Fridley V. Phoenix County Sheriff Case Study

Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office Lt. Mike Fridley knew he wanted to become a negotiator after the day he was dispatched to the scene of an armed homicide suspect.
The 25-year sheriff’s office veteran said he and his partners tracked a suspect that had been on the lam from Oregon to some brush at a property in Humboldt County.
“Basically, we found the guy holding a gun to his chest and he wanted us to kill himself,” Fridley said, explaining the situation in which people try to force law enforcement officer’s hand into opening fire as “suicide by cop.”
But the man didn’t force Fridley’s hand; instead, he was able to talk him down and get him to surrender.
From that point, Fridley knew he wanted to become a crisis negotiator, so he began training for it, and spent about 15 years working his way to his current position as the lead on the sheriff’s office’s Crisis Negotiation Team.

They come from different departments within the office and they all like talking to people, Fridley said.
“It’s not something that you can really teach someone,” he said. “You’ve got to have the skills to talk to someone and keep them going.”
Team members do still get training that aims to teach them how to work during a negotiation. They practice talking over a specialized phone that is tossed to a suspect during a negotiation. During the call one person takes the lead in the conversation, another listens to help analyze the conversation and a third acts as a scribe, Fridley said.
“It’s like any conversation, eventually you might be at a loss so the other person on the line will help and might feed you talking points or alert you to triggers — what sets the person off,” Fridley