Addison Town Council approves new policies regarding police

ADDISON   - Recent training by countywide law enforcement at Lynn Schools on how to combat active shooter situations brought to light that policies were needed for the Addison Police Department.
Addison Police Chief Luke Sheppard addressed Mayor Marsha Pigg and the town council at their regular meeting,  April 15, noting that he recently attended a police chief’s conference where laws and policies were discussed.
“When I came back, I started looking over some of our policies.  We don’t have policies in place that need to be in place,” Sheppard stated.
Sheppard noted that the town did not have any policies in place regarding an officer-involved shooting or an officer-involved death.
“If one of our guys gets killed in the line of duty, or if we kill someone in the line of duty, you’ve got to have something in place to make sure we have the right people to come in and do the investigation along with us, to aid us,” Sheppard pointed out.
“If we have to take someone down, who do we get to investigate?” Sheppard noted. “What is the procedure from the beginning of point A to point B? Where do we go when this happens?”
The policy would delegate what police should do from start to finish should an active shooter situation occur, according to Sheppard.
“So who would be the first to investigate?” asked Council Member George Palmer.
“The way I set that up, our first line of defense would be the DA’s office.  Then, the DA’s office would work with the state bureau (of investigation),” Sheppard  responded.
Sheppard illustrated this would be the procedure that should be followed if, for example, School Resource Officer Tim Williams had to take down an active shooter.
“If Tim is involved in a shooting, there was nothing in (our policy) that says we would take his service weapon,” Sheppard explained. “We have to take his service weapon because it (would have) to go to forensics.
“When we take that weapon, we are going to have to replace that weapon,” Sheppard continued. “There was nothing in our policy that I can remember. This policy covers that kind of stuff.”
Sheppard also stated no policy was in place to cover the school resource officer should an incident occur.
“We have never adopted anything,” Sheppard stated. “This covers him, covers us, covers the school. It pretty much goes over what his job is as far as an SRO, what his job is not.”