Interview with Dennis Dimitroff

I hadn’t seen Dennis Dimitroff in 35 years. Which meant I'd missed his entire 30 year career with Halton Regional Police Services. We talk about it.
Watch: https://youtu.be/r3u-jPJ5RTM

Unedited transcript.

Jim Allan: Dennis Dimitroff.

Dennis Dimitroff: Jim Allan.

Jim Allan: I haven't seen you, I got my calculator out, I haven't seen you in 35 years.

Dennis Dimitroff: Now we're sounding old.

Jim Allan: Try not to think of it in those terms. So in that 35 years, you spent 30 years as a police constable for Halton.

Dennis Dimitroff: Yes. In Halton.

Jim Allan: So in other words, I missed your entire career and you're retired now.

Dennis Dimitroff: I am. Just seven months retired. I retired in July. I don't do the math, but I think it's seven months.

Jim Allan: So I don't get to talk to many police officers or former police officers. So I'm going to talk about the beginning of your career because I remember you back then. So let's start, let's start at the beginning. So I remember you back then. We met at summer camp. So I've actually done an interview with the current Moorelands executive director. If you're watching this, anybody, you can look at this great interview.

Dennis Dimitroff: I'll check it out.

Jim Allan: Things have changed a lot since then back. And you were my boss. You were assistant director for a couple of summers.

Dennis Dimitroff: Well, I never looked at it that way.

Jim Allan: Well, I did. You were my boss and then you scared me. No, you didn't scare me. You were the big lovable Dennis, big, big lovable Dennis, gentle giant, your gentle giant.

Okay. And you could probably carry that on. So what I, so it was Moreland's, then we kind of lost touch, but I was aware that you worked at what? Fred Victor Mission?

Dennis Dimitroff: Yep. That was my first job out of college. Worked at the men's hostel for just under a year. And then you were, then I was definitely aware that you worked in Regent Park and some other places.

Jim Allan: Yeah. And Regent Park at the time was like inner city, lower income. But those sort of like those kids also went to camp. So there was kind of a camp connection there as well. You were kind of dealing with or interacting with the same kind of kids.

Dennis Dimitroff: Yep.

Jim Allan: Now tell me about that job.

Dennis Dimitroff: I guess what now would be the Toronto Community Housing, I think they're called. Back then it was Metro Toronto Housing Authority. So they had a specialized security branch that I just became aware of when I was at college. And it was, I went for them and I worked for them for six years. So I did work at, you know,   to all the housing projects across Toronto. And they worked in the Jane Finch corridor down to Regent Park at Scarborough. Worked all those projects for six years and it was good. And camp was a big part of both our lives. And it, you know, we worked with some wonderful kids and challenging kids as well. And I did encounter quite a number of them when I worked on the projects, which was just a ice breaker, right? They would look at, Hey, I know you. Hey, I know you.

Jim Allan: So what was the actual job title? Were you a security officer?

Dennis Dimitroff: Yes, it was basically security. It was a security officer, but they had a job title called project officer.

Jim Allan: Right.

Dennis Dimitroff: And today it's sort of evolved into a special hospital program. But at the time our company was called Community Guardian Limited. And we wore just green jackets, had a little crest up there, but we had investigative powers. That's about it. And it was a security function.

Jim Allan: So what I also remember about you, and I don't know if it's you told me that, or maybe a friend, a mutual friend, but you always, always, always wanted to be a cop, right?

Dennis Dimitroff: Always wanted to be a cop. Of course.

Jim Allan: And you applied five or 10 times. Is that?

Dennis Dimitroff: Yeah, I didn't think you would go all the way back there, Jim, but yeah, I did. I tried.

Jim Allan:  I'm here to embarrass you, Dennis.

Dennis Dimitroff: Well, not embarrass, but it was a tough go. I do remember going, I wanted it early. I hit the goalpost a number of times. I don't think it was 10. Maybe it was, maybe it was six times over, over a 10 year period.

Jim Allan: And this is what I heard though. And the reason you weren't getting hired was because somebody, somewhere along, like maybe you were getting frustrated and you said, you got some feedback perhaps. Why aren't, why aren't, tell me the truth. Why aren't you hiring me? And it was like, this is just what I heard. Doesn't mean that's the truth. Okay. What did you do? The feedback you got is like, they look at yours as my Moorelands Camp, Fred Victor Mission, Regent Park. They're going, oh, you want to, you want to be a social worker. Is that, so is that, was that true?

Dennis Dimitroff: Well, I think that definitely played a part with some of the police services I was going for. And I went to the selection board in Peel and I can say that would have been the reason. So the selection board in Peel is you're, they tell you right after you're in or you're out. And it was a, it was a tough hit, but, but yeah, that's the feedback I got that, okay, you're, you're too nice. And, and I'm like, okay, well, sure. But that's who I was, right? That's who I, who I was, how I was my makeup. So yeah, so about compassion and things like that. We all sort of had that from our, you know, working at our camp that we care about people.

Jim Allan: So did you alter your strategy going into interviews? Like how did you eventually get a job then? You eventually got hired, what?

Dennis Dimitroff: That's interesting. I mean, I'm always big on volunteer service and doing what I could. So I, I had went from the housing authority to working for the city of York now, now at city of Toronto, of course. And I was a bylaw supervisor there, but while I was doing that, I, I was living in Oakville and I, and I saw the police and I thought, okay, let me see what I can do there. So volunteer wise, instead of say joining a service club or something, I joined auxiliary police, which I did for one year and something happened. So it's not paid. It wasn't paid. So, you know, you're, you're there for the parade functions. You get to go ride alongs. It was a nice way to give back. And at the same time, it sort of answered a little desire that I had, but at that time I was doing really well at my job. I was, you know, going up the ladder and, and then the opportunity came, something happened, not that auxiliary job. It was a situation, somebody with a knife and I had to stand forward, even though that's not my role, but I had to stand forward and became quite a situation. And they basically told me after like, you want, we want you to apply for this job. So when I did apply for Halton that particular year, I was one of six people hired and even me, I had to pinch myself. Like I had, you know, hit the goalposts all these times and I'm one of only six they're hiring that year. So I was, and I haven't looked back as far as that career went.

Jim Allan: You know, I went through your social media, which still is up there and you tweeted a bit. And I know you're on, I'm not on Facebook at all, but I know Twitter and stuff, but you got feedback from like people that you had trained. Here's a quote from a colleague of yours who's actually a deputy chief now, Roger Wilkie, a special shout out to my coach officer, Dennis Dimitroff, who 23 years ago modeled the way on the relational aspect of policing. Dennis taught me how to talk to people, deescalate and control situations, influence others and serve our community. So thank you, Dennis. And I get, I get a sense through some other posts and some other, you know, when you retired, there was some nice things said as well, but you, you, we talk about the social work approach, but you kind of had a more of a humanitarian approach to policing. Is that fair to say? Good things.

Dennis Dimitroff: Well, first of all, I mean, deputy Wilkie, it was an amazing talent. He'd been successful in whatever he had done. But I, he was one of the early ones. I was a coach officer. So when the officers go to the police college, they have their basic training and they come back to the region and they're with an officer up to maybe three months and just, you know, two car, two car training. And, you know, they learned the ins and outs of the actually the applied part of it. So when I joined back in 1990, 1991, community policing was really at the, they were, they were really selling it really high. So I, I absorbed it. I thought, okay, this is me. This is set up perfectly for me. So it's about owning your zone, owning your community, being part of it and your interpersonal relationships that you develop everywhere. So part of that I did when I was in the housing authority and it transferred really well when I was a police officer. So I became the community officer, right? And most of my career was up in Halton Hills, the North part of Halton region. So they, they just seem to recognise me as, as being that face that they can approach. Like I, I love emergency response. Like I love going to the big call and dealing with it in whatever way we needed to deal with it. But there was also the thing about treat people right. And treat people the way that you want to be treated. And if they've made a mistake, well, we're in the business of dealing with people that make mistakes. Does that mean we write them off for the rest of their life? No, no, no. It just means that we, they had to be accountable for whatever they had done. But you treat them, you know, you treat them well, you treat them with respect and, and just move on from there. And I was able to like, you know, over the years, I had people would call me up and tell me, listen, you guys are looking for me. I'm only going to turn myself into you. And I think, well, why? Well, because I trust you that you're going to treat me. Okay. I said, okay, I'll see you at work. When I get into work, you know, you come in with a nice clean arrest and we'll do what we have to do. And other times too, if I dealt with some, I had a more, a few people that I had arrested in more than one occasion. And it was always the same talk, maybe across from a table. And I would say, okay, this is the last time, right? Like, you're going to turn things around. You're going to get some help for whatever that problem is, it's putting you in this direction.

Jim Allan: And it was after you've arrested them.

Dennis Dimitroff: Oh yes. Yeah. But I always had the same talk, right? Or I'd be coming into work one day and someone else may have arrested someone that I knew quite well. And I will go see them back in the custody area and say, you know, hey, what's going on? I thought we had a talk last time that you weren't going to go down this way anymore. And it was those types of things that, you know, maybe be fairly successful, especially in the community, right? So, and there was times when, you know, I had some runs with some individuals and then another time I'd be dealing with them. And I'll say I was wearing my, one of my other hats later in my career and the individual who thought couldn't stand me like, Oh, no, I'm only dealing with that guy. And it was, it went away. And I guess the final thing too is being at it for so long. You know, there were people that, okay, I may have arrested them as a teenager. Well, then they became parents and that was their kids, you know, in those 30 years that I had to deal with. And, and it was usually good, right? And I guess it was, it's rewarding in that sense.

Jim Allan: Now we don't have to spend tons of time on some of this stuff, but you spent seven years as a hostage crisis negotiator. Yes. So you, you did some other things. So tell me about that. That sounds, so that was towards the end of your career?

Dennis Dimitroff: Yeah. So that's, that's sort of something I'd always, always interested in, but it didn't come my way till the end of my career. And I wish I had done it earlier, but for the final seven years of my career, I was on call, even on vacation, if you're available and you started with pagers and it was phones, you started with the phone, you would have to drop everything, you know, get your kit on and drive to whatever location we require, right? So the hostages or the crisis negotiation, most of them are people in crisis, you know, people on top of bridges, barricaded, sometimes, sometimes keeping someone against their will. And it would be our role to work with emergency services, which was your tactical teams and your frontline officers and negotiate their way out, right? Like just try and get them out. And the goal was always to preserve life, preserve life, preserve life, and, you know, find some certain common ground that, you know, if you listen to me, we'll treat you well, but you're going to have to, you know, you're going to have to come out and, you know, you're going to have to move on to the next, whatever we deal with the next, but a lot of times they didn't want to come out as they're going to be arrested. Well, that was non-negotiable in a lot of cases, but then you could work it through, said, okay, yeah, you're going to come out, but you'll be arrested, but this is Canada, you're going to have your day in court. And, you know, we'll get you out other times. Well, I don't want to come out because they're going to throw me to the ground. No, you listen to just the directions you're given. I guarantee you will treat you with respect. And a lot of times we would come out and meet the individual. And I have to say as well, like the team that we had, and I was doing it, there were six of us. I was not just an individual. There's different roles in the negotiating team. And it was a wonderful thing to be part of. I only regret I didn't do it earlier.

Jim Allan: Favorite part of the job.

Dennis Dimitroff: Well, there was one thing I did before it was the hostage on the hostage, sorry, the crisis team. And that was I worked for something called COAS, which stood for Crisis Outreach and Support Team. So I was one of the early officers to do that. So it was a plain closed position. I was teamed up with a mental health worker and could be a psychiatric nurse or a social worker that specializes in. So you talk about, okay, social worker cop. Well, I worked with them for five years straight. And we did some good work. We saved a lot of lives and we're not just saving the lives. We were trying to get to crisis before they got out of hand. And then you get people in the right direction. So that sort of put me in a spot, which helped me when I went to the negotiating team. But also even my last role was in my last bureau I worked at was the Community Mobilization Bureau. And just the way you approach problems, thinking outside of the box, what are underlying issues? What are our underlying conditions that causing a person to move to breaking the law or getting into crisis? So quite frankly, I took way more people to hospital than I did to jail. And all those individuals, I mean, there's and one example, I remember a pair of us went and talked to a young man who had suicidal thoughts, but he was so close to doing it and we had spent a lot of time talking to him. And then at the end of it, he pulled out a note, basically it was a suicide note that he was going to do it that day. We got to him before. And just that was a good sort of thing to get to. And he was able to turn around. So even with the negotiating team, the worst day of their lives could just be that day, but tomorrow, we get them to tomorrow, tomorrow could be better. And so that's where I really...

Jim Allan: Do you kind of just direct them to social workers?

Dennis Dimitroff: Sure. You direct them to services. And so like in my last position, when I retired from, I was a community mobilization officer.

Jim Allan: So what the heck is that?

Dennis Dimitroff: Well, it's just sort of a, it's a unit of officers. We get to think outside the box. So at one point I would have had, you know, seek permission to drive someone out of region to, let's say to a detox center, right? And no, I would just do it. It's okay. I'm going here. I'm taking so-and-so to detox and, you know, we'll get them on their way, right? And these are maybe individuals that were homeless and had that a few times, you know, homeless individual. I had one of the last guys been on the street for two years and he was under the radio. We didn't know about him and was able to connect with him, bring him into the office, just have a long talk. What do you need? We'll try and get some supports, you know, if it's just meals, okay, we'll get some meal cards, connect with their services and I'll drive you wherever you want to be. If you have a connection where there's a family or not, in this particular case, it was a reconnect with the family. So I got them to reconnect with this family and talk to it a number of years and off the street. So I was happy about that.

Jim Allan: So I get the real feeling that you really loved your job. You love policing. Why did you love it so much?

Dennis Dimitroff: Well, so much variety. They just seemed to suit my character. I just thought that... I looked at it differently than I think a lot of it. It wasn't about, you know, the power trip or I want to enforce the law. It was, okay, responding to emergencies, you know, making society a better place, helping along some way and bringing some, you know, bringing some humanity to it. But the variety, it was just amazing in that position. So within my years, I mean, my first time I came off the road, I went into the recruiting bureau and which was good for me because hitting the goalpost a few times, I had made myself a few promises. First of all, when people come and they want to apply for our job, I'm going to treat them well. We're all going to treat them well, right? And if we're, you know, if they're unsuccessful, we don't, you know, we don't have to be harsh on them. It's just, okay, you're unsuccessful, believe in yourself. You come back again, make your improvements. But yeah, when I was there, that was, that was my first break. So I went from frontline officer to, you know, human resources person, right? And during that time, I was involved in the hiring of about 200 officers and we only had 700 at the time. So it was an amazing turnover.

Jim Allan: So everyone knows you basically.

Dennis Dimitroff: Oh, you know what? A lot of people buy me coffee. I used to go to use of instruction, which is a mandatory thing we do every year. And most of the training bureau, I had been involved in their hiring. So things like that.

Jim Allan: In retrospect, it was at a good thing that you were about 30 when you finally got hired. I was, yeah, 30, just turned 31 when I was sworn in. In retrospect, does that make sense for you personally or for any?

Dennis Dimitroff: For me, I think I would have been a good officer if I got on earlier, but I think I was a better officer because of my age when I finally did get on. And then I've been married to my lovely Laura for decades. And then sometimes when you get the position in the police, you see a subtle change in people. Laura wouldn't let me that happen. So I was always sort of the same and a lot of police friends and a lot of, but no, I pretty much stayed the same, I think, anyway.

Jim Allan: I suspect you have tough days as well. What's the hardest thing about being an officer?

Dennis Dimitroff: The hardest thing? Well, I can tell you about my worst call in my career. And that was a tough one, a real tough one. I had been on a job. I think I was on the job five, six years. No, it was before Deputy Wilkie. So I maybe had five years on the job and we had an impaired driver up in Acton and it was a collision. So the impaired driver collides into another vehicle. So then we manage an accident scene, right? Two of us go to it. One officer takes the person in custody and then I'm left with the accident scene, which involves, you know, managing the scenes. I have my lights flash in, I might have had a flare up. Your range of your tow trucks are coming to remove the vehicles, taking the accident report. So I was on the scene by myself on my own and the driver of the other vehicle that was hit, not the drunk driver, the other driver was in my cruiser and I was filling out the accident report. And then he had said to me that I have the keys to the vehicle and I said, okay, because the tow was there ready to tow his vehicle involved in the crash. And I remember we talked and he said, okay, I'm going to take the key to the tow operator. I said, okay. So he went over to the tow operator. Ordinarily I would have done that. I said, okay, I'll do it. Stay here. I'll go and, you know, drop it off to the tow guy. But this young man did it. And when I was in my cruiser, I heard a big thump screeching tires. Saw a car swerving towards me, veering, going eastbound. And this young man, plus the tow operator, had been hit by a second drunk driver. It was horrendous, right? So then I had to deal with the scene. I don't know how many feet he was flown, but then he died. He died there. And his wife was also right on scene. His father had lost. It was a really, a tough call. So sad for them. And I had a lot of guilt thinking that that should have been me. It shouldn't have been this young man. I should have been the guy that was killed. So I carried that for a long time.

Jim Allan: Why so?

Dennis Dimitroff: Because you're there to protect, right? It could have been you or it should have been you. That's where my thoughts were at the time. It should have been me. So I carried a lot of guilt that it should have been me at the time. Sure, we're there to protect people, not to put them in harm's way. The second drunk driver that came through, there was lights flashing, tow truck and my police vehicle. He drove right through and I didn't stop. So when I actually got out of the car, I had to manage the scene for an extended period of time, and he drove away. And I had to call out to head, it was Acton's. I called out to Rockwood, tell Rockwood OPP failed to remain, vehicle coming their way, closed the road. So as he dealt with all the crisis at the scene, truck came back and in the grill, there was a shovel sticking out of the grill, which was the tow guy cleaning up glass from the road. And he does pull up, pulls over to the side. I have to go away from Mr. Williams there and go to the driver and drunk guy looks up and say, I think I hit a deer. He didn't hit a deer. Give me your keys. Like gave me the keys. And then I couldn't care if he walked away because my priority was to deal with the injured. But then another officer did come along and he was arrested and charged and served some time. But yeah, tough call.

Jim Allan: So, I mean, when I hear a story like that, I think about your own mental health. Do you get take, is it possible for you to ask for assistance? Because obviously there's trauma is not to you as well.

Dennis Dimitroff: I have to say like my police service I worked for, we were exceptional. We are very, very good with that stuff. Then there was a time probably in earlier years where you just suck it up. You go to the next call. But I had a lot of support and we had an employee system program. I did see someone for once, but it wasn't for me. And so many of us in the police profession do go through challenging things like I just described, some of them worse, not quite as bad, but effects have been so many different ways. So I had something called critical incident stress. For me, it might have been PSD, but that's what they called it at that point. And I have great support. We got through it, right? And good family support.

Jim Allan: Do you go back to work the next day on this?

Dennis Dimitroff: No, I'm not at the start. Well, no, there's a lot of blood on my uniform at the time. And so I had to take the day off, not from that, but just I needed some time. But I didn't, I'm one of those guys that went through almost my entire career with barely missing a day off until the end. But came back at the next block. So we were four days, four on four off. And on my days off, my sergeant on his day off came up and saw me and we didn't live close at all. Like he lived in Milton, I lived in Fergus and came and that was just amazing, right? And then like I said, other officers, so many reached out. And when I went back to work, my one coworker had my uniform all laundered, because like I said, there was some blood on it and stuff. And we got through it.

Jim Allan: How do you know you're ready to go back to work though in that kind of situation, other than having a clean...

Dennis Dimitroff: Well, I think I had to go back to work, right?

Jim Allan: And got to get back on the horse.

Dennis Dimitroff: Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Something.

Jim Allan: Well, part of the job. Yeah.

Dennis Dimitroff: It was, yeah, you got to get back. Of course, you know, that's what I paid for. Like I said, what I say, I probably took one day off and then it ran into my regular days off and then came back in the next block and had some support. But I had something even earlier happen when I was on the housing authority, where I got jumped by three guys and I just beat pretty good. I gave back as good as I got, but I made a point of going back to work the next day and just...

Jim Allan: Just to show them that you didn't defeat me?

Dennis Dimitroff: Yeah. Not to go into all the details, but yeah, two of us went to hospital. So not just me. I went to hospital and so did somebody else, but I made sure I went back the next day. And I think you just had to do it. And yeah, you can't let these things get to you. You still have a role to play. You must...

Jim Allan: I mean, talk about having a bad day at work. I mean, you must... Do you take that home occasionally? On occasion? You say you have a wonderful wife, et cetera, but I mean, how do you leave that at work?

Dennis Dimitroff: I have a very good relationship with my special Laura and she knows when I need my space, right? Or I need to go somewhere or do something. And she can sense that you had a stressful day.

Jim Allan: You don't need to tell her all the details or...

Dennis Dimitroff: No, no. I mean, no. I mean, sometimes I would and just like go on to the...

Jim Allan: So she kind of knows what the broad and broad...

Dennis Dimitroff: Yeah, of course. And then she would give me my space or I do what I need to do. I've always been active. My weight always hasn't been... My weight's been up and down, I've always been active. So exercise, of course, was a big part or whether it's sports, golf.

Jim Allan: You ate your stress, did you?

Dennis Dimitroff:  Sometimes I did. Yeah, yeah. Sometimes I did. My weight fluctuated over the years.

Jim Allan: We're having pizza tonight, Laura, kind of thing.

Dennis Dimitroff: Of course. Yeah, let's do that. Yeah, of course. Yeah, for sure.

Jim Allan: Well, I'll say what's interesting about talking to you too is like, you know, police officers have a life. They're real people, right? And then you also have some health issues yourself. You have a son who has health issues. Yes, yes. So I don't know what you're comfortable talking about, but towards the end, you had a health scare in the last few years, right?

Dennis Dimitroff: Yeah, yeah. So I mean, it's interesting, you know, losing contact with some of our camp people earlier on. I'm not sure if I left the camp scene or the camp scene left me, but things did happen. Things became very complicated. I got married younger than, I guess, most of the group, but then I had a child who was sick. He was born with cystic fibrosis and lots and lots of complications. And so that really put our focus in a different direction. But when you talk about my health challenges, and not only my health challenges.

Jim Allan: And your son is 35.

Dennis Dimitroff: Yeah, so my son is 35.

Jim Allan: So perhaps not coincidentally, that's the entire time I haven't seen you. I wonder as maybe...

Dennis Dimitroff: Sure, that was a focus. He's always been a focus. And I have another son, Paul. That one's name is Mark. But yeah, it's always been a focus. And even to this day, we support him. But to tell you, Jim, at the beginning, we didn't think he was going to live past 20. So we're always facing with us. Facing that, right? That we're going to live him. And the last two years have been really challenging for our family. Because not only was Mark in the really difficult stages of cystic fibrosis, but I was diagnosed with colorectal cancer two years ago this month. And it was a hard, hard go for me, real hard. And then my wife, Laura, I was diagnosed with breast cancer last summer. So you're talking that real tough couple of years in the health department.

Jim Allan: But you personally fought back. And then you, I suspect from reading your social media, you came back to... You could have retired, but you wanted to retire as an active officer.

Dennis Dimitroff:  I did, I did. I didn't want to retire. So COVID, the damn COVID, I was diagnosed and then went off right at the start of COVID. So March of 2020. And I was sent home, because immune system and all that stuff. And then I had a hard 10 month battle. I was stage three, some really difficult surgery, radiation, chemo. They didn't skip anything. And in fact, even at the start of COVID, radiation was supposed to be a 28 day cycle. And I says, oh, for you, we're going to do it in five days. So I had a really, really heavy dose for five days. And I was okay. I mean, still in hindsight, but yeah, it was just part of it, right? And I thought I was tough at some points in my life. I'm a tough person, but that really tested me. And, but I do know I'm fairly strong and tough at the end of it. But yeah. So I got through the 10 months, went back to work a little too early, to be honest with you, but I was dying to get back because I wanted to retire, like you say, on my own terms.

Jim Allan: So it weakened you?

Dennis Dimitroff: Yes. So at the end of-

Jim Allan: You lost weight probably, right?

Dennis Dimitroff: Oh, I lost a lot of weight. I hadn't been, went down to my weight I was when I finished high school. It was something else. And that's from being, you know, quite heavy at one point down to, we'll say a bit of 75 pounds less of my heaviest, it went to my lightest during my illness. I'm back up now about 25 more pounds and 30 pounds maybe. I feel okay. So I'll keep it at this weight. But when I went back to work, we had neuropathy from chemotherapy. So my hands and my feet were tingling. And sometimes they're really numb and sometimes a little bit of pain. Yeah, mostly discomfort, but I wanted to get out there. I didn't want to do the, I want to get back to my old job as much as I could with my old job. And so I-

Jim Allan: Being on the street, you mean?

Dennis Dimitroff: No, at that time I was in the Community Mobilization Bureau. So I had an office up in the Halton Hill station in Georgetown. And like I said, still sort of an extension of some of the other work I had done. Problems would come to me, you know, what can you do, right? So it's like, I guess it's thinking outside of the box, like let's say for a neighbor to bring people in for mediation, that sort of thing. So it was like, I want to get back to that, but I also want to be able to, if something happens, I want to be able to go to that emergency. So I wanted my use of force options back. So the big thing I guess was like the firearms. So I was able to load my firearm, shoot it, but I wasn't able to load the bullets into the magazine. But you didn't need that to pass, so someone did that for me.

Jim Allan: When you talk about your son and cystic fibrosis, there's been a lot of progress over the years. I mean, he's 35 now. There has been, yes. And you said before, you weren't expecting him maybe even to live that long.

Dennis Dimitroff: That's right, yeah.

Jim Allan: So what's changed in that regard?

Dennis Dimitroff: Well, man, this is so recent, Jim. This is like brand new. I mean, and it's life pretty assured with it because a month ago, he was probably struggling the worst he had his whole life. But he's just been put on a new drug. That's not cheap, really expensive. But we think it's a game changer. And I can tell you in the last two weeks, we're seeing not the nonstop coughing, not the congestion in the lungs, not the digestive issues. So this is brand new, but it's really expensive. So with the fight against cancer, of course, that's always there. But the cystic fibrosis world, we've made some strides and let's keep going, right? So I think it's a worthy cause if people want to support it.

Jim Allan: So we're talking just a few days after this whole thing in Ottawa ended. So I'd be remiss if I didn't. I've got a police officer in front of me. I could ask you about that. And I suspect, I mean, are you like an athlete who is watching football? I think you played football in high school, right? So are you watching TV and are you missing it when you're seeing cops in action?

Dennis Dimitroff: Yeah. And just to go back just one step further, like even COVID, when that happened and I got sent home, I felt like I was sitting out the war. This is when they needed us the most and I wasn't able to be there. So I did get back to work within the 10 months and did a little bit with the COVID, police response to COVID. But with this one you're talking about now, do I want to be there? Sure. I would have wanted to be there. I don't know what my role would have been. Maybe a liaison officer. I'm too old to be on the front line. But on that whole thing, looking at it from the police lens, I was really impressed with the restraint the police showed and their tactics. And because I knew a little bit about the tactics, I sort of knew how it was going to play out in certain things. And a few other things threw me off like, oh, I didn't see that coming. But I think the officers did extremely well.

Jim Allan: Well, it's just days after it ends that we were recording this, but a lot of it's very political online. I'm probably slightly left of centre, honestly. However, that said, I was sitting on the couch for the American thing, you know, the famous January 6 so-called interaction.

Dennis Dimitroff: Of course, yeah.

Jim Allan: And in hindsight, I mean, they knew it was coming. I knew it was coming because I was sitting on the couch with my popcorn, watching it, right?

Dennis Dimitroff: Right.

Jim Allan: So, and then there's sort of some implication that they didn't have enough security or cops there at the beginning. And then they were not called during the day. It's heavily implied. It's probably what happened. I mean, that's probably all come out in the history books. So, you know, when someone comes to our own, and that's the thing, it's the capital of Canada. Symbolically, the parliament buildings are right there. It was unsettling to me that it would be that easy just to take over the capital, like from a military point of view.

It's like, you can't let that happen and you have to get them out, regardless of the politics of it personally. So that's, I mean, what do you think about that kind of thing?

Dennis Dimitroff: Well, first of all, I mean, you take the two, right? So you have January 6 and just the Ottawa. So January 6, I don't think they read the crowd properly. In our case, in Ottawa, I think they did read the crowd properly. And there was a whole host of other levels of response the police could have taken. And they didn't, right? I think it was a very measured, as the crowd escalated, okay, what is the next attack that they bring in? And I thought it was really good. I mean, before they brought in the big guns, there were maybe on a municipal level, slow to react. I mean, I think they were hoping they'd just go away after two or three.

Jim Allan: It's almost like the Neville Chamberlain, you know, the prime minister, just let people roll in and maybe we'll all be friends and maybe they'll leave and they didn't leave.

Dennis Dimitroff: If you were there, the idea is no one, like, let's do this without anyone getting hurt. That would be the mantra. I mean, on the whole, the crowd was not really violent. There was sporadic incidents. I mean, on the whole, they weren't violent. So the police said it'd be to a certain level of force. But at the same time, like you said, they got to get them out of there and they can't be there. And then there's a clear law that said, you know, you're in the zone here, you know, you're breaking the law and you got to go. And you can go further, Jim, as far as like that was their point made. I thought their point was made, you know, on the first day they were there, okay, you made your point, get the hell out.

Jim Allan: The delay was something because they got more and more ground in, right? And could they have nipped it off earlier?

Dennis Dimitroff: Sure, they could have, right? But they're always, policing is a profession where, Damned, if you do, Damned, if you don't, you're always going to have a ridiculous amount of criticism based on your, based on your decisions, right? And sometimes those decisions or those actions are in just like seconds or minutes, or they're drawn out, like the protests in Ottawa was. But I think in the end, as you look back, the police did well in that situation.

Jim Allan: So you're a cop on the street. How well do you know the law? How much do you need to know? Because you're not, you didn't go to law school for four years, so you don't know everything, right?

Dennis Dimitroff: No, but you're expected to know everything. And I always said I knew not to make a mistake. And we have this thing in policing, we don't want to be the person who our bad decision results in case law that affects how we, how the rest of us do our job. But there was also a number of cases where we don't have the luxury of not knowing our authorities. And you're held accountable. So if you don't know, that's not a good enough excuse. But I used to say I knew enough not to make a mistake, you know, a large mistake is going to result in case law or something, you know, quite terrible down the road. I mean, there was also so many levels of accountability, not only accountability to your own rank structure within your within your police service. But you know, civilian oversight, SIU, you know, Ontario civilian complaints, emission or whatever they have right now. That's what that's and I've been subject to that a couple of times. You know, use of force, somebody gets injured because you've had to apply force. You know, let's take a look at it. Let's see if there's any culpability or responsibility on the officers. I had a couple of situations I was, I knew even going into it that no, no, I'm that what I had to do, you know, unfortunately, something happened. And the person was hurt, mildly, but he was hurt, and they're going to look at it and they're gonna hold me accountable and let the chips cards fall where they may or the chips fall where they may. As long as your conscience is clear. Yeah, you don't want to be deceitful. I mean, this has happened and like I said, everybody could look at those incidents that could be seconds and minutes and they're going to dissect it. You'll be responsible for those.

Jim Allan: So when you said earlier about not expected to know everything you actually are, you have to know your stuff. You're a police officer, police constable out in the community. And so you meet people, all shapes, sizes, all sort of social economic categories. What part of society needs the most help? Because they're probably

Dennis Dimitroff: That's a hard question. I mean, there's so many areas where people need help. My thing I focused a lot on is food, right? Food shortages and food banks. I mean, there was a number of calls I went to as a regular officer. And I remember, you know, you go in and check out, there's no food, there's no food in here. And I remember going out. And sometimes I go out and buying food for people, okay, coming back, you know, here's $25, whatever you could do. And then I was sort of the start that I'm through that I got connected with the food bank in town, which was the Georgetown, it was called the Georgetown Bread Basket. And we did some pretty substantial food drives for them over this over the last six years, which basically to stay in it, but so many people, um, all different walks of life are needing those services now, right? So yeah, I mean, I really think that's a good thing to be part of. And again, every town and community has a food bank. So for me, that's, that's fine. That's one I would get to.

Jim Allan: So just having food on the table solves, solves a few problems.

Dennis Dimitroff: Absolutely. Sure.

Jim Allan: Or problems before they start perhaps.

Dennis Dimitroff: Of course. Yeah.

Jim Allan: Dennis, thanks for coming and thanks for being so open and honest. It's 35 years. Too long. Good to see you again. And thanks for, thanks for coming.

Dennis Dimitroff: Jim, thank you. Good to see you. You did a great job.  So thanks for having me.

Jim Allan: Appreciate it.