Coffee attendees learn about real-life detectives

 

By SUSAN W. MURRAY
The Independent

 

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The popularity of crime shows means police detectives run into what they label “the ‘CSI’ effect.” At the March 10 Coffee with the Chief, Woodstock police detective Tino Cippolo pointed out to the more than two dozen residents in attendance that real-life detective work bears little resemblance to the Hollywood version.
Unlike TV, Cippolo explained, most crimes are not cleared in an hour, and few departments have their own crime labs. In Woodstock’s case, detectives send evidence to a crime lab in Rockford for analysis. Depending on the lab’s workload and the case’s priority, it might be weeks, or even months, before results come back. Further, jurors now freely question police methods and ask to see forensic evidence, the collection of which is not feasible or effective in all cases.
Detective Sgt. Kurt Rosenquist said people tell him that they aspire to be detectives but don’t want to become police officers. Rosenquist has to break the news that all detectives begin their careers as police officers, writing parking tickets, checking seatbelt compliance and responding to residents’ calls.
Rosenquist and Cippolo detailed the qualities in a police officer that make an individual a good candidate for detective. First on their list was a well-trained, highly motivated person with a desire to succeed. The officer must have had good attendance and performance records and display exemplary verbal and written communication skills. In addition to “street” common sense, detectives have to think creatively and put themselves in a criminal’s shoes when considering what a suspect’s next moves might be. Finally, detectives work very long hours and have to be willing to report to work on short notice.
Woodstock’s detective division differs from many other departments because the assignment as a detective is for four years, after which the officer returns to regular patrol.
“There are different schools of thought on that,” said Woodstock Police Chief Robert Lowen. One school holds that a detective’s specialized training and experience are underutilized in a patrol officer position.
Lowen pointed out that in a small department like Woodstock’s, there are few specialized jobs, and opportunities for advancement come through good performance in a specialized position. Returning a detective to the street not only opens up a detective slot for another officer, it puts a much more effective officer on the street, Lowen explained. Cippolo noted that as one of three detectives under Rosenquist, he spends every third week on call, beyond his regular 3 to 11 p.m. shift. “One-third of my life is spent on call,” Cippolo said. “You get burned out.”
One resident asked what crimes the detectives deal with most often.
“Criminal damage to property and burglaries,” Rosenquist said.
Lowen asked Rosenquist to describe one case for the crowd that demonstrated both the “heads-up” awareness necessary for a detective and the collaboration between investigative departments in the county.
The Huntley Police Department issued a bulletin with a picture showing four suspects at the Woodstock Wal-Mart attempting to use a credit card stolen from a motor vehicle in Huntley. Rosenquist recognized the suspects as teens from Woodstock and notified the Huntley Police Department. He arranged to bring the suspects to the Woodstock police station for questioning and conducted the interview with a Huntley detective present. One subject admitted going into cars in open garages and stealing the credit card and a GPS unit. Huntley police charged him with two counts of burglary and a second subject who was with him with two counts of theft. The stolen credit card had been used in Lake in the Hills and Algonquin prior to its unsuccessful use at the Woodstock Wal-Mart, so information was passed on to those police departments for charges.
All four subjects admitted to entering about 20 garages in Woodstock the previous summer and stealing alcohol. Due to the delay between the incidents, their failure to identify specific garages and consumption of the evidence, no arrests could be made for those incidents.
Later, the suspect in the two Huntley burglaries was charged with a count of burglary to a motor vehicle in Woodstock. He was alleged to have taken a credit card and tried to purchase an iPod at Wal-Mart.
Lowen commended Rosenquist for his work in clearing up cases that had been difficult to solve.
“Those were cases that were going nowhere,” Lowen said.
The next Coffee with the Chief will be at 7 p.m. Monday, April 14, in the training room of the police department on Lake Avenue. The topic will be Crime Stoppers.

This article was published in the March 26, 2008 edition of The Woodstock Independent.