“She goes out and helps the public. She does more than her job,” Dawson County, Ga., Sheriff Billy Carlisle said of Sgt. Melissa Brown. “I’d love to have a whole force of officers like her.”
The Pea Ridge native was surprised, honored, touched. Melissa King Brown was named Patrol Officer of the Year of the Dawson County, Ga., Sheriff’s Office for 2012.
“Many citizens have called complimenting her,” the sheriff said. He said there are 110 employees in the Sheriff’s Office.
Ironically, law enforcement wasn’t Brown’s first choice for a career. A 1982 graduate of Pea Ridge High School, Brown, then Melissa King, got married, moved to Georgia and worked for Walmart in management. But, she realized that once the challenge of a new position was over, she was bored.
“As I approached 40, I asked myself ‘What are you going to dowhen you grow up?’ I actually talked to a counselor at church,” Brown said. “I never could lock myself into one thing because I was always afraidI’d get bored with it.”
She was advised to make a list about things she enjoyed doing, then consider career paths that would fulfill those pastimes.
“I realized I loved to drive; my dad was a truck driver. I like to be outside. I love to help people and to help people solve their problems.”
“It’s kind of funny, but I realized that police officers drive all the time, they’re outside all the time ... I love to try to figure out who did it before the end of a mystery,” she laughed, remembering that she liked watching “Charlie’s Angels” (a television drama on the air from 1976-1981).
“I used to think I’d love to do that, but when you come from a little town like Pea Ridge, going tothe police academy was foreign thinking. I never thought about it again.”
So, as she was approaching 40, Brown found herself enrolling in Fulton County, Ga., Public Safety Training Center. And she has since earned another 1,182 training hours. Once hired in law enforcement, she worked in patrol for four and a half years, then transferred to port services where she realized that she’s too young for that. “There’s not enough action there,” she said.
Then, Brown served as an investigator for three years, and when that “burned out feeling” arose, she transferred back to patrol where she’s been the last 10 years.
She says law enforcement was once a predominately maledominated profession, but that “society has recognized that females have the same capabilities that are needed in fields that were once male dominated. ... in today’s society, it’s good to have female officers to be able to dealwith various problems.”
“If a law enforcement officer tells you they’ve never been scared, they’re either lying or they’re in a situation where they’re dangerous to themselves,” she said. “You must protect yourself and the people that need to be protected.”
Brown said she has received letters and phone calls from people thanking her and admits that although she loves to help people, she doesn’t always realize what an impact she has on people.
One example she recalled was working a car wreck where the driver was a young girl who was scared. “I treated her as if it had been my teen-age daughter and took a few extra minutes to talk with her. That affected her.
“We don’t realize we are affecting people at the time. You’re just doingyour job and you might go that extra step of compassion and people recognize that,” she said.
The mother of three grown children, Brown is the daughter of Bob and Elizabeth King of Pea Ridge. Brown’s children are David, 27, of Niagara Falls, Canada, Jordan, 25, who is working on a bachelor’s degree for teaching at the University of North Georgia, and William. She has a grandson and another due in July.
“Mom was very reluctant ... probably because it’s such a dangerous job, but I’m like, ‘Mom, that’s just something I want to do.’ She knows that I’m pretty hard-headed.”
Brown remembers that when her daughter was still living at home, her parting words were: “Bye, Mom, I love you. Don’t get shot.”
News, Pages 1 on 02/20/2013