PAGE – Sunset is less than an hour away. Page Police Detective Terry TerEick’s unit is stealthily parked out of view of oncoming motorists on U.S. Highway 89 near Maverik where speeding is a problem. Some motorists begin slowing down.
There is a speed trailer here that promotes safety by controlling speeding in a way that is informative but not intimidating. But motorists still drive through this 45-mph zone at high speeds, said TerEick, who helped cover the swing shift on a Wednesday evening, as he monitored the traffic.    
Minutes later, a 2016 Ford Focus hatchback zoomed past, clocking at 62 mph in the southbound lane. TerEick turned on the sirens and made an attempt to stop the vehicle, in which a 23-year-old male was driving. The young man pulled off the road and waited for TerEick to approach his vehicle.
“I’m going to let him know he was speeding too fast and give him a warning,” TerEick said after verifying the man’s driver’s license and proof of insurance, and not finding an arrest warrant.
The dispatcher, Orlynda Tsosie, later gave TerEick a 10-0, meaning to use caution.
“That’s weird,” he said as he got back into his unit. “Ten-zero means to be careful. I’m not sure why.”
TerEick asked Tsosie what the 10-0 warning was for and she informed him that the 23-year-old man is known for carrying concealed weapons, which is legal in Arizona, even without a permit as long as one is not a felon or a prohibited possessor.
“If I had known about that, I would have approached it a little bit differently,” TerEick said. “But I tend to approach every vehicle like there’s a potential danger in there – just to be safe because we never know.”
He continued saying, “The big thing is I’m always watching their hands because that’s what they’re going to hurt me with. If they’re going to pull a weapon they’re going to use their hands. As long as I know what they’re doing with their hands.”
Page Police officers face a multitude of dangers in their everyday duties that rival the threat of getting shot. For instance, foot and vehicle pursuits, making an arrest, traffic control, among others. Officers here are exposed to these dangers on a daily basis.
They wear ballistic vests and heavy leather belts containing pepper spray, handcuffs, a radio, sidearm and other things. The equipment they wear can weigh up to 20 pounds, putting stress on the body. They must get into and out of a unit at least 20 times a day wearing this equipment.
Furthermore, they are exposed to extreme temperatures for extended periods of time, whether they are conducting traffic control at an accident scene in 100-degree heat on Highway 89 or providing security during the annual Page-Lake Powell Balloon Regatta, Page Police officers are at the mercy of the elements.
And they must always be ready for the unknown.
“Every call’s different and we never know what to expect,” TerEick said as he sat in his unit with the lights on to slow down traffic and to deter crime and traffic violations in the area. Doing this, TerEick says, lets people know that there is a police officer nearby.
But “it’s mainly never knowing what your day’s going to be like.”
Every day is different, said the detective, who has been with Page Police for three years.
“There’s exciting calls and there’s calls that we go on where we really feel like we’ve made a difference. It’s pretty rewarding.”

TerEick’s swing shift – one of the busiest shifts – last Wednesday started on Aztec Street where he and other police officers did a welfare check at a residence. Officers found an intoxicated man there who had a “local,” meaning an arrest warrant at the magistrate court. The man was arrested by another officer and taken to the holding facility on Tunnel Road.
“I am 10-8 (in service),” he told Tsosie. “Sometimes, we don’t get a lot of information when someone calls something in. We have to try to figure out who called and why.”
Alcohol abuse is a top problem in Page, said TerEick. And alcohol leads to situations such as disorderly behavior, domestic violence, and a long list of other issues.
“Pretty much all those issues stems from alcohol,” he explained. “When we book someone, we’ll (indicate) if they were (either) intoxicated or not at the time they’re booked.”
There were no calls at the moment, so TerEick went to check on the traffic at Horseshoe Bend where the National Park Service rangers were responding to an attempted suicide call and a rock-throwing incident.
“So, Page’s jurisdiction ends about midway up the trail,” TerEick said as he entered the parking lot and patrolled the area. “We handle everything here in the parking lot and half way up there then the park service takes it from there.”
TerEick and other officers often drive with their unit’s windows rolled down so their senses take in more information, which puts them at a tactical advantage, and the public has more access to them. The reason, officers say, is it is safer and more effective.
“We rely a lot on our senses,” TerEick said. “We can hear yelling, someone breaking a window–– So, we tend to keep our windows down at least half way.”
Meanwhile back in town, TerEick looks for individuals who have consumed enough alcohol to pass out behind the Gateway Plaza, a desert area where officers usually find them. And they are normally intoxicated and dehydrated.
“We carry water in our units for people who might be in distress,” TerEick said as he made his way to the city park, another area in town where intoxicated individuals linger.
TerEick gave a bottle of water to an older man who seemed unresponsive for a moment.
“He’s code 4 (no assistance needed),” he told Tsosie back at the dispatch center. “He’s OK.”
Page Police officers say they feel respected by the public and, in turn, believe officers have little reason to distrust most people. So, rather than viewing the neighborhoods where they patrol as hostile territories, officers say residents here share their values.
“We have a lot of support from the local community,” TerEick said as he drove through a neighborhood near the airport. “I’ve seen a lot of trust between the community and the law enforcement here. Since our chief (Frank Balkcom Sr. who has been here since November 2014) started working here, we have done a lot of community policing projects (such as ‘Coffee with a Cop’ and ‘Shop with a Cop’ events). There’s a lot of programs.”
Suddenly a call came in from Canyon Lake Apartments where there was an altercation over a dog. TerEick arrived at the apartment complex within a few minutes.
“The nice thing about Page is that it’s such a dense community that we get from call to call quickly versus some of the agencies that are more spread out,” TerEick said en route to the apartment complex where neighbors argued over an incident. Other officers also arrived at the scene, including K-9 officer “Hasy,” a Belgian Malinois and her handler Officer Crystal Thinn.
After things were straightened out, TerEick did more patrolling, this time around Powell Mobile Home Village where he spotted some children playing on the ridge near the library.
“Sometimes on these cliffs, we get some juveniles up there drinking or smoking weed, or something,” he said as he drove alongside a fence and waved at the children (a wave goes a long way in law enforcement). “We try to drive through as many neighborhoods as possible. The community likes to see that we’re out here. And while we’re here, we look for anything suspicious, (such as) traffic violations.”
But neighborhood patrols completely depend on call volume and workload.
“Our department doesn’t have quotas for traffic tickets and we don’t have to make a certain amount of arrests or anything like that,” TerEick said. “We’re plenty busy without having to be motivated by quotas.”
Illegal dumping is another problem in Page. There is an illegal dumping site just behind Vermillion Cliffs Corrals where there are no dumping signs, but some people do not read the signs and still do it, said TerEick as he put his unit in four-wheel drive, a feature that all of the Page Police units have, to drive through the bumpy desert.
Another call came in from the city park, where Officer Daniel Carbajal found a man overly intoxicated and was transported to the hospital by ambulance.
“Our primary concern at that point is his welfare: get him to the hospital, get him treated then he (Carbajal) can continue an investigation,” TerEick said. “Sounds like he has some misdemeanor charges, but since he is handcuffed, (Carbajal) has to follow him to the hospital.”
And there are sad times in law enforcement, especially incidents involving children, said TerEick.
“Some of the calls involving children that we go to–– There’s places of neglect or abuse,” he explained. “It hits certain officers differently. Every officer, after their shift, will need to have some unwind time. A lot of the officers are involved in outside activities and do whatever it takes to unwind after a shift.”
Tsosie agreed saying calls involving children are the hardest.
“There are calls where you get a call and you’re overwhelmed and emotional but there’s nothing you can do, you just have to work through these calls,” said Tsosie, a 25-year veteran dispatcher who also works for the park service.
Though there are some quiet times in the community, officers can never predict when it will be quiet and when it will be busy with perhaps 50 calls per service.
The Page Police Department has a patrol boat. There are two officers currently in Phoenix training and learning about boating laws and boat patrol duties.
“We don’t have the staffing to always have an officer on the lake,” TerEick said, “but for special occasions where we know there might be a lot of people (on the lake), we do put the boat out and officers can do anything from operating (a boat) under the influence enforcement to liquor law enforcement. And if there’s a medical emergency by the water, it’s easier to transport the patient by boat than it is to try to carry them up the rocky cliff.”
Before the end of his shift, TerEick showed what his unit is equipped with, such as the laptop mounted in the unit and a first-aid kit consisting of things like a tourniquet, trauma dressing, and even a Narcan nasal spray for the emergency treatment of a known or suspected opioid overdose.
The nasal spray has been used a number of times by Page Police officers, who are trained to handle the aftershock during which the user finds themselves in a situation they cannot readily control.
“(Law enforcement) is something that I’ve always wanted to do since I was little,” TerEick added. “When I was small, I idolized police officers.”