WEBVTT

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>> My name's William Smith.

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I am a Lancaster City police officer.

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I have been recently reassigned
to the detective division.

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A day for me currently as a patrol officer, I
come in, I work a 12 hour shift, and, you know,

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I help patrol the streets of Lancaster City.

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And my new assignment coming next month, I'll be
a detective and I'll come and I'll do follow ups

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on cases that have come in, specifically
with the auto theft unit for stolen vehicles,

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chop shops, and things of that nature.

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Well, Lancaster City's a, is a city
of approximately 70,000 residents

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and that's what we have on books in the census.

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Maybe between 65 and 70,000 residents.

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And it's, you know, we're located
an hour from Philadelphia, you know,

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and an hour north of Baltimore, about two
and a half, three hours south of New York.

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So we're kind of a crossroads for people,
anybody heading south out of New York

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or north out of the DC metro area.

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And, you know, we have our share of
crime, it's just on a, in a smaller level.

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We have our shootings, we have our domestics,
and we also have our issues with traffic

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and parking that I, we have
to deal with on a daily basis.

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And so a day for me can be where, you
know, I'm dealing with traffic accidents,

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like when you have bad weather in the morning,
I can deal with a lot of traffic accidents.

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And that can change quickly with any
number of crimes that could happen that,

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violent crimes like a shooting or a robbery.

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So, you know, I've seen the whole gamut of
crimes from the smallest parking complaint

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to the most severe shooting or stabbing.

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So, you know, it's a, it could be a busy day.

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It could be a long 12 hours or it
could be a real quick 12 hours, so.

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Well, I've been on the job now,
I start my 11th year in January.

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And for me, the first time I arrived on
something like that, it's kind of surreal.

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You're kind of looking at it and you're
like, "Wow, this is really happening?"

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And, you know, but after being on the job
ten years, now it's kind of you just go

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into auto pilot and, you know, you start doing
what you got to do to preserve the crime scene,

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to make sure it's safe for other officers

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and other first responding
personnel to enter the scene.

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And, you know, making sure that
you're talking to the right people.

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You know, observing, being the trained
observer that we're trained to be,

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you start looking for anything that's
out in the open that's obvious.

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And you have to do, you have to be careful
because you don't want to go digging too much

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because then, you know, you don't want it

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to contaminate the crime
scene or mess something up.

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So, you know, for me now, being that I've been
on the job ten years, is, it's nothing new.

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Ten years ago, you know, it's kind
of like, you know, you're looking,

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you're seeing things for the first time.

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So, yeah. It can be, there's a little bit of
a shock factor, but then you get over that