Night Patrol Units serve and protect in the dark
Rapid City, S.D. (KELO) — The Rapid City Police Department continues to evolve as it shifts focus to high-priority areas to prevent crime from continuing across town.
And as the sun goes down, the job shifts its focus to those who patrol at night.
Officers aim to serve and protect 24 hours a day, with multiple units working every corner of town.
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'Crime happens all times of the day obviously. Particularly, we find that criminals do like to act in the nighttime hours, so that's a lot of the difference. We're very reactive, the crimes are different, people are very much out when the weather gets warmer doing things, doing a lot of stuff at night,' RCPD Patrol Lieutenant Ryan Phillips said.
The street crimes division is split up between two units, with the morning focusing on downtown and park areas and the second unit working nights.
'Violent crime, drug crime, anything involving a gun or weapon, that's our primary focus on Street Crimes B. So we get tasked with going anywhere in town that there's been a spike in violent crime recently. We'll go there and we have the ability to spend more time, more focused patrols in those areas,' RCPD Street Crimes Sergeant Michael Shyne said.
'I see people doing certain things and I can be like, I need to address this before it becomes a bigger issue. It might even just be going to a call for service for something random like an intoxicated call and you can hear people arguing upstairs and you're like what's going on up stairs. I should address that maybe I can stop something from happening,' RCPD K-9 Handler Ekaras Jackson said.
While most parts of town quiet down, the downtown scene comes more alive as the sun sets.
'During the summer hours you'll see a lot more of our guys, a lot more of our officers with the weather being a little bit nicer, they're on foot more. We are a little bit more spread out and we try to be more mobile because as the weather is nicer people are more mobile, they're not as packed into the houses,' Phillips said.
Patrolling the street downtown at night is all about making on the spot judgements as people are walking in and out of bars.
'Did they have a few beers and maybe just being a little loud as they walked down the street? Or is this person harassing somebody, is this person about to get into a fist fight. That discretion comes into play because maybe we might address those situations differently and maybe prevent an assault down the road, prevent a DUI or something like that. So I think discretion is one of our biggest tools,' Jackson said.
One of the downsides of nighttime patrolling is the lack of visibility, which makes each officer's role more vital at tracking down what can't be seen.
'It takes a little more time at night. Going and canvassing a neighborhood is easy in the middle of the afternoon when you can see everything. Whereas at night, you're almost having to shrink down the area you're searching to begin with. And I think it's almost like, in the army we'd call it like hands across America, it's shoulder to shoulder and you walk,' Shyne said.
At the end of the night, the goal is to protect those who are out, whether that's going to the store or enjoying a night out.
'The people that are making it not enjoyable to live in this community, I want to get those people off the streets and so that people don't have to worry about things being stolen from their car, their house being burglarized, not being able to walk downtown in fear of some sort of random act of violence, so that's my main goal.' Jackson Said
The Rapid City Police Department's night team works to have eyes placed throughout the city to be able to react and respond to situations quicker.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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