Why did you become a police officer?

I became interested in high school. I went to Bridgewater Raynham and I knew some of the town police officers in Raynham where I grew up. That's when I started my interest and then after high school I went into the U.S. army military police and stayed with it.

Why did you persue a position as chief?

When I first started, it wasn't of interest. I never aspired to be chief when I first started here in 1982. But, I just kept taking the exams and became deputy chief and then just kind of worked my way up. It was just timing and exams I guess.

How do you like working in Easton?

I love it. It's a wonderful community. The longer I'm here in town and I live in town, the more interesting I find people. I get to know people, and there's some very interesting people. They're very talented people and very committed people.

I worked originally for Raynham police and there was an opening here. I heard that they were accepting transfers from other departments so I applied and came up.

What's the most difficult part of the job?

As a police officer in general, responding to domestic violence or serious car crashes – especially the fatals, and having to give death notifications are always one of the more difficult part of the job.

Any time you see children being abused or neglected – that's difficult.

What's the best part about your job?

Having the men and women that I have working on the police departments is one of the best part of the job. The community makes my job a lot easier. Certainly the town's leadership – the selectmen and town administrator are wonderful to work with.

Easton has a fairly low crime rate. Is there a part of you that wishes there was some more excitement?

I like to think we're doing our job by, for the most part, keeping the violent crimes out of town. When I was younger I thought about working for Boston police and I was even accepted there but I enjoy working in a community like this where you get to interact with the people

As a police officer, what are your thoughts on the DJ Henry shooting?

It's just a tremendous tragedy all around. I don't know the circumstances of how everything came together so quickly but it was just a terrible tragedy certainly for the family and certainly for the officers involved.

How much longer do you plan on doing this?

I'm very happy with my job right now and I have no plans on leaving for the foreseeable future. I can retire in two more years, I'm eligible for it, but I have two kids in college.

My daughter goes to Manhatten College and she's in Paris studying French and my son goes to Massassoit studying law enforcement. He runs a business during the day.

What are the biggest issues in town?

Traffic complaints are the biggest complaints that we get – speeding and motorists treating stop signs as yield signs. We have 600 crashes a year approximately. If our duty is to protect property and lives, you have to look to see where the most property is being lost and where the most injuries and deaths are occurring. I'm committed to trying to reduce the number of motor vehicle crashes by increasing enforcement.

Is it difficult to deal with limited funding?

We have to deal with level service funding right now. Next year's budget is the same as this year which is the same as last year. I really would like to increase our detective force. We currently only have two detectives right now and they're both overwhelmed. Our detectives deal with identity theft fraud, and they work with the banks with different issues the banks have problems with.

Anything you'd like to leave us with?

I'd like to remind people to lock their cars. I'm glad people think that the community is so safe that they can leave their cars open, but on the other hand, they need to lock them up.