Allen Police: Behind the Badge

Officer Chris Hester's Magical Journey

• Allen Police Department • Season 1 • Episode 3

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Officer Chris Hester from the Allen Police Department is here to tell us about his two-decade journey in law enforcement, filled with unexpected twists and a touch of magic. Alongside co-hosts Officer Sam Rippamanti and Alexus Birmingham, Chris recounts the experiences and tight-knit bonds formed on the force, encapsulating the lighter, human side of policing. Get ready to laugh as Chris shares a humorous first meeting with Sam and the story of his own apartment being broken into, providing a unique perspective on the unpredictable nature of life behind the badge.

We also learn about the comprehensive training that prepares officers for the unexpected. As well as Chris revealing how classic TV shows fueled his passion for law enforcement as a child. Adding a sprinkle of wonder, Chris performs an astonishing card trick, demonstrating how magic is used to educate and engage. This episode is a blend of humor, heartfelt stories, and a dash of the extraordinary, offering a rich insight into the lives of police officers.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

Welcome back to another episode of Allen Police. Behind the Badge, we're your host Officer, Sam Rippamanti and Alexus Birmingham.

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

And today our special guest is Officer Chris Hester. Thank you for coming on today.

Officer Chris Hester:

Hello, hey, thanks for having me, hey, Chris.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

So tell us a little bit about what you do for the police department.

Officer Chris Hester:

So I'm currently the training coordinator and I've been up there for a little over three years and I've been with the department 19 years and two months. And who's counting?

Officer Chris Hester:

Teah, right, exactly who's counting. And you know, originally I had no desire to be in training. And it's interesting how I came to this position, because everyone's like, hey, Delio is going to leave. And we kind of traded places because now he's in community relations and I was an SRO. But in between, I was in community relations and I was an SRO, but in between, you know, I was in community relations before going to SRO and I said no, no, no, you know, I like doing what I'm doing. It was Arsenal at the time he was the sergeant in internal affairs, come up here, come work for me, and all that. He just kept harping on me. And then finally he's like all right, I'll do it. And two people had put in for it and then the other person withdrew. So I saw the chief in the parking lot one day and he said, hey, congrats on being the new training coordinator. And I said, no, sir, I haven't had the board yet. No, he goes, you're the training coordinator.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

That's one way to wind up.

Officer Chris Hester:

That's how that happened, but no, it's a great position and a joy to do.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

So tell me some interesting stuff over your 19 years. That's a lot of experience.

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah Well, first of all, I think we need to talk about how me and Sammy met.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

I remember, I remember well.

Officer Chris Hester:

Because this is the best story. So I'm in the report room and I'm at 19 years. Are you at 17 years? Yes, may will be 18. Okay, so I'd been on the streets for two years, right, and definitely not a senior officer at that point. But Sammy sits down next to me and he was in field training, I think. Yeah, I was in field training and I was stressing.

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah, For the listeners. Back then our report writing room had four computers. It was four workstations and they're all side by side just in one long row, and I'm sitting down and I'm typing a report, a DWI report, something along those lines, and Sammy's typing with one finger on each hand. He's kind of pecking away there and he goes uh, officer Hester, and that shows you how informal it was at the time, cause we're definitely not like that with each other. Now he goes how do you spell holler? And I was like wait, what?

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

Holler.

Officer Chris Hester:

And I was like down in the holler and uh like H O L L E R and he goes. No, she was. She was hollering at him, she was uh writing a, I guess, a domestic report. So that that was our first interaction it was a.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

It was a family violence report. I remember it and and she was hollering at him and I had to type it in the report and he's like, well, why don't you use another word? Like she screamed at him, she yelled yeah oh, that might make more.

Officer Chris Hester:

I started giving him some options, but I'm from salina so I was like, okay, I can definitely relate to this, so that it was like instant bond that was back when it was uh, four officers and one supervisor on night shift, oh wow yeah, there was four oh, we we call it four and two to be in the supervisors, and they would just cut the city, you know, into four quadrants kind of, and we each had a corner and if it was on a call, we'd all be in the same place looking around, going oh, something else happens. So that that shows how far we've come, as far as you know just how many officers we have on the street. But it also means we worked really close with each other, cause if there are only two of you on one side of the city, on how you know, on that side of highway 75, we were pretty much going to every call together if it's a two man call and most of them are, so we've got a lot. I have a favorite. It might be one of the same ones that you're thinking of too. Let's hear it.

Officer Chris Hester:

So my apartment was broken into. It's going back to 2008.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

And so that night we're working night shift and that back then shift didn't start till 10 pm. So we worked 10 pm to 8 am and and chris, I remember he's like man, I'm gonna take off early, since at that time we had five officers, we had a rover, so if we had five, one of us could leave early if we ever want it. So I remember chris was like I'm gonna take off early, go home, play some video games. And he was a single guy at the time so he had all this extra time to do stuff and uh, so he left early and got home and everything. He didn't have any video games. Somebody had. We laugh now, at the time it was pretty. Yeah, we were pretty upset, all for him. Somebody broke into his apartment and stole all of his so I had electronics.

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah, I'd moved into that apartment about a week prior so I didn't have time to get the renter's insurance going. Plus, you're working night shift patrol, so you're sleeping when everything's open, right. So I'm like, just get my stuff in there. I'd barely unpacked about halfway unpacked maybe, and someone must have knew that I worked at night, you know. But anyway, long story short, I come home and I can see my door cracked about that far and you can see where they pried it. I'm like, here we go. So I go in and I mean, if it wasn't nailed down it was gone. They didn't take clothes or anything, but I play guitar, so electric guitar, multiple guitars were taken. You know TV, video games, computer digital camera, all that stuff, computer digital camera, all that stuff. So that's the precursor.

Officer Chris Hester:

We have to tell that part of the story to tell this next part of the story on how this came to be. Um, so we were working. I guess I would have been on the east side, so I don't know if you were on the east side too, to back me up, or if you crossed over. I don't remember that part.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

I remember getting a. I don't know back then if it was an mdc message or a text message, but I got a message from him. He said hey, my apartment complex like now. So I fly over there to the apartment complex to back Chris up.

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah, this is a couple of weeks maybe after the incident had happened and it really made me empathetic, which I already was. But when you have it happen to you, it's so violating to have someone come into your space and I wanted to make sure that it didn't happen to anybody else. So I'm that's part of my district, so I would go, and you know this is the crown Vic days, so you'd black your vehicle out or, you know, park under where there's not a street light and I'm watching and I see a car come into the apartment complex and the guy parks at, you know, building 14 and cuts his lights off and gets out and he's like sneaking down, you know, passing building 16, 17, going right toward building 18, which is where I lived, and I'm just watching him. I think that's the moment where I'm sending Sammy a message on the MDC. You know, hey, you may want to head this way and I was watching and observing.

Officer Chris Hester:

So he goes and this guy crouches down next to an apartment window and it looks like he's messing. I mean, from the observer standpoint you would think this guy's breaking into an apartment or doing something he shouldn't be doing, so he's messing with the window seal. I'm pretty far away, maybe 40, 50 yards away, and he can't see me. So I'm waiting and he messes with it a little bit and then he sneaks back to his car, gets in his car and by that time I'm rolling behind him. You know we're going to try to knock him down and get a traffic stop and at least see what he's up to. And that's when Sammy backed him up.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

You know it's suspicious behavior. So I think he had a traffic violation too when he was leaving. And so Officer Hester pulls him over and he's like all right, we're, it's for good cop, bad cop here. So chris is going to be stern and then I'm going to come in and be like hey, man, it's okay, and try to get him to make sure he's not really trying to break into houses. But it's almost like the movies. I get up there and I'm now all of a sudden I'm feeding off of chris and we're both like what are you doing? We know you're trying to break into that apartment and this poor kid, he's a teenager. We say kid, he's. You know he's probably 17.

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah, 17, 17 or 18. And, um, you know all the signs were there of nervousness. So you know he's like shaking voices, quivering, and uh, it's which amplifies the suspicion. Right, I'm like, okay, I saw you drive in, cut your lights out, you walked three or four buildings at 3 am in the morning. What are you doing? Messing with someone's window? Like none of this adds up. You weren't just visiting a friend, kind of thing. And then Sammy's jumping in. I feel bad now because I think he ended up crying, the kid starts crying.

Officer Chris Hester:

He finally breaks down and we're like-oh, he's not a burglar, yeah, and he goes. Sir, can I be honest with you? I was. My girlfriend broke up with me and I'm just leaving her a love note and a mixtape of our favorite songs for the cd and I was like, no, you weren't, and you know, because I'm still trying to get him to admit you know because it wasn't.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

We didn't believe it at the time. It was like you're you're messing with windows at three o'clock in the morning. Yeah, who does?

Officer Chris Hester:

that, apparently, if you're heartbroken heartbroken you do, so we let him go with a warning and you know, just kind of hey, don't come back doing this kind of stuff. Or if you do anything like that, come back in the daytime. Of course we go back and look, sure enough, on the window seal there's like two I don't remember the girl's name there's a love note and there's a CD and a CD with a rock on top, all their favorite songs. There's still a chance. They worked it out. Who knows, maybe they're listening.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

It ended on good note with the young man. We had a good conversation after that and explained to him why it looked suspicious and he understood and and then we tried to offer a little bit of advice on his relationship and uh, so it all ended well.

Officer Chris Hester:

So let's talk a little bit about what a training coordinator does for the department yeah, so, um, so, initially, when they approached me about it, uh, you know, because I I liked what I did as an SRO and especially in community relations, because it's a different side of policing, you know it's it's Sergeant Felty used to say it's it's easier to prevent a crime than to solve a crime. So get out there and prevent some crime, right, and I kind of had it in my head that as an SRO, you know we're doing good with these kids, mentoring them, and, um, you know, I really wasn't ready to leave that I don't think. But what made me change my mind is I was thinking about okay, how important is training to what we do, to the police department, to the city, to the citizens? It's the most important thing. If you don't have well-trained officers, then you don't have the best service that you can get.

Officer Chris Hester:

So when I thought about it that way, that's what made me think okay, you know, being a training coordinator because, your heart has to be in it, you have to believe in what you're doing, and so I said, okay, I'll do it, and I dove into it. So really, in a nutshell, it's making sure that the officers are equipped to encounter anything that they're going to encounter on the street, and it could be everything from in-service training, where we use our in-house instructors to teach things, we bring in someone from the outside and we get requests. All the time An officer will say, hey, can you bring in this organization or this group? We'd like to have some training in this, and you know it's working along those lines. And then you know there's state compliance, making sure that everybody has their, you know, hours of continuing education, but really that's what it is.

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

It's supplying the officers with their needs from a training perspective. How long is like the training? How long does it get for like from new recruits or the lateral process.

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah, that's been. That just changed recently and we had some state changes as well. So, for those that's listening, she's referencing, if we have someone that comes in and they're a new recruit, they have no police experience whatsoever and they want to become a police officer and there's a pathway to that and then we'll hire one of the agencies that will hire someone and support them while they're doing that. So you'll get paid as we sponsor you to go to the academy and that's about currently the academy's 29 weeks. So we'll bring you on a couple weeks early just to make sure that everything's ready to go. Um, we'll do some things with physical preparation, physical fitness, because that's a big aspect of what we're doing, to kind of prepare them for that. And then, once they get out, they have six weeks with me where I, uh, I do more training. We, we host a mini academy.

Officer Chris Hester:

Um, the different agencies will call them different things, but we call it mini academy, and then that prepares them for field training. And then, if you're an out-of-state lateral or an in-state lateral, there's different requirements for them depending on what you're doing. So out-of-state lateral would be six weeks with us and that's after they've taken the state exam. There's all these courses that they have to take to prepare them for the state exam, including in-person. So they add trainings every two years when they go to the legislative session. They usually add training requirements, which is a good thing because you can't train enough, but there's different processes for all that. So I kind of coordinate all three of those things and Jason, our other training coordinator, who just started helping with that, he's taken a lot of the in-service training which includes block training and that's just where we take officers and we have them, you know, train for a 40-hour period. We consider that their work week and they go and they do their firearms training, defensive tactics training, all that. So there's a lot of moving pieces to it.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

Do we have any openings right now? We have three. Oh, we do, really we. Do you know of any test dates coming up or anything like that?

Officer Chris Hester:

Well, we have an academy coming up June. So for someone that wants to get into it and they're not an officer, june 10th is the academy start date. We use the Plano Richardson Academy partner with them and we kind of do tests on an as-needed basis. When we got hired, you'd have 300 people show up and you'd have one test and then for several months there wouldn't be another test. And now, as Laura receives, you know, interest Laura's our background investigator, one of them she'll set up tests to kind of accommodate three or four people that have put in for it.

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

Now we know what you do for the department, but tell me a little bit about yourself. Who's Chris Hester?

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah, so I grew up in Salina, so I haven't strayed that far.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

And I lived there. Yeah, state champion.

Officer Chris Hester:

Sammy lived there for a bit, lived there until I was 19 and moved out. I was raised by my grandparents they're both passed now but you know, I what I think is a different childhood than most kids, just because my, my parents were so much older and, uh, you know, I spent all my time going to antique shops and listening to Merle Haggard, you know, and everyone else you know, their parents are in their twenties and their elementary school and all that, and you know mine are in their fifties and by the time you get to high school they're older. But uh, but no, I wouldn't change any of that. So I grew up fishing a lot. We had a single wide trailer at Lake Texoma that we go to pretty much every weekend and all summer and that's kind of what connected me to Sammy, because you know, after the whole how do you spell holler thing, and I knew he'd like to fish, because no one speaks like that and not like to fish.

Officer Chris Hester:

So I grew up running jugs on Texoma, catfishing, all that crappie fishing, but I always wanted to be a police officer. It was all I ever wanted to do and I blame andy griffith because growing up my grandpa, you know, we watched all those uh shows, green acres and petticoat junction of the younger listeners. I have no idea what I'm talking about. Um, but yeah, watched andy griffith and cops a lot. So you get lured into the action of cops and you're like, oh, it's like this all the time. Then you become one. You're like it's not like this all the time at all.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

You come to allen, we're in the winter time, we're counting the rabbits.

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah, at night, yeah, because it's so many bobcats you see in the alley, no, which is a good thing, old alley, um. But but it comes in waves and, uh, you do get to experience all that, and just not not as it's portrayed on tv, um. So so, mentally, I always just prepared myself that this is what I wanted to do. I just didn't know where it would take place. And, um, I sold insurance for three years 18 months with Nationwide and 18 months with farmer's insurance and learned a lot. But I was like this is not for me, I don't really care for being in an office.

Officer Chris Hester:

And here I am, 19 years later doing training Exactly. So, yeah, I came full circle, but I think it prepared me a lot. But as soon as I turned 21, I just started applying and I applied for Allen. I applied for another agency that I won't mention and Allen gave me the job offer first and it's funny because Laura was the background investigator at the time who hired me and then she was my field training officer, so my FTO, and then now we work together, so she's the background investigator again and then I'm the ones that train the employees that she hires.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

So that's awesome so you play the guitar. What other hobbies you got? I know of one yeah, there's one, the.

Officer Chris Hester:

The rumors are true. Word got around. I kept that secret for a long time. Uh, so, no, I'm a, I'm a magician and I'm a professional magician. Now I can say that, but I used to just love magic. So when I was a kid, I saw a magic show on TV. It's called World's Greatest Magic and it came on every Thanksgiving around that time right. So I'd seen it one year and the next year I knew it was going to come on. So I'm going to put a VHS tape on and record it. So I record it. I recorded it over a karate tournament that I had. Like a childhood memory is gone because I recorded this TV show. I used to watch this tape all the time and, uh, you know, I I didn't know how any of these guys did this stuff, but it it was phenomenal to me.

Officer Chris Hester:

I knew it was sleight of hand and um, it's a performing art and uh, I always just kind of did it as a hobby on the side. So I've become a police officer and it was a different persona when you get to work, you, I become a police officer and it was a different persona when you get to work. You know, there's an assertiveness to it, and there has to be. So I never went around saying, hey, I do magic tricks, you know, pick a card right, that kind of stuff, and I can't remember when the first I don't know when word spread, you know it spreads like wildfire Once one officer knows, then everyone's like hey, show me some magic.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

Hey, you do magic tricks, show me something. The first time I remember seeing you do magic we were doing a tip-a-cop for Special Olympics and we were at Cheddar's and he had these little red balls in his hand and he's walking around tables and I'm like what is he doing with those? Next thing, you know, they're disappearing. And I'm locked in Like I forget what I'm doing. I'm locked in Like I forget what I'm doing. I'm supposed to be serving drinks and helping out and I'm just watching him, following him, watching him do magic at all the tables, because it was the coolest thing to watch. He'd slide a hand with those little red balls. I mean, I think it's slide a hand. Maybe they really just care, I don't know.

Officer Chris Hester:

See, I started to tell our supervisor at the time in community relations we used to do tip a cop every year in, um, you know, benefits, special Olympics. And I said, hey, can I do some magic? Cause I think I could really. You know it'll help, um, you know, just with the entertainment aspect and the tips and everything. No-transcript at that point, but no, it went really well and I think that was one of the times where the secret was out.

Officer Chris Hester:

And then that was long before I became a school resource officer, so by that point I did magic all the time, so I would do magic for the kids. I even put together a program while I was at SRO and it was called make a good informed choice. Magic right came up with the acronym and so we did shows for and this was kind of the beginning of COVID, because I remember performing with a mask on, you know, until the kids got in and everyone was separated. But I, we did full magic shows for the kids, just teaching them safety things, you know how to make good informed choices. A lot of what we did in community relations because we go to the would have led me up to this point, Like I don't think I would be doing magic 20 years ago had I not gone through this path other than a hobby.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

Right. So where are you at in your magic now? Like, what are you doing with it now?

Officer Chris Hester:

So about 14 years ago I started doing magic, I say professionally.

Officer Chris Hester:

You know, on the side someone could hire you to perform for them, did a lot of corporate work, a lot of kids' birthday parties too many to count, probably and but that led me to things like performing for the Dallas Cowboys, performed for Ross Pro Jr, hillwood Airways, hilton. I mean they're like corporate companies that will hire you to go and perform magic and that's really how I honed a lot of my magic skill, because you, you perform for these people and you know there's some CEOs that will just say, okay, show me what you got and impress me. Right, it's not your typical magic audience where you go up and it's a family and you know they, they're eager to see what you do. So you have to get really good, you know, to perform for those, uh, so those kind of people. So I just kept following my passion and, um, so we recently opened a magic venue, um, up in oklahoma. So I I do magic on the side, outside of this, and it's kind of like having two full-time jobs but neither of them really feel like feel like work.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

You oh wow, that sounds exhausting. It is so. We've talked a lot about it and I know for everyone that's listening, you can't really see it, but do you have anything you could, any magic you could do for us?

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah, does anyone happen to have a deck of cards? Oh look, I just happen to have some right here, hey what do you know?

Officer Chris Hester:

I think life takes you down a path, right. Sometimes we don't expect it. I met my wife working for the Allen Police Department, right, and I think back, if I would have went with that other agency let's say that other agency gave me the job offer I wouldn't have the kids that I have now. I wouldn't have the friends that I have now. I mean, you can call that what you will, but I think destiny, fate.

Officer Chris Hester:

So I'm going to try something and, for the listeners, I'm holding a deck of cards here and I'm going to do this for you. So, alexis, I want you to. In a deck of cards, there's high cards and there's low cards, okay, and I want you to just go instinctively, so just like subconsciously, don't think about it too much, but I want you to choose one of them Now, I'm not going to eliminate. So if you say high cards, I won't say, oh, we'll eliminate the high cards. If I want you to take a low card, like, whatever you choose is what we're going to use, okay, okay. So if you say high cards, we'll keep the high cards. If you say low cards, we'll keep the low cards. It doesn't matter to me which high cards.

Officer Chris Hester:

She wants to keep the high cards. It could be 7, 8, 9, 10, jack Queen King, and then the low cards would be Ace 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, somewhere along those lines. Doesn't really matter, because we're going to take it a step further. So of the high cards, so let's say, just to be sure, let's say 8, 9, 10, jack Queen King. Is that fair to say those are high cards? Yeah, yes, and I wouldn't expect you to pick the ace of spades because it's on the front of the deck, it's the one that she can see right now and it's also the most common card that people select. So if I said name a card, you said ace of spades and I could predict that not as impressive. But of the high cards, there's eight, nine, ten, jack, ten, jack, queen king. Which one would you like to use?

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

Am I supposed to tell you?

Officer Chris Hester:

Yes.

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

Nine.

Officer Chris Hester:

The nine? Yes, Okay. So of the nine, there's clubs, hearts, spades and diamonds. Two of them are red, two of them are black. Okay, would you like to use a black nine or a red nine, Red, the red nine? So of the red nines and this is completely fair there's the heart or the diamond, and it's completely up to you which one would you like to use.

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

Heart.

Officer Chris Hester:

So there's the nine of hearts. Do you want to change your mind?

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

Nope.

Officer Chris Hester:

Okay, so she just picked the nine of hearts. What drew you to the nine of hearts?

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

Just chose the card, she just chose it.

Officer Chris Hester:

You didn't have any conscious thought about it, right? It's not your favorite card, it just felt right in the moment Because there's something interesting about the nine of hearts. We're going to come back to that.

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

Okay.

Officer Chris Hester:

But on the back of the cards. It has some things written on the back.

Officer Chris Hester:

Oh my gosh so on the back of the ace of hearts, for example, it says grand prairie, because any of us could have worked there, right, chief die came from. There is a history there, but you didn't choose that one. Um, this one says frisco. That would be the eight of hearts. You're one off. Frisco is actually the be the Eight of Hearts. You were one off. Frisco was actually the other agency that I applied for when Alan hired me. So you were one off from choosing that one.

Officer Chris Hester:

You could have chose Richardson, which would have been the Six of Clubs. I'll go through these pretty quick. There's Plano, which is the Five of Clubs. Garland is the Five of Hearts. Grapevine, carrollton you can see they're all different. Royce City. There's Farmersville it was actually tough to find 52 towns in this area to fill out an entire deck of cards. If there's Waxahachie, that would have been the ace of clubs. Highland Park, you could have gone with the eight of diamonds. You can see they're all different. There's no duplicates. There's no other nine of hearts, but you pick the nine of hearts and I think life is an interesting way of leading us to a place that says alan on the phone, and it does so on the back of the nine of hearts city of alan wow, I'm a little lost here.

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

What just happened?

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

for those that listening, go watch the youtube video, and it watched that.

Officer Chris Hester:

I'm not sure how this happens, uh, but she's going back and rethinking like did he make me choose? Watch the high cards?

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

and make me see what happened. Yeah, that's. It's kind of like the one when we were in chipotle and you spelt my name using Wikipedia.

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah, so that was random. That was kind of our first meeting we had met in passing. But me, you and Sammy all had lunch together at Chipotle. Delia was there, and even them. They were kind of like hey, we don't really see you do magic all that much at work. It's like because I'm working, show us something.

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

And he so happened to have a deck in his pocket too, so you have to always be prepared. But yeah, that one was a pretty cool trick. You guys need to go and watch his show.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

Oh, it's one of the best experiences with. Chris's magic at work. So we do our Citizen Police Academy twice a year, chris's magic at work. So we do our Citizen Police Academy twice a year and one of the nights it's DWI investigation, traffic investigation night, where we actually and so we bring in volunteers that have participated in Citizen Police Academy in the past and it's very monitored. We drive them there, we take them home, but we actually they drink and then they go in and we actually do field sobriety testing so our citizens get to see the effects of what alcohol will do. Well, we'd let them have a few drinks in their controlled environment and then we'd bring Chris in to do magic before we took them. And, oh, minds blown in that room. But Chance Graves also minds blown in there. But Chance Graves was also would be in there because he was one of the chaperones for that and he's completely sober on duty and he was. I think his mind was blown, usually more than the drinker.

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah, chance is always looking over the shoulder of the drinkers and I would just see his eye. You know, wait, do that again. Wait, I'm like who am I performing for here? He would get so mad. Yeah, he couldn't figure it out. And the more they drink, the easier the magic gets, for me at least. Right, you know, when you're sober it's a little bit tougher, but no chances is falling. Wait, what'd you want to catch you? And then it becomes a challenge because chance is very analytical.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

He's the puzzle solver yeah, but he never figured them out, as far as I know.

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah, he came up to a show recently and I got his sons up on stage. What's the name of your theater? Hester's Theater of Magic, and that's just a tribute to my grandfather. So growing up he was a mechanic. So he quit school at about seven years old, third grade or so, to go work on his grandma's farm. To go work on his grandma's farm and that's how he learned to fix trucks and tractors, because his grandparents, you know they needed help and something would break down and he would be looking over his grandpa's shoulder trying to figure out how does this work.

Officer Chris Hester:

So I always say he's the smartest man I ever met, for you know, being I don't want to say uneducated, but leaving school at seven years old and he was self-employed, he did his own taxes, he could read, write, all that and he was brilliant, he could fix anything. I mean he worked on. He used to have trophies in the back of his automotive shop and I asked him one day, you know, I said, daddy, what are the trophies for? He goes, well, that was a race car that I worked on and they won first place. Bring him all kinds of stuff to to work on. But his automotive shop was called Hester's Rebuilders and I thought well, if I open a place, what would you call it Just Hester's Theater?

Officer Chris Hester:

in this, but I tack on of magic so people know what it is.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

That's pretty cool, and his shops. It was in downtown Solano for a long long time, yeah.

Officer Chris Hester:

Up until a couple long time, yeah, up until a couple years ago. So my uncle, my grandfather, passed away in 2010. And that was right when I was about to go in community relations and I can say this for the listeners on how much work feels like family. So, um, sammy, sergeant Felty, I think, uh, bob, at the time, maybe Chance um came to the funeral and uh, or the visitation, and um, and that it's hard for anybody to go through that. That was the hardest time of my life and I'm going through this pivotal moment. You know, in my career. I'm going to go to this other unit and I didn't really know these guys all that much other than I knew Sammy, probably better than all of them, but I hadn't really worked with the other ones and there they were, you know. So that, so that meant a lot.

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

So, speaking about the community, if you could tell our viewers or the city of Allen one thing, what would it be?

Officer Chris Hester:

I would say one. I would say thanks for the support, because we've been so blessed in a police department that for the majority who've had so much support throughout the years and even in times, or on a national scale, that hasn't been the case. It's always been the case. Here, you get people coming up to your window all the time when you're on patrol. You know knocking on the window. I just want to say thank you for your service. I want to buy your meal.

Officer Chris Hester:

You know that makes a huge difference. It really does, um, so I would just say thank you, I mean, for making this 19 year career, um, you know, enjoyable, safe, you know, I I feel relatively safe on the streets of Allen, who got amazing coworkers for backup, but just citizens as well, but just the citizens as well. And then, from a training standpoint, I mean from a training coordinator standpoint, um, you know, I would just say that the it's an amazing department. I mean one of the best trained in the country. I would say, and I think that has a trickle down effect. I think that, um, you know, that affects the quality of life here and, um, we couldn't do it without the resident support.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

Is there anything new to your unit? Anything as far as the hiring process?

Officer Chris Hester:

Yeah, we've got a lot of changes just from Chief coming in and he's ambitious and he's got a lot of good ideas, a lot of good vision on where he wants to take the police department. We've already implemented a lot of those changes and we have a new police department coming down the pipeline and we're going to implement a lot of those changes. And, um, you know, we have a new police department coming down the pipeline and you know we're going to implement a lot of things that will give us a little more freedom on scheduling as far as because right now we we use a lot of in-house venues but we also use, um you know, off-site locations for some training. But we're going to have everything from our own defensive tactics mat room, a permanent mat room where you don't have to put the mats out to train, they're just always there, kind of a jiu-jitsu style, everything from virtual reality, use of force simulators you know all that is kind of in the plans.

Officer Chris Hester:

From a fitness standpoint, you know a big part of the police training overall. You know our fitness initiative which got talked about. I think our fitness initiative which got talked about, I think in both episodes it has made a huge difference and the equipment. We just opened the police gym, the other police gym, the CrossFit gyms, and now we have one at the police department that we can train at and we have the offsite. So a lot of those big changes. And then, just as far as standards go, raising standards, you know, for the new hires that are coming in, because we want the best and you know, when you have the best, you're going to give the best service to the citizens.

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

So earlier you mentioned our new police headquarters. We just want to remind everyone that our groundbreaking will be on February 19th, so we're all pretty excited about that.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

Chris, thank you for coming on today and talking to us. Show us a little magic. Yeah, it's been a lot of fun. Figure out how you do that before it's over with. Enjoy the mystery. Thank you everyone for listening or watching today. If you want to learn more about upcoming events, go to allenpoliceorg.

Outreach Coordinator Alexus Birmingham:

And make sure to like and subscribe, and if you have any questions, leave them down in the comments below.

Officer Sam Rippamonti:

We'll see you next time.