Meet the city official: Cox proudly serves Kingston

Editor's note: The Madill Record is running a weekly segment about city and county officials in Marshall County.

KingstonPoliceChiefKasey Cox grew up in Kingston and graduated from Kingston High School in 2005. He is a self proclaimed “Jack-of-All-Trades”, who eventually found his path in life to his dream job of being in law enforcement.

Starting his career out at the Bryan County jail in 2010, then through many twists and turns, Cox made his way to Kingston Police Department working his way up the ranks to chief of police. Cox married Rebekah Cox in 2012, and together, they have two young daughters that they are proudly raising in Kingston. The Madill Record recently sat down with Cox for a short Q&A for the residents of Marshall County to get to know him.

Q: Within all the multiple apects of the training you have done for your position in law enforcement, especially dealing with mental health, do you feel that has helped you alot in your field, having that perspective?

A: “Absolutely, I definitely think that is a big issue. And I don’t think it has necessarily increased in the years. We just all have social media at our fingertips so it is more prevalent, you think. But there are a lot of people out there that will call us and are like this person is this or this or their doing this or this and you get there and you can just automatically tell that individual is schizophrenic or this person may have dementia or Alzheimer's. So the training definitely helps us, especially how we can provide assistance and whatever we need to them. Absolutely, I believe that training is necessary.”

Q: You are a big advocate for training for all the officers. You had pushed to have a gun range put in to help train the officers with emphasis on night training for the officers who work at night. How is that coming along?

A: “We got it. We got our shed out there, our carport. We were lucky and had some picnic tables donated to us from Atwoods. And we got our burm put up.It does need some finishing touches but it was thrown together for us to have a base. We have used it once to qualify. That's what the other issue is, we are such a small department. Since I have taken over I have tried to increase our funds, because a thousand rounds of ammo is costing us about $300 I try not to just… I’m trying to place the chess game and not checkers to keep us there so that we can do it more than once a year. Because I believe if you are a citizen and you rely on all eight of us and you have a situation where we had to come out and use our firearms, that you would have enough faith that we had enough training that we are actually going to hit what we were intending to hit. So over the years it was just once a year to quality. And ammunition is not cheap so it’s not like you can go out there all the time and do it and do it. So I do think it is a necessity that we do have more than once a year training. Ok well, everytime we were qualifying it was daytime. I work night shifts, I work evening shifts. I’m more of an evening shift guy, day into night so I get the best of both worlds. These guys don’t practice shooting at night, they don’t practice shooting out there with emergency lights flashing. I think they need that, so that is one thing that I wanted to strive for is get that set up so we can go out there at night and it’s since coming along.”

Q: You are very active in the community and enjoy teaching and training. You were just at the Kingston High School drivers education class prior to this interview, tell our readers what you were there to talk about. A: “ Our captain asked me to come out and speak to his driver ed. So we got some pamphlets. One is distracted driving and one is interacting with law enforcement. Now I do not have any problem with the media in our area. I get along very well with you guys. Get along very well with 10, 12. (The news channels) but not everything you see in the media is good. It must be true because it is not t.v. right? Not always the case. Especially what about these young minds, they're just coming in from a ball game or practice and they hear an officer killed this guy, without knowing all the facts. Well subconsciously in the back of their mind that’s kinda telling them their bad. How would it be if I say well because he is a bad civilian I treat you like a bad civilian too because of one person. I try to communicate with them that that is not the case. There are bad cops out there just like there are bad civilians. But we are not like that, and I have zero tolerance for it. But these guys need the information and like I said communication is key anywhere and everywhere. They are starting out in drivers ed, they haven’t gotten their license yet. Once they get their license they are like alright I’m independent and kinda free. Well subconsciously they get pulled over what kind of experience are they going to have. This is where I come in with interacting with law enforcement that just says a few things about being calm and polite, follow instruction, keep your hand in plain view, make slow and deliberate movements, do not interfere or obstruct the officer. Just key points of all this stuff. It doesn’t just say what we prefer. So just like it says in here (referring to a hand out) to turn off your car, I’ll tell the kids I’m not going to ask you to do that. Unless there is a reason I can not hear you or I think you are fixin’ to run, I won’t ask you to do that. Here is the important thing too, I tell these kids I speak from experience. That saying, let haters be your motivator, well I had a lot of haters back in the day. So I told the kids the story, of I was a senior I just got out of school, I got pulled over by an officer because my manufacturer's radio was too bright. I said guys have you ever hear the devils in the details. Ok now their curiosity is getting peaked, and I said that whole story what did see what was wrong. Back then I couldn’t tell you either. I didn’t know the law. You guys it was about this time, what time do you get out of school? Look outside what is it, daylight? So I said how could it be that you are pulling me over because my radio is too bright? These are reasons why we are here communicating and giving this stuff to you. With me being the chief of police here, I can make sure it doesn’t happen to these kids. These are your rights. They don’t know unless they are told. Some people aren’t going to tell you because they don’t want you to know. You gotta be transparent.I should hold myself accountable to respect your rights because I have those rights too. But if you don’t know your rights how can you know they are being violated? Hopefully I put something different in their minds, at least enough to do research and not have a bad experience like I did.”

Q: What motivated you to change your direction in life to pursue a career in law enforcement?

A: “So it’s always been there. I always watched cops and all this stuff and I've never been too fond of manual labor. I knew that wasn’t for me. I was working at Walmart because I had just left Haliburton. The assistant manager was like a trust fund kid the same age, a little bit older than me, but he was always saying, I don’t want to do this. I drive my parents corvette and I want to be a cop and do all this. Well you have this mentality I don’t want to see you in law enforcement. So it wasn’t something necessarily one thing but it was. I took it as you know what, I’m tired of telling people that I can’t do nothing and people like this can control it. Whether it is controlling you by stopping you and you not knowing the law and them getting what they want out of it. So I kinda took it as a just look, you just wait. So that is when I started working at the jail and trying to take the steps because I tried college. I’m not good at math, I can’t do algebra. I did it but I did it the hard knock way. Motivation just keeps growing, doing things like saving that little girl's life, I can spread that wealth.”

Q: Anything else you would like to say about Kingston and the community you serve?

A: “There is more to my job than just writing tickets and taking people to jail. I believe in this community and my team. We come together to take care of our community. I enjoy and love this community. I want this community to come together. We gotta interact with one another, whether it be through school, work, whatever the case, basketball games. Let’s be nice.Let’s get along with each other. Let’s quit focusing on the negative stuff, fighting and bickering and let’s enjoy our lives and enjoy our families. My door is open to all my guys, it’s open to you, to whoever is working at the convenience store down the road. I’m here, I’m not one of those chiefs who just shuts my door. I am truly here for the community and I truly care.”