YES, VIRGINIA, THERE ARE GOOD COPS

According to a September, 1957, article in Life magazine, many of the larger cities in America were dealing with major problems in their law enforcement agencies at that time: graft, kickbacks, racketeering of different kinds—the list goes on. In Miami, for instance, some members of a special squad assigned to investigate burglaries were suspended for—guess what? Committing burglaries.

Cincinnati, a city of slightly over a half million people in 1957, was a city with considerably less crime than many larger cities. Herbert Brean of Life profiled the Cincinnati Police Department in his lengthy, in-depth 1957 article entitled “A Really Good Police Force.” A major reason for the success of the CPD, and why it was considered possibly the best police force in the country, was its remarkable police chief, Stanley Schrotel, who served in that capacity from 1951-1967.

My “Augusta McKee Mystery Series” takes place in Cincinnati during the 1960s, a period during which I lived in that city. Not having any run-ins with the law, I knew very little about the Cincinnati Police Department until I began to write the books, at which time I came in contact with Lt. Stephen Kramer (ret.), who, when I started writing the series, was President of the Greater Cincinnati Police Historical Society and Museum. Thanks to him I have learned a lot in the past two and a half years, gaining a profound appreciation for Chief Schrotel, whose name comes up in many of my books in the series since one of my main characters is a homicide detective for the CPD.

In his Life article, Brean suggested that even some law enforcement officers don’t understand what the basic purpose of police work is: first, by constant surveillance to discourage misconduct by individuals, and second, to further discourage the potential wrongdoer with the knowledge that there will be swift and sure retaliation if he is apprehended.

Going one step further, the policeman’s job is to not simply “to help obtain a conviction, but to gather all facts, whether they incriminate or exonerate.” It is as much a cop’s duty to be sure that a suspect is not deprived of his rights as it is to obtain a conviction against him. “The policeman is the guardian of everybody’s rights, including the criminal.” This philosophy was successfully put into practice in Chief Schrotel’s Cincinnati. (Quotes from Brean’s article.)

It appears one reason this worked was because the community supported and cooperated with their police officers because they trusted them. It wasn’t unusual for an alert citizen to tip off the police about a crime in progress with the expected outcome the arrest of the perpetrators. It didn’t hurt that at that time in the city’s history, there was surprisingly little criminal activity. No organized crime, gambling, or houses of prostitution. (Note: all of that was available in Newport, Kentucky, just across the Ohio River, but that’s another story. You can read about that in my novels The Case of the Disappearing Director and The Case of the Purloined Professor.) As I remember Cincinnati, it was a place I never felt unsafe as both a college student and later, a young wife and mother. Remember, we’re talking decades ago.

One of Schrotel’s top priorities was described by Brean as “policing the citizen without arousing his antagonism.” According to the Life article, Schrotel was sensitive to any hint of police brutality, because he believed those most affected by it were the officers themselves. When a member of the CPD used force of any kind, he had to fill out a complete report, countersigned by his superior, as to the reasons for the incident. The perpetrator would also be taken to General Hospital for an examination if that was deemed appropriate, and photographs might be taken for use by a defense attorney. Schrotel wanted to avoid any sense of the “bully boy” authoritarian figure among his force. He himself was a quiet-spoken, erudite, and unfailingly polite man, addressing everyone as “sir” and “ma’am.”

Who was this remarkable “Top Cop,” anyway? A native Cincinnatian, he joined the force before he was twenty-one in 1934, during the Depression. He rose quickly through the ranks, eventually becoming a colonel, much to the consternation of the “old guard” members (Brean described them as “thick-necked, tobacco-chewing district captains and lieutenants who believed in toughness”), who viewed with suspicion the young man who set records with every exam he took. His grade on the Chief’s exam was 99.33. In 1951, at the age of 38 he became the youngest chief in CPD history.

Colonel Schrotel also proved himself capable in the field, solving a difficult murder and robbery case and later cleaning house in the department itself by putting an end to graft involving towing details. He suspended 45 police officers on his first day in office. He believed the effectiveness of a police force is dependent on the quality of its officers, not on heavy-handed tactics.

In addition, Chief Schrotel was known for his keen attention to detail, working tirelessly to improve procedures as much as possible in order to avoid wasted or duplicated effort.

A biography provided by Lt. Kramer has this to say about Chief Schrotel: “[He] wanted Cincinnati Police Officers to view themselves as the best in the nation.  Over a period of a few years, he did everything in his power to assure there was no better educated, trained, equipped, and dressed law enforcement agency in the country. 

“Furthermore, he treated individual officers as valuable assets. Once he met an officer, he would remember his name forever. Patrol personnel would often find him lurking, at any hour of the day or night, when they were responding to calls for service or initiating vehicle stops and the like. Sometimes he would watch from a block away and would call up the officer’s captain the next day with a report that the officer needed counseling or that he had done a good job.  He read every report and seemingly knew every detail about every incident, offense, or policeman.”

Over the years of his time as chief, many new practices were adopted, all to the betterment of the force. Chief Schrotel earned his law degree from Chase College of Law in Cincinnati in 1950, while he was working in the CPD. He was considered one of the finest police officers in the country, and a number of cities attempted to hire him. But Cincinnati was his home and he never left.

When he retired in 1967, after fifteen and a half years, one of his legacies was the importance of education for police officers. By 1978, over 60% of the force had some college, and 22% held master’s degrees.

This is my favorite story provided by Lt. Kramer about Colonel Schrotel, and what kind of police officer and man he was. Keep in mind, this was in the early 1950s-late 1960s.

“Colonel Schrotel altered the practice, or at least the tradition, of black officers being assigned to only black neighborhoods and expected to interact only with black violators. Lillian Grigsby, a black female hired as a Policewoman in 1947, was assigned to a black neighborhood one day and looking for truants and wayward children. She ventured into the downtown area and spotted three white Northern Kentucky boys coming from a movie theater and rounded them up. One of their fathers complained to the Chief and Colonel Schrotel asked him to come to his office. Before he arrived, he also asked Policewoman Grigsby to sit in on the meeting. Policewoman Grigsby feared that she would be made to apologize to the boy’s father—or worse. When the father arrived, registered his complaint, including that she was a female and black and should not be arresting his son, Colonel Schrotel looked at her and then at the man and simply told him that she was not a black officer, or a female officer. She was a Cincinnati police officer, trained as a Cincinnati officer, and paid to locate violators such as his son, regardless of the neighborhood or color of their skin. Thereafter, black officers were assigned to all neighborhoods. And, still later, he directed that districts deploy mixed race double-cars.”

There are good men and women out there, many of them already serving as police officers in this country. They need to be given the opportunity to “protect and serve” in the right way. They need our support and appreciation. And they need professional, respected leadership to guide them. The history of Chief Schrotel and the Cincinnati Police Department is proof that policing can be the vocation it should be.

Colonel Stanley Schrotel

Police Chief, Cincinnati, Ohio, 1951-1967