By Richard Urban
Emmett Turner didn't want to be a cop.
It wasn’t that he’d ever had any bad experiences with the police, although he does admit to having had one run-in with the law when he was a youngster. He just couldn’t see himself pounding a beat for the rest of his life.
In 1967, close to the end of his two-year stint in the Army—which had included a year as a helicopter door-gunner in Vietnam—Turner was assigned to the Army base in Ft. Rucker, Ala. He was offered the chance to get out early if he would join the Washington, D.C., Police Department. He turned it down.
Two years later, Turner was working at an aircraft assembly plant near his hometown of Brownsville, Tenn., when a coworker tried to talk him into becoming a cop.
“I said, ‘Man, I don’t want to be a police officer. I just came back from Vietnam. I want some peace and tranquility.’ ”
A few months later, after he had resumed his studies at Tennessee State University, Turner was walking through downtown Nashville and happened by the Civil Service office. “I said, ‘Oh, what the heck. I’ll go in and get an application.’ That’s where it all started,” Turner recalls.
As it turns out, the coworker who suggested that Turner become an officer was Ewing Ware, who also joined the Nashville Police Department, graduating from rookie school in the same class as Turner. But he didn’t stay on the force, and Turner lost track of him. Tragically, not long after Turner was promoted to police chief, Ware died last January when an Air Force F-14 slammed into a neighborhood east of the airport.
The man who didn’t want a career in law enforcement went on to become Nashville’s first African-American police chief. At 54, Turner has now spent half his life doing a job he couldn’t see himself doing 27 years ago.
The department he inherited after Robert Kirchner’s retirement last year was making headlines. But they weren’t the kind of headlines a new police chief would want. The department was in the news more for its internal problems than for its efforts at fighting crime. Relations between black and white officers had not settled down in the three years since the Reggie Miller incident, in which white officers beat up an off-duty black officer who was making a routine stop at a traffic light. Internal power struggles often detracted from the department’s mission.
Much of that has changed over the past year, as Turner has quietly transformed the department in his own understated way. Although it would be difficult to say that racial tensions have been obliterated, it certainly does appear that they have been eased. And Turner has assembled a professional management team that seems to work well together.
What’s more, he’s brought about these changes without drawing a great deal of attention, particularly media attention, on himself. That’s the way Emmett Turner operates.
After Kirchner announced his retirement, Mayor Phil Bredesen appointed a committee to conduct a nationwide search for the right person to lead the troubled department. Of the three names sent to Bredesen, Turner’s was the only one recommended from within the ranks.
“I wasn’t very familiar with Chief Turner,” Mayor Phil Bredesen says. In previous dealings, the mayor had sized up Turner as a quiet guy who never had much of anything to say. “But when I started talking to him, I discovered a depth of knowledge and commitment. I discovered him to be very world-wise in his views about the department and what it should be.”
In conversation, Turner comes across as a low-key, soft-spoken, modest man who would rather shun the spotlight. He frequently mentions his “philosophy”; he is thoughtful about the way he approaches his job. And he still finds himself surprised by the fact that he is actually leading the most visible department in Metro government.
“You know, to be quite honest with you, I don’t think it still has sunk in,” Turner says. “A lot of people got excited about it. I didn’t get that overwhelmed when the mayor made his choice. I guess the reason why is because I was assistant chief, and it was sort of a normal progression. And, had I not thought that I could do this job and do it fairly well, I never would have applied.
“I think that a lot of other people saw it as being a big move. I guess it never hit me. And I don’t think it’s hit me yet.”
If Turner’s modesty is sincere—as it seems to be—it probably has its roots in his small-town upbringing. He grew up in Brownsville, about 50 miles east of Memphis. He describes his hometown as a small cotton town, where the schools were segregated. His father was an electrical contractor; his mother was a schoolteacher.
“It was a small town where everyone knew you. It was very difficult to get into mischief, though we did to a certain extent,” he recalls with a chuckle. “When you did, it wasn’t easily hidden.”
Turner graduated, one of a class of 125, from the all-black Carver High School in 1960. He attended Tennessee State University for two years before returning home to work on an aircraft assembly line. He was married and broke; meanwhile, his wife was trying to earn her own degree.
In 1966, Uncle Sam came calling. The Vietnam War was heating up, and a huge troop buildup was under way. When Turner left for the jungles of Southeast Asia and the Army’s 52nd Aviation Battalion in August 1966, his wife was seven months pregnant. He didn’t see his first daughter until she was 10 months old.
For about a year after being discharged, Turner sold cars by day and worked the assembly line at night. In 1969, he came to Nashville and, after completing his training, went out on the street as a patrolman, working out of the West Station. Whenever he could, he took classes at TSU.
“I sometimes worked till 3 in the morning and had an 8 o’clock class. It was pretty tough,” Turner says.
But he persevered, and in 1972 he earned his degree in sociology. By that time he had become a school resource officer.
From that point on, Turner made a steady rise up though the ranks. “It really wasn’t intentional,” he says. “It was more coincidental than anything else. I certainly didn’t want to stay a patrolman for my entire career, so I chose to make the effort to try to get promoted.
“I am the type of individual who wants to progress. I think my biggest ambition at the time was just to get promoted to sergeant.”
But it was his work with young people that Turner enjoyed the most, and that experience still helps shape his approach to running the department.
“It doesn’t take a genius to understand that the children of today will be the leaders of tomorrow,” he says simply. “They’re going to be the senators, the president, the teachers, the scientists, the lawyers, and even the chief of police.
“If you look at the issue of juvenile violence, juvenile crime is on the upslope. You may not be able to see any benefits, short-range, but I think long-range we can. And I think prevention is the key.”
Turner likes to talk about his department’s ongoing involvement with young people—from the DARE anti-drug program in the schools and the Police Athletic League to the juvenile counseling program and the Explorer program for teenagers.
Turner is particularly proud of the GREAT (Gang Resistance and Awareness Training) program, which was begun under Kirchner’s watch and expanded after Turner became chief. Developed in collaboration with the federal Department of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, the program trains officers to recognize when children are in a violent environment and encourages the officers to refer at-risk youngsters to Family and Children’s Services for help.
Turner’s approach to long-standing problems is a nontraditional one. He advocates a comprehensive strategy that differs from the ones many urban police departments have been trying over the years.
“We have gone from a philosophy of traditional policing—where as a police officer you go out and arrest a bad guy, and that’s it. What we’re looking at now is a well-rounded Police Department that can do problem-solving, one that is proactive with an emphasis on community policing. We’re looking at the issues that affect this community, and we’re becoming very much involved in other activities that would not traditionally be police responsibility.”
This nontraditional approach, known as “community policing,” has been a law-enforcement buzzword for years, but primarily among big-city mayors and their police departments. In different forms, it is being attempted in cities of varying sizes throughout the country. Community policing is unconventional because it requires police officers to get out of their patrol cars and get into the community. What’s more, it entails problem-solving that often goes beyond preventing and solving crimes.
“Part of the community policing philosophy [is] that you build bridges and that the community is going to have to become more involved in their own neighborhoods,” Turner explains. “There’s no way that police officers are going to be able to look at the needs of everyone in the community, even though we try to address those issues.
“I think people in the community are going to have to become very much involved in the protection and safety of their own communities. And we will assist them and do whatever we can to help them.”
In Nashville, the impact of community policing can be seen in a number of initiatives, including the police department’s Environmental Task Force, the Citizen Police Academy, and the department’s Enterprise Community.
The Environmental Task Force was created in 1993 to investigate the root causes of crime in Nashville’s neighborhoods. The task force operates on the theory that, because patrol officers spend most of their time in the community, they are the city employees most likely to be well-acquainted with conditions in the neighborhoods they serve.
“We’ve looked at areas where people have complained about derelicts hanging out,” Turner explains. “We’ve looked at dilapidated buildings where prostitutes and drug dealers go in. We try to get something done by calling Codes Enforcement, or by finding a lot where weeds have grown up and then getting Public Works to come in and mow that lot.”
Turner is also more than ready to talk about the Citizen Police Academy. Begun last year, the Academy brings residents from all walks of life into a classroom one night a week for 11 weeks to learn how the Police Department operates and why it does the things it does. The reasoning is that, if private citizens understand the mysteries of police work, they take more responsibility for what happens in the community and help officers keep the city safe.
The Enterprise Community was created to focus attention on the high-crime area between 16th Avenue South and the Tennessee State Fairgrounds, north to Lafayette Street. Nine officers are assigned to each of three “alert centers” near public housing developments. The department had focused on public housing for years, but, Turner says, people in the surrounding neighborhoods felt they were being ignored.
“The philosophy is to provide a neighborhood atmosphere—not just for public housing, but for everyone who lives in the area,” says Turner. “The officers become involved in attending community meetings and listening to what the community perceives as issues that the Police Department can be involved in—whether it’s something related to crime or whether it’s getting a lot cleaned up and having Codes come out to look at an old dilapidated house where people are hanging out and committing various illegal activities.”
This summer, the department’s South Precinct is scheduled to open at Harding Place and Antioch Pike. The new precinct will be a smaller version of the downtown headquarters, housing patrol, and investigative units, and it will have prisoner processing. There will be room for community activities, and residents will be able to pick up police reports without having to come downtown. In addition, area residents will be able to pay their water, electricity, and telephone bills at the precinct, where an automated teller machine will also be available.
Community policing means moving sworn officers from behind desks, where they will be replaced by civilians, and out to the streets. There will be more walking beats and bicycle teams. Turner says the Police Department has made progress but still needs to have more officers on the street. Mayor Bredesen has encouraged Turner in pursuing that goal.
The department also has added substantially to its ranks. Since the Crime Bill passed two years ago, 97 new officers have been hired. Federal funding helped pay for their training and salaries, but those funds will run out soon. Turner will then be faced with replacing those federal dollars with local money.
“The challenge for him is to make sure the mayor and the Council fund the appropriate number of positions. It’s not an easy task,” Vice Mayor Jay West says. “There’s a comfort level with Council now, but that could change any minute. So he has to keep working on that.”
Turner agrees: “We’ve been involved in the process of developing a strategic plan long before Chief Kirchner left. You can develop a plan, but not have the funding to implement certain parts of the plan. Then you just have to do what you can. I think that’s what we have done.”
Flexibility, Turner insists, is a necessity. “As society changes, as things change in the world, the Police Department is going to have to change,” he says. “The key thing we’re going to have to do is expand our technology, and we have to do a good job of selling the Police Department to the community.”
Technological challenges will require that the department be equipped for the 21st century.
Last summer, after Officer Paul Scurry was killed while trying to make an arrest, Turner and Bredesen persuaded Council to appropriate about $500,000 to provide officers better firearms, .40-caliber automatic pistols. Those weapons have been delivered, and officers are now being trained to use them. (Officers will be able to purchase their old service revolvers from the department.)
But Turner’s most expensive technological advance involves equipping his men and women with mobile data terminals to provide them with instantaneous information from a central database. The terminals should cut down on paperwork and allow officers to make more efficient use of their time.
In addition, technological advances will enable the department to do a better job of crunching numbers and providing detailed reports based on crime statistics. As a result, the department should be able to redirect its resources to the places where they are most needed. Officers in charge of the sector stations will be given more of the resources they need to solve their own problems.
“I don’t need to sit up here and the assistant chiefs don’t need to sit up here and tell [the sector commanders] what they need to do,” Turner says. “They’re out there doing it every day. We have competent people. We just need to provide them with the resources.”
Bredesen backs his chief in his campaign to upgrade the department’s technological capabilities. “Ultimately, I want a modern, well-run Police Department that is supported by the community and the government,” Bredesen says. But the mayor also insists that the human factor will always have the most impact on the department’s success or failure. “The Police Department is the ultimate service department,” he says. “It depends heavily on the morale of the department, and I’m not talking about just pay raises. The officers have to love their jobs and respond in kind to the community.”
There are plenty of opinions out there as to how Turner and his Police Department should be doing their job:
The mayor wants the department to be more involved in schools and to make a special effort in reducing gang and drug activity. Vice Mayor West wants a “21st-century department that can deal with 21st-century bad guys.”
Metro Council Public Safety Committee chairman Horace Johns sees violent crime and gangs as major problems, but he also wants the department to be more responsive in its dealings with the general public.
“From a PR standpoint, [Turner] needs to be aware that crimes to property—auto theft, burglary, and larceny—are things the average citizen cares most about. When they experience these, they often don’t think the police are doing anything about it. The police need to do a better job of letting people know what they’re doing.”
John L. Fair, president of the Nashville Chapter of the Urban League, suggests that population growth will continue to put pressure on the department, challenging the department to keep up with the crime that comes with that growth.
Turner agrees that his major challenge is reducing crime in a rapidly expanding metropolis. He has to be concerned about Nashville’s full-time residents as well as its tourists.
“I think people are going to have to realize that we’re no longer Small Town, U.S.A.,” he says. “I think we have to look at a holistic way of dealing with crime, and that’s not just locking people up. Once again, that requires going back to prevention and looking at the long term. I think what people often want to see is short-term results.
“And I think they have to look at the Police Department and the whole judicial system. There’s just no way the Police Department can solve it all.”
Turner knows that the public feels frustrated whenever police officers arrest a criminal, only to see him back out on the street the next day. The chief and his officers share that frustration.
“But what I try to tell police officers is that you need to keep things in perspective,” Turner says. “You’ve done your job. You’ve arrested that person, you’ve gathered the evidence, you’ve gone to court and presented that evidence. Whether or not the court convicts him or her is up to the court. And if they are convicted and if they are sentenced, then it’s up to the state of Tennessee to keep them incarcerated.”
The life of a police officer—the life Emmett Turner thought he never wanted—is a tough one. But it does have its benefits. “There is a downside, but there is an upside—and that’s job security,” Turner says with a laugh. “I can’t remember anyone ever being laid off.”
Turner is dead serious, however, about the quality of his police officers. Without them, he cannot bring about the reforms that he dreams of. “We have a good staff here, a good group of people,” he says, taking the long view as usual. “I feel confident that we’re going to be able to move forward and do some of the things we want to do.”
On the Beat
Facts about the Metro Nashville Police Department
♦ The department employs:
1,250 sworn officers (2.25 officers per 1,000 residents)
208 school crossing guards
436 civilian personnel.
♦ The department cleared 17,000 cases in 1995 (a clearance rate of 57 percent).
♦ Metro police officers responded to more than 1 million calls in 1995 (621,708 non-emergency calls; 393,502 emergency calls to the 911 hotline).
♦ The department’s annual budget is $66.8 million (7.47 percent of the total Metro budget).
The Decision Makers
The 1996 Nashvillian of the Year selection committee included:
♦ Donna Hilley, president and CEO, Sony/ATV Tree
♦ Lisa Hunt, rector, St. Ann’s Episcopal Church
♦ Kevin Lavender, senior vice president, Symmetry Health Partners
♦ Ruth Ann Leach, columnist, Nashville Banner
♦ Dick Lodge, attorney, Bass, Berry & Sims, and chairman, Nashville Sports Authority
♦ Butch Spyridon, executive vice president, Nashville Convention and
Visitors’ Bureau
The Honor Roll
1989-1996
The Nashville Scene began its “Nashvillian of the Year” awards in 1989. Emmett Turner joins the following list of distinguighed recipients:
Joyce Harris and Suzanne Brown, instructors at Caldwell Early Childhood Center, 1989
Andy Shookhoff, Juvenile Court judge, 1990
Phil Bredesen, mayor of Nashville, 1991
David Satcher, president of Meharry Medical College, 1992
Gordon Bonnyman, staff attorney for Legal Services of Middle Tennessee, 1993
Barry Scott, actor, playwright, and youth educator, 1994
Henry Foster, U.S. surgeon general nominee, 1995
Up Through the Ranks
Highlights of Turner’s career
Like many other Nashvillians, Emmett Turner came here from elsewhere. He was born in the West Tennessee town of Brownsville in 1942 and attended that city’s all-black Carver High School. He holds a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Tennessee State University and has completed 30 hours of postgraduate work toward a master’s in psychology. His wife, Patty, is a teacher at Glencliff Elementary School. They have two daughters.
Turner’s jobs with the Metro Police Department have included:
♦ Patrolman, 1969
♦ Youth Enforcement Officer, 1970-72
♦ School Resource Officer, 1971-78
♦ Sergeant, Sexual Abuse Unit, 1979-84
♦ Lieutenant, Patrol Unit, 1986-88
♦ Captain, Patrol Unit, 1988-91
♦ Major, 1991-93
♦ Assistant Chief of Police, 1993-96
♦ Chief of Police, 1996
Gordon Bonnyman, staff attorney for Legal Services of Middle Tennessee, 1993
Barry Scott, actor, playwright, and youth educator, 1994
Henry Foster, U.S. surgeon general nominee, 1995
Up Through the Ranks
Highlights of Turner’s career
Like many other Nashvillians, Emmett Turner came here from elsewhere. He was born in the West Tennessee town of Brownsville in 1942 and attended that city’s all-black Carver High School. He holds a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Tennessee State University and has completed 30 hours of postgraduate work toward a master’s in psychology. His wife, Patty, is a teacher at Glencliff Elementary School. They have two daughters.
Turner’s jobs with the Metro Police Department have included:
♦ Patrolman, 1969
♦ Youth Enforcement Officer, 1970-72
♦ School Resource Officer, 1971-78
♦ Sergeant, Sexual Abuse Unit, 1979-84
♦ Lieutenant, Patrol Unit, 1986-88
♦ Captain, Patrol Unit, 1988-91
♦ Major, 1991-93
♦ Assistant Chief of Police, 1993-96
♦ Chief of Police, 1996
