Area leaders see how sheriff works

Sheriff’s deputies’ and police officers’ daily jobs require them to make split-second decisions on how to respond to potentially life-threatening situations, and a group of St. Mary Parish residents got to test their own skills of what they might do when faced with hostile encounters.
The St. Mary Chamber of Commerce’s Leadership St. Mary program spent Thursday learning all about the St. Mary Parish Sheriff’s Office, how deputies do their jobs and the tools they have to assist them.
This is the fourth year Leadership St. Mary traveled around the parish meeting public officials and business leaders to prepare people to step into leadership roles, Chamber of Commerce board member Jason Bailey said.
St. Mary Parish Sheriff Mark Hebert said the sheriff’s office participates in the Leadership St. Mary program each year as a way to “bring them into our world.”
This year they were put in “real crisis scenarios that law enforcement officers are placed in every day,” Hebert said. Participants had to make nearly instantaneous decisions when confronted with a situation including when to fire a weapon in order to protect others, the sheriff said.
Sheriff’s deputies let each of the Leadership St. Mary participants see how he or she would react when responding to a domestic violence scenario.
The group also visited the jail and learned about the workings of the facility, the sheriff said.
“We’re all about educating the public with the kids and the general public on what we do, constantly, to build that rapport and stay engaged in the community. This gives us an opportunity to do that every year,” Hebert said.
St. Mary Parish Sheriff’s Capt. John Kahl, who’s in charge of detectives, narcotics and evidence at the sheriff’s office, spoke to the group about the office’s different divisions, including the department’s special response team of which all members volunteer to be on.
Lt. Sennet Wiggins, who leads the office’s detectives division, demonstrated two different remotely-controlled robots equipped with cameras that law enforcement can use to help them assess the situation inside a residence or other building, if necessary. One of the robots can be thrown into the building while the other one, which looks like a mini-tank, can be driven into a building to assess a potentially dangerous situation. The sheriff’s office recently received the robots through grants.
Law enforcement can also communicate with suspects or other people remotely through the robots, Wiggins said.
Participant Robert Allain of Baldwin said he didn’t know what to expect going into the domestic violence response situation. Allain called the experience “eye-opening” to what law enforcement goes through.
Though the group experienced more excitement on their visit with St. Mary Parish Sheriff’s Office officials than previous Leadership St. Mary events, “every sector we’ve gone through has been unique in its own way,” he said.
Victoria Simoneaux of Franklin said each person in the group was faced with how quickly law enforcement must make decisions when responding to an incident in the line of duty.
“I commend them for the job they do because I know I couldn’t do it,” Simoneaux said. “I’m glad they’re there to protect us.”
New participants go through the Leadership St. Mary program each year.
The group meets once a month and every month is centered around different topics or events including tourism, health care, education and agriculture, Simoneaux said.

This story was written by Zachary Fitzgerald of The Daily Review staff. Reach him at zfitzgerald@daily-review.com.