated for for a issue that rises to the level of decertification while they are pending decertification
we flag their file so even so if they go to work for someone else if they determine an agency determines they want to take the risk of hiring that officer we have fully disclosed that they are pending decertification we have nothing in the rules and regulations to prevent them from being hired but what we do is disclose all the information to the agency that wants to
Speaker 105
43:30
to entertain the idea of hiring them so
Speaker 95
43:33
they they possibly can continue to work we see that happen yes sir. there are
Speaker 87
43:37
agencies out there that struggle hiring people and they will hire officers that are pending decertification doesn't
happen often but we have seen it happen yes
Speaker 99
43:45
sir so chair if you hadn't if you hadn't went out there I I had the opportunity to to see one of those hearings and it was very enlightening and I think what it amounted to more than anything is the guy lied and that probably hurt him more than the actual offense did and and you know he didn't do his paperwork and he lied about it and that probably hurt him more than anything but it it it you know just to hear one of those
things that it you with your background you would you would enjoy a lot a lot more than I did waiting waiting on what I had to do I'm I'm you know, I just think you'd you'd enjoy to to hear one of
Speaker 87
44:28
those things thank you senator that's a good question I add a comment to that you can do that just for information purposes probably 90 to95% of the reasons that the commission decertifies officers is tied to an integrity issue, an honesty issue they may commit an
offense but then somewhere along the way you're absolutely right they lie about it during the investigation they they withhold information they don't disclose all the facts and we've seen individual officers that curbed a tire and didn't want to admit to it and lied on a document an accident report be decertified we've seen officers lie about not wearing their ballistic vest and none of that probably would have got him fired. none of it would have gotten them fired but because they lied about it without integrity we we cannot carry the
Speaker 95
45:11
badge I appreciate what y'all have to do
Speaker 99
45:15
that I mean it would be very hard but I understand you know it's those little things that add up to big things and and if you can't trust them with little things they never get to
the big things sir thank you senator Representative Purrier recognized for a
Speaker 111
45:34
question you think you mentioned over there under understood your timeline is about a year about 18 months from a request to a hearing and I'd say that's fairly accurate because the last incident in a county
So my question is if an officer commits action that is more serious than than just you know something
Speaker 113
45:53
you know more serious you know I don't know what that could be I don't want to dive into something else.
Speaker 114
46:02
Is that hearing moved up faster we can and we have done that in the past depending on the serious of
Speaker 87
46:09
the issue now some of the more serious issues obviously potentially have criminal ties a criminal prosecution tied to that. We usually lift its criminal prosecution play out before we
have that hearing just procedurally that's the smart thing to do but yes we have had cases that are more severe than others and and we feel the need to move those up we do try to move those up when we can it's not standard practice but again it's based on the severity of the actions sir yes sir but again4.5 years is what we inherited and we're down to
Speaker 106
46:37
a year and a half and that's that that's better than it was
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
46:49
Jef followed senator thank you and your your program covers all level of law enforcement is that
Speaker 87
46:55
correct ma'am Every law enforcement officer in the state of Arkansas regardless state, county or municipal gets their certification and authority through us to to to wear the badge and do the job so yes ma'am we cover everything from the
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
47:08
smallest agency to the largest agency in the state and and remind me one more time your investigations are triggered or initiated by a report or is it interagency is it from citizens
Speaker 87
47:20
so it can be a number of ways the citizen complaints are probably the least common if there's an allegation made by a citizen of a criminal activity we would often refer that either to the local prosecutor or the Arkansas state police for investigation for follow up but most of ours are prompted by the separation documents or a conversation with a prosecutor sheriff or a local chief. OK I mean just
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
47:52
I I personally had a real issue that occurred. um, with a with an officer that was just repeatedly harassing people and it this was several years ago,6,7 years ago perhaps but I think this is, I think they're this person is still an officer and I was I didn't at the time I was elected but I chose to file
a report as a citizen just like anybody else and it was literally dismissed and it it became really really really bad that I you know, I had some very strong visits at that point because it wasn't just me that was filing report after report after report I mean there were other citizens that were filing reports on this in particular person and it was not taken seriously and so I have a lot of concern about
that because you know this was a repeated behavior that was occurring with an officer who is literally throwing his weight around. bragging about it to other officers and harassing people and and eventually you know, was able to be moved to where they had a larger supervision which I thought was
needed and appropriate for this person. I don't want anybody to lose their job. however, I also know that when an officer acts like that they're putting themselves into danger. they might pull the wrong person over and give the wrong person a hard time and then you know, children may lose a dad. I mean they so I I hope you know that these things are taken seriously from citizens that do have
some issues you know about being harassed or being bullied or you know so egregious to where you know, I'm going to arrest you, put you back in in the back of my police car travel you know 10 miles or 15 miles to the police station but then let you out and not arrest you. but now you're stranded and you have no car and I just just basically did it just to show you that I could. That happened and nothing happened to the officer so I
just hope that you will look at citizen complaints just as strongly as you do others because I think that's really important because at the end of the day it should be about the safety of not just the citizens that are being patrolled and and and policed but the officers themselves could be in real danger if they act like that and they're they just pulled the wrong person over at the wrong time so anyway I'll follow up more so on that but you know
we we've got to deal with that because not everybody's meant to wear
Speaker 106
51:04
a badge. I absolutely agree with that. Our number one job is is law enforcement officers
Speaker 87
51:10
to build trust and legitimacy within our communities that's our number one job every single day that we we walk on out of out the door and so that responsibility is is very great our rules and regulations don't allow for just a a a ton of action reaction to the citizen complaint the way they're currently written so what we
traditionally do if I get a citizen complaint the first contact is their supervisor their their agency head whether it's the sheriff or the chief potentially the prosecutor if it rises to the level of something you talked about there there could potentially be a criminal charge there so we're talking to the prosecutor we're having those conversations we've seen that be very effective we've seen that very effective in in addressing those issues eventuallytually we'll we'll get a case probably that that rises to the level that we have to consider that citizen complaint and and seek a decertification
in conjunction with by working with the sheriff the chief and the prosecutor so yes ma'am we do take those serious every one of us followed up up with again we we passed some of those to a local entity or the state police for investigation because there potentially is a criminal aspect of that that's something that we don't do we don't investigate the criminal side but yes ma'am they are taken very seriously you central flowers are recognized for question
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
52:32
thank you thank you director for
your testimony ma'am a couple of things as it relates to what senator Irvin brought up about citizen's complaints sometimes you have citizens that complain through the local department do you all pull those records or
what happens is there an investigation that's
initiated because of an internal or a local complaint so
Speaker 114
53:10
I probably wouldn't be aware of those internal complaints unless there
Speaker 87
53:15
was a separation of that officer from the agency again that separation is is a a key factor in in what we base a lot of our decisions on so if an officer has multiple complaints and the agency determines that he just doesn't need to be there. Maybe it didn't rise to a criminal violation maybe it's not a policy violation but he's
just not shouldn't be wearing the badge shouldn't be doing the job oncece that separation document comes in then we're asking those questions that's when I would probably become aware of the complaints that we would review those complaints see if it fell within under one of those nine reasons for decertification that's that would prompt us to have conversations with that chief and sheriff does this officer need to be decertified? Do we need to flag his file but so I'm kind of in on the backside of that if those complaints are coming to the
department. I'm usually made aware of those during that
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
54:09
separation process and and the other question I had was about the
process itself now much is done administratively with an administrative hearing but is there an appeal that can be made by that officer that may be decertified there is ma'am. it's a typical appeal
Speaker 85
54:30
process that would go to to I believe circuit court usually
Speaker 87
54:35
theagG will represent us the attorney general's office would represent us in
Speaker 86
54:40
those hearings but yes ma'am there is an appeal process and it and it's used
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
54:45
we seen it used numerous times do you have any kind
of statistics can you offer us any numbers on how many appeals are are made no ma'am
Speaker 95
54:55
I didn't bring that information but since I've been here for the last three years years, I
Speaker 87
55:01
can recall probably less than half dozen
Speaker 130
55:06
I'll be glad to provide that information to the body if you would like that but I
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
55:14
believe it probably less than half do so in in and last Mr chairir I wanted to know after an officer is decertified and maybe there are no criminal charges filed against the officer but depending on the facts and the circumstances
do individual citizens have a right to pull that decertification pack order to pursue civil claims yes ma'am so our our
documentation is is foible under the freedom of Information Act
Speaker 87
55:56
so yes a citizen could request and that happens often we we receive a lot of requests for information very common so yes ma'am that that
Speaker 106
56:08
exists and it has been used for those purposes
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
56:11
I'm certain. and so that would probably cause
you or some of your staff or maybe the local either the sheriff or the police chief to come to court and testify possibly it could result in that yes ma'am.
Have you ever been in one of those type of appeals
Speaker 87
56:29
not as the director but as a former chief of police I've been in numerous numerous hearings over my my career ma'am, but not as the director since I've held
this position. OK thank you chair you or some of your staff or maybe the local either the sheriff or the police chief to come to court and testify possibly it could result in that yes ma'am. Have you ever been in one of those type of appeals not as the director but as a former chief of police I've been in numerous numerous hearings over my my career ma'am, but not as the director since I've held this position. OK thank you thank you senator re ctor I don't I don't see any further questions from committee members really appreciate you being here today and I just close by saying this I appreciate you safeguarding and you know the law enforcement communities across this state by making sure that the bad actors are eliminated and the process that you've put in place because you know there's always been a saying
among law enforcement officers as there's no one that resents a bad officer more than a good officer and I can attest to that and I think you can too so and we know when an officer's actions are unwarranted unjustified or excessive they're going to be scrutinized for more greatly than people in comparable walks of life but that's that goes with wearing the badge so with that you're excused and committee members senator do you have anything
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
57:39
I'll just say March meeting we're looking at having a march meeting in Loanoke at the fish hatchery and having a tour of that fish hatchery there. so hopefully we'll get we'll work on getting that going. I talked to the director of the game and fish about perhaps doing that next month that's with you that sounds
good committee members no further action before this committee. this committee this meeting is adjourned.
Agenda
A. Call to Order
B. Comments by Co-Chairs
C. Discussion of 2025 Pit Maneuver Statistics and Impact of Act 734 of 2023 [Exhibit C]
D. Discussion of the Decertification Process for Law Enforcement Officers in Arkansas
E. Other Business
F. Adjournment
Documents
Speakers
Representative Dwight Tosh Chair
Unverified
Mike Hager
Unverified
Speaker 21
Speaker 23
Chair
Unverified
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
Speaker 12
Speaker 47
Speaker 53
Senator Ricky Hill
Unverified
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
Speaker 74
Speaker 38
Speaker 27
Speaker 84
Speaker 87
Speaker 92
Speaker 86
Speaker 95
Speaker 99
Speaker 88
Speaker 102
Speaker 105
Speaker 111
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Speaker 106
Speaker 85
Speaker 130