By Robert Cloud
When Sheriff Tim Wilz delivered his department’s 2022 annual report to the Waupaca County Board on Dec. 19, he focused on the men and women who work there.
Law enforcement works 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, taking emergency calls, patrolling the roadways and waterways, caring for and transporting inmates, investigating crimes, enforcing narcotics laws and doing community outreach.
He discussed each of the divisions and their roles in local law enforcement.
Communications
Wilz opened with the dispatch officers who work in the Communications Center, taking 911 calls, communicating with deputies, as well as officers from nine law enforcement agencies, 14 fire departments, ambulance services, Waupaca County Highway Department, Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and the State Patrol.
The Communications Center has 13 officers, a sergeant and a captain.
Dispatch handled 41,646 complaints, 837,083 radio transmissions and 318,858 phone calls in 2022, Wilz said.
“They are the first responders to every call,” he said. “Without the first responders, the sheriff’s office would fall on its face.”
Patrol
The Patrol Division includes 21 patrol deputies, four transport deputies, 30 part-time deputies, six sergeants, a lieutenant and a captain.
Their service area includes 2,085 miles of state, county and municipal roadways, 240 lakes, and 79 rivers and streams.
In 2022, patrol deputies issued 2,409 traffic citations, 897 written warnings and 209 ordinance violations. They made 163 OWI arrests.
They also responded to five fatal crashes, 505 crashes with injuries and 574 with no injuries in 2022.
Wilz noted that patrol officers don’t just watch the road and hand out tickets, they are dispatched to assault and disorderly conduct complaints, traumatic deaths and drownings, break-ins and domestic violence reports.
Among the units within the Patrol Division are the ATV/UTV, snowmobile and water patrol units.
Although it was not featured in the 2022 annual report because it was certified until the summer of 2023, the Waupaca County Dive Team is part of the Patrol Division. There are three detective sergeants, two telecommunicators, three correctional officers and five patrol officers who are members of the Dive Team.
In 2022, the Patrol Division had three K-9 officer units: Deputy Graham Barden and K-9 Nova; Deputy Adam LaBrosse and K-9 Dom; and Deputy James Santiago and K-9 Cuda.
The dogs have been used to find narcotics during traffic stops and while executing search warrants, tracking missing seniors and runaway juveniles, locating and pursuing suspects. The K-9 units were deployed 180 times in 2022.
They are also star attractions at community outreach events such as Meet the Fleet and school visits.
K-9 Nova, a black Labrador retriever who served the Waupaca County Sheriff’s Office for five years, died in the summer of 2023.
The Waupaca County SWAT team is also part of the Patrol Division.
The SWAT team is deployed to potentially dangerous situations. This multi-jurisdictional team comprises 20 tactical officers, four negotiators, a commander and deputy commander from the sheriff’s office and other police departments.
Detectives
Waupaca County’s Detective Division a property manager and evidence technician, two narcotics detectives, six detective sergeants and a captain.
According to the annual report, “The Detective Division is primarily responsible for investigative follow-up, evidence collection, crime scene analysis, and proactive investigative efforts on many different crimes, which generally require more time or resources. These crimes include sex crimes, child neglect and abuse, death investigations, property crimes, computer crimes, and significant traffic crash investigations. The detective division works in cooperation with other local, state, or federal agencies.”
In 2022, Waupaca County detectives investigated 62 sex offenses, 30 child abuse complaints, 15 deaths, eight thefts, six arsons, six fraud complaints, three threats, three overdoses, three missing persons and one homicide. They also assisted other agencies 10 times.
Waupaca County detectives also collaborates with the Wisconsin Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force and the Central Wisconsin Drug Task Force, which includes 15 law enforcement agencies within eight counties.
In 2022, Waupaca County seized nearly 4,924 grams of marijuana, 60 marijuana plants, 20.75 grams of heroin/fentanyl, 6.56 grams of cocaine and 351.9 grams of methamphetamine.
Corrections
Wilz described working in corrections as one of the most dangerous jobs in law enforcement.
“They get beat up, spat at, feces thrown at them,” Wilz told the county board.
He noted that they are there to protect the inmates.
“While they are in our custody, we are their safekeepers,” Wilz said.
The Corrections Division employs 38 deputies, six sergeants, a lieutenant and a captain.
Waupaca County jail can house up to 321 inmates and its average daily population is approximately 200.
Waupaca County has safekeeper contracts to house 75 inmates from Wood County and 35 from Portage County.
The sheriff’s office collected nearly $460,000 in safekeeper fees from Portage County and $985,500 from Wood County in 2022.
Records
The Records Division has three full-time civilian employees whose responsibilities include reception duties, typing reports and documents for deputies, managing sheriff sales, background checks, processing all criminal charges, preparing records and legal documents, extracting data from the RMS system, performing duties of Incident-based reports, receiving and preparing all documents related to civil process, processing discovery material for the Waupaca County District Attorney, serving as a notary republic, and also processing some DMV transactions, according to the annual report.