Originally aired February 16, 2001

Later this month the State Patrol's 46th class of recruits will begin basic training. It's paramilitary-style training, designed to test them at every step. An intense 19 weeks, Sunday night to Friday afternoon, before sun-up to well after sun-down. These 25 men and women will be the first class at the Patrol's new training facility in Grand Island.

Last year, "Statewide's" Mike Tobias followed Class 45 - the last group of recruits to go through the old training facility in Lincoln. In part one of a two part series, he takes us inside this training environment and examines why the patrol believes it's the best way to produce officers who are ready for anything.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: • Nebraska State Patrol web site http://www.nsp.state.ne.us/

VIDEOS

Watch the Perspective story here:
RealPlayer | QuickTime

Listen as Col. Tom Nesbitt, Nebraska State Patrol superintendent, talks to Class 45 recruits on the first day of training.
RealPlayer

Take a guided tour of the Combat Exertion Course from week 5 of training. Segment includes comments from training officer Jeff Barnes.
RealPlayer

Shoot or don't shoot? Recruits face the decision during computer-generated FATS simulations from week 11. Segment includes comments from training officer Jeff Barnes and recruit Jim Reilly.
RealPlayer

Take a guided tour of the Pursuit Driving Course from week 12 of training. Segment includes comments from training officer Jeff Barnes and recruit Ryan Henrichs.
RealPlayer

See 64 years of State Patrol training. This segment includes video of training from 1937, 1945, 1956, 1963, 1975 and 1984. You'll also find comments at the beginning and end from Elmer Schroeder, who directed State Patrol training in the 1960s and 1970s.
RealPlayer

TRANSCRIPT

Transcript of Perspective

TRANSCRIPT - Class 45

Reported by Statewide correspondent Mike Tobias.

Graduation Day. Thirty-four new State Patrol officers receive their badges and take the oath of office.
[Governor Mike Johanns] "… do solemnly swear that I will support and defend…
"As I look upon the graduates today, I think about the impact that each of you will have on our state during your years of service as a member. I think of the people and the family…"
The route they took to get here is far from the pomp and circumstance of graduation.
[Col. Tom Nesbitt] "I hope by now you can smile, obviously, and when you remember that first day. And I've got a chuckle once in a while when I heard some of the stories about some of you coming out of the barracks and scrambling for your clothes. And half-dressed and wild-eyed, and I know some of you were wondering, what on earth have I got into here?"
They arrive like six-year-olds on the first day of school. Quiet. Nervous about what's in store. They're the 45th class to go through State Patrol Training. Forty recruits, hired for trooper or carrier enforcement officer positions.
It's the largest class since 1990. The Patrol has been short-staffed for several years, struggling to find qualified applicants. Salary increases at the start of last year helped recruiting.
[Lt. Julie Maaske] "Welcome to the Nebraska State Patrol Training Academy."
Almost all the recruits are native Nebraskans. Many have military or law enforcement experience.
[Myron Bell] "Myron Bell, one of the young guys in here." (laughter)
Myron Bell is a 39-year-old retired Air Force mechanic from Bellevue.
Dunbar native Tony Kavan was a Marine and worked at the Dodge County jail.
[Tony Kavan] "I spent the last year as a Dodge County correctional officer."
Jim Reilly of Spalding graduated from UNL and was an Army Ranger.
Beatrice native Ryan Henrichs played college football.
[Lt. Maaske] "For some people it is the pure adventure of law enforcement. The fact that they don't want something that is mundane, day in and day out. A lot of our people like to be in the outdoors, they don't like to be cooped-up in an office-type setting."
Women are notably absent from this class. Maaske says recruiting women is a challenge. She went through training with one other woman fifteen years ago.
[Lt. Maaske] "It isn't a profession that is very… that's real typically thought of for women. We're getting there, more and more."
It's tough just to get this far. About three hundred people applied for these spots. A lengthy, stressful process narrowed the field.
[Col. Nesbitt] "The stress is going to continue. Believe me. It's going to be stressful in camp, you have a lot to get through, a lot to learn. But we're going to turn you into the best officers in the State of Nebraska, and in my opinion… our opinion, in the country."
By the end of week one, the recruits know what he means by stress.
Drill Sgt.] "Broken nametag already."
[Tuma] "Yes sir."
[Drill Sgt.] "Okay. Are you working on getting that replaced?"
[Tuma] "Yes sir, I have a one-oh-five submitted, sir."
[Drill Sgt.] "Okay, thank you.
"Let's go. You're not allowed to be in the hallway, let's go. Let's go."
[Drill Sgt.] "And you got all the way to formation without your headgear on. How in the world did this happen?"
[Drill Sgt.] "This morning in chow line I find another button unbuttoned. I know we've talked about that four or five times. I know we have. Last time we did that you told me that wasn't going to happen again. It did. Do we even need to talk about the goat rope of a formation we had for colors this morning?"
It's a high intensity, military boot camp environment, common for state police agencies nationwide. They're tested every minute of camp, with only weekends off. Marching in formation, inspections, push-ups; it's all about building discipline and self-confidence.
[Lt. Maaske] "We need out officers to be disciplined, to be attentive to details, to be very professional. We hold them to very high standards and we set very high expectations for their performance and their behavior while they're here in the training camp."
The music is best known as the theme to Patton; a movie about a general known for discipline. The recruits listen and reflect at the end of their first week in camp. There are three fewer men than started the week. Three more will soon drop out.
[Lt. Maaske] "But it isn't for everyone. And sometimes people have to almost come here and see the realities of it as much as we can show them here in a controlled setting to find out that it really isn't for them."
[Bell] "It's been a pretty tough week actually. We… we've come together quite a bit but we still have a ways to go."
[Ryan Henrichs] "I played college football so the intensity is what I figured it would be."
Ryan Henrichs has no doubt about his decision to join the Patrol. Playing defensive end at UNO for a couple seasons was good preparation. He also took classes at UNL and hopes to finish his degree later. A father, mother and brother in law enforcement made it easy to choose this career path.
[Henrichs] "Ever since I could remember that's what I wanted to do. Never even questioned it, never wanted to do anything else."
[Troopers] "Lift your heads and hold them high. Class 45 is walking by. Proud to be NSP."
The recruits spend a lot of time in the classroom. Ten hours on some days. Motor vehicle law, communications, law enforcement ethics are all covered. Recruits take a total of 63 tests.
Today's topic, drug recognition. Sgt. Glenn Elwell tells of encountering a mother and daughter on hallucinogens.
[Sgt. Glenn Elwell] "We ended up getting into a physical confrontation with a 14-year-old girl that weighed ninety pounds. And she was throwing two of us around like we were rag dolls."
For many academics are the toughest part of training.
[Jim Reilly] "Late nights of studying. You know, up for most of the night. You don't get very much time to study between classes."
Jim Reilly grew up a farm boy and got a criminal justice degree from UNL. He gave up a promising career as an Army office and ranger to join the State Patrol. Reilly wanted to return to Nebraska.
[Reilly] "I grew up with a respect for the law. And I always kinda had a feeling that if the military was not quite what I wanted it to be and I would get out of the military that I would be interested in probably a career in law enforcement."
It's called the Combat Exertion Course. Recruits climb a wall, a chain link fence, run up and down hills, through tires and barrels. Halfway through they stop and shoot live rounds at targets.
Training officers are at their side, adding to the stress.
[Jeff Barnes] "We need them moving and shooting like it's going to be on the street. So this is as close as we can get to simulating that on the street."
[Reilly] "Whew, yeah, tough one."
What's the worst part of it?
[Reilly] I'd say coming up this back hill over here, after you've been through most of the rest of the stuff. It's a good little climb.
[Drill Sgt.] "This isn't retirement now buddy, let's go. This is not retirement, you'd better move."
[Bell] "I think it's just concentrating after being under stress for the run and concentrating on the targets. That's probably about the hardest thing."
The Combat Course ends the first week of firearms training for the recruits. They may never fire a weapon in a real-life situation. Troopers rarely use deadly force, usually during one or two incidents a year. But now's the time to find out whether they can. In past years it's when some recruits drop out, realizing they can't pull the trigger on another human being.
[Barnes] "I mentioned it to the class that something else they have to ask themselves also is if come the point in time, could they and would they actually pull the trigger on somebody if they had to actually shoot and kill 'em to save themselves or save somebody else?"
[Reilly] "You know, a guy thinks about that quite a bit. He should anyhow. If it's in defense of another person I know I could do it. But a person should ask themselves that."
The Combat Course also brings out the camaraderie that's a big part of the State Patrol experience. The recruits spend thousands of hours together, under stress, in confined quarters. At times they squabble like brothers, but in the end there's a family-like bond.
[Lt. Maaske] "We try and facilitate that camaraderie because in law enforcement and within the State Patrol itself we think of ourselves as a family. Part of producing that family feeling is a closeness that you get while going through basic training."
The training tradition began in 1937 at Camp Ashland, a bare bones military camp.
The Patrol moved its training to the current Air Park facility around 1970. Training is longer now. It was just five weeks during the Camp Ashland era. But the philosophy of military-style training is similar.
Something new is a formal set of core values.
[Troopers] "Honesty, professionalism, self-discipline…"
Adopted three years ago, these guide all Patrol officers. They're a daily part of training.
[Troopers] "Team oriented."
[Col. Nesbitt] "I carry those core values in my pocket with me. And I pull them out, sometimes daily, to review them."
[Drill Sgt.] "All right, so in this fashion he comes checking… Notice how he took the knife away. I'm starting to get him off his pedestal a little bit."
Next week we'll follow Class 45 as they learn to defend themselves, pursue suspects in cruisers, and make split second decisions in scenarios with armed suspects. All leading up to graduation day.