San Diego Sheriff Detentions to Law Enforcement Transition

[gameparts]

How easy or difficult is it in the San Diego Sheriff Dept to go from being a Detentions/Court Officer to a full Law Enforcement Officer. Interviewing lieutenant said you could do so after about one year of working in detentions but have to attend the LE academy of course. In reality, how hard is it to go from detentions to law enforcement? Anyone done that recently and how long did it take working in detentions? I don't want to have to stay in detentions forever if my goal is law enforcement.

[micro911]

My daughter worked as a corrections officer for 2 years after graduating the corrections academy. She then attended the LE academy and became a parole agent with full LE credentials. The LE academy was a few weeks shorter than the full academy. She loves the current assignment.

[ARDude]

Can't say about San Diego. But with LAPD you can start out as a detention officer. (Some do because they aren't 21, or just want to see what it's like).
But if you know you want to be a police officer why waste time going thru 2 different academy trainings.

[GizmoSD]

The transition isn’t hard, we have recruits in every law-enforcement academy that are prior-detentions. Some of them are squared away and some of them are train wrecks. The academies are fundamentally different, so that aspect isn’t terrible. If you go through the law enforcement academy as a prior detentions deputy, you’ll be making more money than everyone else there as well.

You can learn a lot while you’re in the jails. You can learn a lot about how to write reports, how to talk to crooks, and how you react under stress. Some of my best patrol trainees were prior detentions. Or you can sit around and do nothing and forget everything you learned in the Academy, while picking up a lot of bad habits and a terrible attitude along the way. I’ve seen both. It’s up to the individual and their work ethic. I’ve also seen plenty of prior detentions deputies fail patrol training.

All that said, both bureaus, law-enforcement and detentions, are short staffed. If you’re a competitive candidate, and you don’t have anything in your background, and you want to do law-enforcement then tell them that. I can’t imagine we would turn anyone away right now if they could get through backgrounds.