Our First Responder of the Day is Deputy Derek Pope. Deputy Sheriff Derek Pope was awarded Deputy of the Year award for 2010, by the National Sheriffs' Association. He was the first Alameda County Sheriffs Deputy to win the award.

Deputy Pope earned this award for his heroic actions 4 years ago on March 21, 2009, when he, along with members of the Oakland Police Department's Tactical Team, entered into an apartment building on 74th Avenue to apprehend a suspect who had murdered 4 Oakland Police Officers during a traffic stop earlier in the day. Deputy Pope, armed with an AR-15 rifle, was posted in the inner perimeter area where he had an unobstructed view of the front door of the apartment. He switched from patrol officer mode to SWAT officer mode and entered the apartment during an active gun battle with a murder suspect. He was wearing only his class B uniform with his Kevlar vest. He had no additional SWAT protective gear. During the search, another sergeant, in close proximity to Deputy Pope, was fatally shot in the head. Deputy Pope and two other SWAT Team officers eventually located the suspect holding a highpowered assault rifle, where they engaged him with their firearms, fatally wounding him.

Deputy Pope is a twenty-two veteran of the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office and has worked at many different duty stations throughout his career. He is currently assigned to the Airport Police Services at the Oakland International Airport. Deputy Pope has been assigned to this duty station for 4 years.

Deputy Pope, you are a hero, and for that we thank you.

If you have someone you'd like to nominate, email us at firstresponderoftheday@hotmail.com and Katie Green will make sure we cover them! Lets thank these guys who put it all on the line for us.  

Our First Responder of the Day comes from Alameda County! His name is Deputy Sheriff Terrance Montigue. He has been on the force for 14 years. For the last 3 years he has been an Alameda County Robbery Investigator. They've been working REALLY hard to get the number of robberies down in the county, and guess what?! Robberies in surrounding agencies have actually INCREASED, while robberies in Alameda County have dropped 11 %! On top of that, the robbery section of the department has solved more than 40% of the robbery cases they face!

Now, I have DIRECT instruction to mention this: Deputy Sheriff Montigue is from Newark, New Jersey... and his colleagues don't let him forget it. The phrase he hears frequently is, “...not bad for a guy from New Jersey.” … This might be because he is an avid Yankees and Jets fan. But thats ok, because in the land of the GIANTS he is a hero. And for that, we thank you.

If you have someone you'd like to nominate, email us at firstresponderoftheday@hotmail.com and Katie Green will make sure we cover them! Lets thank these guys who put it all on the line for us.