Clackamas County Sheriff's Office

The Clackamas County Sheriff's Office is the law enforcement agency led by the elected Sheriff of Clackamas County, Oregon and provides police services to unincorporated portions of Clackamas County and contracts police services to the incorporated cities of Wilsonville, Estacada, Happy Valley, and Damascus. The Sheriff is the jailer of Clackamas County and operates the Clackamas County Jail.

History

The first Sheriff in the Oregon Territory was William Livingston Holmes. He was elected to the position in 1845 and served until 1852. Holmes was the first of 32 Sheriffs in the county. William C. Dement was elected as the second Sheriff, lasting nearly one year before resigning. He later served on the Oregon City Commission in 1861. When Dement left, Holmes was appointed to serve out the term until Septimus Heulat, a man with a long law enforcement background, was elected Sheriff.

Almond Holcomb followed Heulat with two one-year terms. When he left, he became Justice of the Peace in Oregon City in 1860. Lewis Day was Sheriff of Clackamas County for only one year followed by John Towson Thomas, who was elected to a two-year term from 1860 to 1862. William P. Burns served for six years after being elected in 1862. Before taking over as Sheriff, he was Oregon City marshal.

John Myers, the former Sheriff of Stanislaus County in California from 1856 to 1860, was elected to the Clackamas County position in 1868 and was Sheriff for two years. Arthur Warner followed Myers when he was elected Sheriff in 1870 and was Sheriff of the county until 1872.

Absalom Fouts Hedges became the county's 1lth Sheriff when he was elected to the office in 1872. His term lasted two years until John T. Apperson was elected in 1874. Apperson resigned on May 11, 1878. Thomas M. Miller was appointed to take Apperson's place for two months. Pillsbury was elected and served from July 1878 to 1882.

Adolphus Schoeps was elected Sheriff in 1882, serving until 1884. William Knight was elected in 1884, serving for four years. William W.H. Samson served until the election of Charles W. Ganong, a blacksmith who made the county's first Oregon Boot, a metal inmate detention device, was elected Sheriff for a two-year term from 1892 to 1894. He was followed by Eli Cook Maddock, who was elected to a two-year term. George W. Grace served a two-year term from 1896 to 1898. John J. Cooke was Sheriff of Clackamas County from 1898 to 1902.

He was followed by John R. Shaver was killed in the line of duty. Shaver was murdered while conducting a homicide investigation an escaped prisoner named Smith in Woodbum on April 29, 1906. Robert Breckenridge Beatie was appointed to take Shaver's place and then was elected two times.

Ernest T. Mass was elected in 1911 and was Sheriff for four years followed by William J. Wilson, who was the first of three sheriffs to spend more than 10 years in office. Mass was back again in 1925, serving as Sheriff until 1941. He was followed by Noble Fred Reaksecker, who was Clackamas County Sheriff until 1957.

Joseph Everett Shobe was elected Sheriff five times, spending 20 years as the Sheriff. Before he took office in 1957, Shobe was an Oregon City policeman from 1935 to 1941 and a Clackamas County Sheriff's deputy from 1941 to 1957.

John R. Renfro, a former deputy, served a four-year term after Shobe left office. He returned to being a deputy with the department after his term ended in 1981. Paul McAllister, a former trooper with the Oregon State Police, was elected to a four-year term but resigned after serving only two years.

Bill Brooks, was appointed to fill the vacancy left by McAllister in 1983. Brooks was elected to the position in 1984 and again in 1989. The Sheriff's since Bill Brooks have been Ris Bradshaw, H. Pat Detloff and the current Sheriff, Craig Roberts, elected in 2004.

Source: A History of the Oregon Sheriffs 1841-1991 by Linda McCarthy and published by the Oregon Sheriff's Association

Services

Patrol

The patrol division provides call response, traffic enforcement and crime detection activities. The patrol division has several specialized units including a Motor Enforcement Unit, a Special Weapons and Tactics Team, and the Clackamas Interagency Task Force.

Corrections

The Clackamas County Jail is the only county correctional facility. It employs 127 full and part-time employees. The Jail’s budget for fiscal year 2005-06 is approximately $16.5 million. Approximately 16,000 offenders are booked into and processed at the Clackamas County Jail annually.

Civil

The Civil Division is comprised of law enforcement officers and support staff that maintain the security of the Clackamas County courthouse, transport inmates to and from court, perform extraditions and interfacility transports, and serve papers that are part of civil processes that include restraining orders.

Investigations

The Detective Division is primarily utilized as investigative support for the Patrol Division. Personnel assigned to detectives possess special skills in interviewing, crime scene investigations, warrant preparation, evidence collection and preservation, and surveillance activities. CCSO has the following units in detectives: Child Abuse Team, Computer Forensic Unit, Crime Reconstruction and Forensic Team, Crime Scene Investigation, Domestic Violence Enhanced Response Team, Forensic Imaging, Homicide and Violent Crimes Unit, Property Crimes Unit, and Special Investigations Unit.

Search and Rescue

Because of Mount Hood and other extensive outdoor recreational areas in Clackamas County, the Clackamas County Sheriff's Office maintains an extensive search and rescue capability. Sheriff's Office personnel do not conduct the actual search activities, but instead conduct complicated coordination activities of different search and rescue organizations.

Administrative Services

The Administrative Services Division provides personnel and records support to the other divisions of the Clackamas County Sheriff's Office.

Public Safety Training Center

The Public Safety Training Center is a 22,300-square-foot (2,070 m²) facility was completed in 1998 and is named in memory of the late James T. Brouillette who was a retired Portland Police officer and the director of the criminal justice program at Clackamas Community College. The facility was built by the Clackamas Community College. It Brouillette's idea that there be a regional firearms and law enforcement training facility and shooting range for sports enthusiasts.

In 2004, the Clackamas County Sheriff's Office took over ownership of the PSTC. The PSTC provides an indoor firing range that is used by both law enforcement agencies and the public. The PSTC offers public fingerprinting services and the Sheriff's Office Concealed Handgun Licensing Program.

Established: 1845

Jurisdiction: Clackamas County, Oregon

Employees: 370

Stations: North Station (Administration), South Station (Patrol), John R. Shaver Building (Investigations), Wilsonville Station (Patrol)

Jail: Clackamas County Jail 2206 Kaen Road, Oregon City, Oregon

Airplanes: 1 Fixed Gear Cessna 182 (Operated by Part Time Aero Unit)

Police Boats: 4 ((1) 24' Duckworth, (1) 22' Jetcraft, (1) 21' Jetcraft, (1) 19'

Elected Sheriff: Craig Roberts

External links

http://www.clackamas.us/sheriff/