Question:
How did you work with the other federal agencies given that most
of them are enforcement agencies? Presumably, you're doing a very different thing until you find
out who did it and prosecute them. So how do you coordinate with them?
Answer:
For example, they may call us to help them create some confidence with the community.
Often times, the community may already not trust them, but they do trust us because they know
us. We've worked with them for years. We can go and help them to create trust. At some of
those regional meetings where the teams were brought in, they began to see us as a team. But we
didn't cross our boundaries in terms of enforcement and community support. We had to work
together. Their priority was to find the perpetrator, our priority was healing the community.
Those are very valid and different. There became more of an appreciation from the law
enforcement side for what we did. They saw what we did and they saw the impact of it. They
saw that their job became easier because of what we did. It also said to the community that there
is an administrative response that includes all of us, and that was important for the government.
Question:
Was there a state level response as well as federal?
Answer:
From the state police, local police, and the fire marshals, yes. They were involved also as
part of the working team.
Question:
But beside law enforcement, was anyone else involved?
Answer:
One of the state agencies that was most involved was the state sheriff's association. They
were at every one of our team-building meetings. They helped sponsor them, as a matter of fact.
There was one guy who was the head of that, who had incredible personal power as well as
position power. If he told some of the sheriffs that we were doing something, they would come
because they trusted him. He was a great resource. The state police were involved from the law
enforcement perspective. Of course local police were always brought into the network. It was
probably the best example of inner agency cooperation that I've ever seen, and a great testament
to that effort.
