Mike MacFadzen: Personality should never get in the way of investigations, supporting victims

To The Daily Sun,

My name is Mike MacFadzen, I am a Republican candidate for Belknap County Sheriff. This is the third in a series of informational letters to the voters.

For the sheriff’s department to work effectively there must be functional, professional, and productive relationships, not only with other law enforcement agencies but also non-law enforcement agencies. This would be groups like New Beginnings, Child Advocacy Center, local shelters, and church groups. This is important in dealing with homeless, mental health situations, drug cases, child victim cases and domestic violence cases. These relationships are important from the top down to make these difficult cases easier to for the deputies involved to do their jobs and provide resources and support for victims. The deputies in the field are doing well with these types of cases but they are having to jump hurdles that shouldn’t exist currently. This is especially true for child victim cases. Holding deputies back until the child makes a disclosure and then re-interviewing only further traumatizes the child. This is unacceptable and against all protocols for these types of investigations. Micromanagement and not having a clear understanding of how these cases are investigated, and the ability to develop professional relationships with others is currently impeding these cases.

Personality should never get in the way of investigations and supporting victims. Supporting victims and victims' rights should always be a priority for leadership. These relationships are the responsibility of leaders to develop and maintain so the deputies can effectively do their jobs and advocate for victims of crime. These same principles apply to domestic violence cases as well as moving people to recovery from drug and alcohol addiction. You do this by working with outside agencies and not being judgmental of people’s circumstances.

Mike MacFadzen

Laconia