Firm lures police with six-figure jobs overseas

OAKLAND, Jul 03, 2009 (The Oakland Tribune - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- DCP | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating -- A company that recruits police officers and former military personnel to be international police trainers and border enforcement advisers in Iraq and Afghanistan was in Oakland last week recruiting for roughly 400 spots in the war-torn countries.

DynCorp International, which is based in Falls Church, Va., provides services to civilian and military government agencies worldwide. It operates programs in law enforcement training and support, security services, base operations, aviation services and logistics support in the Middle East, Haiti, Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia and other places that have experienced conflict, violence and war.

The recruiting came as Oakland faces an $83 million deficit and could decide in the coming weeks or months whether it will have to layoff police officers. The city has applied for $67 million in federal funding to pay for 140 police officers over a three-year period and expects to hear back on its grant application as soon as July. Depending on how much the city receives from the grant, Oakland may have to cut the ranks of its Police Department.

This could mean a lot of police officers looking for work in a bad economy.

"People hear about us through word of mouth and advertising and with the economy now, with (police departments) laying off people, that will up our numbers," said recruiter Marla Turcotte, a former North Carolina police officer who spent about a-year-and-a-half in Iraq training

police officers and two years in Kosovo doing similar work before working to recruit others.

She said she found both experiences fulfilling.

"I spent 19 months in Iraq and I never had any trouble with the local nationals. They are willing to listen. They want to learn. It's just that the situations with the thugs and the terrorists (things can be tenuous)," she said.

She only had a handful of people come to the recruiting fair at a hotel near the Oakland International Airport on Thursday. But those who did stop in -- current and retired police officers -- seemed seriously interested in going for the jobs, which pay between $118,000 and $134,000 yearly, with some of the income tax-free. By comparison, starting salaries for Oakland police officers range from about $72,000 to $90,000.

Health insurance is covered and all equipment -- from uniforms to hot and cold weather gear and weapons -- are issued to the workers, she said. But the firm won't take just anyone. "You have to have blemish--free background. You are representing the United States," she said.

DynCorp spokesman Douglas Ebner said the work is done on behalf of the U.S. State Department Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs. More than 6,000 people have gone on international police missions since 1994, when work started in Haiti.

Workers, advise, assist, monitor and mentor foreign national police, help develop modern law enforcement institutions, provide technical support and assistance in policing skills and techniques to foreign national police, identify corruption and violations of human rights and maintain international observation and presence over foreign national police.

They usually return to U.S. police jobs, stronger and better equipped to handle conflict, he said.

"They've had to adapt in cross-cultural circumstances, they have often had to work in situations where you don't have computers and (other support materials). It strengthens the human side of policing and leadership," Ebner said. When they come back to their jobs, they have greatly broadened their perspective and ability to work cross culturally."

In Oakland, that couldn't be more important.

Michael Oster, a Solano County police deputy spent a year working in Kosovo. He went from being a K-9 handler stateside to a homicide and internal affairs detective when he was in Kosovo. He also helped open a new station in an area that did not have one, he said. "It was an experience to have people who had been fighting against one another come up and thank us," he said.

He is thinking about taking on a second mission because Solano County is planning cuts to police services, he said. "They've announced layoffs for civilian personnel and are looking at losing four deputies," said Oster, 47.

Whatever he does, he said his time in Kosovo has made him a better cop. "You had to take the skills that you learned (on the streets stateside) and put them to work," he said. "Everybody had to go back to their basic police training. You have your partner, a radio and a note pad. You did your own finger printing, crime scene photos and evidence collection."

Reach Kristin Bender at kbender@bayareanewsgroup.com.

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