My Ride Along With The Lexington Police Department

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I chose to do my ride along with the Lexington Police Department. The police officer that I got to ride along with was Officer Ernesti. Officer Ernesti has an associates degree in criminal justice. After high school he attended Southeast Community College in Lincoln. He says that he wished he chose a different field to study. The reason is was because he got in a fight with a suspect and injured his arm. He was afraid that he did something severe to his arm that he would not be able to perform any police duty. If he would have had a different degree he could have fallen back to something that does not relate to criminal justice. Before getting hired by the Lexington Police Department in January of 2014 he worked in Gosper County for two years. During his time at Gosper County he was a K-9 handler.
Before leaving the Lexington Police Department to go patrol, I had the chance to talk to officer Snow and officer Baker of what they were doing in the computer lab. Before they would go patrol they will check their email and see if they have any calls that they need to work on before leaving the police department.
As officer Ernesti and I head to the explorer he talks to me about the equipment that he carries on his belt. He carries a taser that faces outward for the safety of getting his hand gun confused with the taser. He also cars a baton and a hand gun. Before meeting up with me, Officer Ernesti was picked up from home by the previous officer who was patrolling in the explorer. During his shift there are usually four other officers on duty which includes one sergeant. I also had the chance to speak with Sergeant Grayek because he was the one who scheduled my ride along with Officer Ernesti. The explorer that we used was number 686...

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...how it affected his job. He told me that the dominant issue about the changing multicultural was the different languages that he has to face with the community. He tells me that he treats everyone the same and that he does not have to be cautious about one culture specifically but he is exposed to many cultures everyday and he enjoys learning about the different cultures in society.
To conclude, I learned many things on my ride along, but the thing that I still think about now is how police officers just do their job. The media gives police officers’ a bad name and tell the public about the bad things that they do. The media does not show what the officers do to protect the community or how they risk their lives in order to bring safety to the community. My ride along was a great experience and I am glad that I had the chance to ride along with Officer Ernesti.

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