forensic interviewers. And the hardest part of the job? “Putting your personal feeling aside in certain situations and reminding yourself at the end of the day that you are human.” A 20 year Navy veteran, Shavers began her law enforcement career with the Mississippi Department of Transportation Commercial Vehicle Enforcement and had a six month stint in corrections with the Harrison County Sheriff ’s Department. “When I was in the Navy I did a tour as a member of the military police/auxiliary security force,” she explains. “When I retired from the military, I still felt the need to continue serving, now as a police officer.” Like so many working women, Shavers says balancing a demanding job requires a solid marital relationship.
Married to Gregory for six years, she is the mother of 16year old Kierra. “My husband is my rock,” she says. “He often has to play both parental roles due to my having to work late at the last minute, or having to work a special event or holiday.” She recalls one memorable Mardi Gras when her traffic division rode in one of the parades, allowing the children to sit on the motorcycles and take photos. “One little girl yelled out, ‘Look, Mommy! It’s a girl police officer.’ When she was sitting on my motorcycle, she told me that when she grows up, she wanted to be a police office on a motorcycle too,” Shavers explains. That young girl may very well find herself following Shavers’ credo by writer Christian Nestell Bovee, “Doubt who you will, but never yourself.”
APRIL THOMPSON ‘My children check on me through the night until they go to sleep’ “Every day that Officer April Thompson puts on her ballistic armor, straps a gun to her side, hangs a badge over heart, and says good-bye to her children is another day she has proven her worth to her community.” That, in one articulate sentence, is how Biloxi Police Chief John Miller describes his colleague, 37-year old Patrol Officer 1st Class and mother of three April Thompson. Her story, like her fellow female law enforcement officers above, is awe-inspiring. Thompson says she discovered her passion for criminal justice in elementary school when a police officer spoke to her class about how he viewed the community he worked for and what he found important in safety to help pass on to kids. “I later experienced the police coming to my house during my parents’ divorce,” she explains. “My sisters and I were so scared and upset, but this officer was so calm September-October 48 controlled. and ” She goes to2016 say that the officer didn’t
leave until she and her sisters were alright. “At that point I knew I wanted to be that calm for someone else in their times of grief.” From the sound of Thompson’s job description, she is doing that and much more. Working first as a 911 operator, dispatcher, police desk clerk, negotiator, and Rape Aggression Defense instructor, Thompson reports to calls in her current position involving anything from a lost pet to a shooting. She is fully aware of the dangers of her job, as Miller explained. Saying good-bye to her children each day is for her the hardest part of the job. “I have always been aware of the fear of the unknown possibilities of my upcoming shift,” Thompson says. “My children check on me through the night until they go to sleep. I tell them we live in a very good community. I want them to have faith in the good in people and not to focus on the negativity.” That’s where she believes she is rewarded for her work as a police officer. “I am teaching my children as I learn and grow as a person by facing my fears and adversity head on,” Thompson explains. She says the qualities of her courage, integrity, and faith as she does her job help her children apply principles to life of how to treat others with equality. The word “team” is an essential part of Thompson’s vocabulary and success in balancing career and