Graying of Police Force

At an age when some of his future bosses are contemplating retirement, Franklin Craddock wants to begin a career as a police officer.

At 56, Craddock, the oldest recruit ever to enter the San Diego Police Academy, is scaling walls, firing pistols and racing police cruisers around the academy’s Miramar College site with people less than half his age. But Craddock fully expects to work as a cop for the next 10 years.

What’s more, he says, his age has not been a problem in passing any of the academy’s physical requirements.

“If you want to know the truth, none of it’s been really hard,” Craddock said.

If Craddock completes the 21-week academy training, he will join a growing number of rookie cops over the age of 40 patrolling San Diego streets in a mutually beneficial arrangement that gives the cops opportunities for second--and third--careers and adds mature, experienced men to the generally younger patrol force.

Seven rookie cops over 40 are now on the force. Four others are in the two academy classes under way at Miramar College.

Officials say those numbers represent a marked increase over five years ago, though statistics have not been formally kept. The department has had no age limitations on entering the force for more than a decade but is not specifically recruiting older cops, according to police officials.

Leroy Brady, director of police personnel services, said he is not surprised by the increasing number of older recruits.

“With people living longer and starting in the working world at an earlier age, you have a lot of people just not ready to retire when they hit 40,” Brady said. “You have a lot of people who went into the service and come out and are not old people. You’re not ready to go to pasture at 40. Forty years old is not what 40 years old used to be.”

Rookies Add Maturity

The older rookies add maturity and judgment to the force on the street, said police spokesman Bill Robinson. “These are not qualities you are born with,” Robinson said.

It is too soon to predict whether the older rookies are less apt to be involved in shootings or physical confrontations, but the department has no hesitation about adding older cops to the force, Robinson said.

“They are an asset,” Robinson said. “The fact that they have kept themselves physically fit and have gone through the academy would lead us to believe that they wanted to make a career out of being a police officer.”

The department has no mandatory retirement age, though officers can choose to retire at 55.

Always Stayed in Shape

A retired Marine Corps sergeant major and captain in a Georgia prison, Craddock has prided himself on keeping in good physical condition. He spends long hours on his own after class at the academy to work off extra weight and even looks forward to physical training.

“I’ve been able so far to keep up with everything,” Craddock said.

Craddock says he has always wanted to be a police officer. But when he retired from the Marines in 1973 and inquired at a number of cities nationwide about getting into police work, he was told that he was too old. Eventually, he took the prison job before retiring a few years ago.

When he heard that the San Diego Police Department had no age limitations, he fully expected to get hired.

“I thought I came in pretty well qualified,” Craddock said. “I feel that I have a good 10 years left that I can put back into the department.” Like all academy graduates, he will be assigned to field duty when he graduates. He will not be working behind a desk.

“I don’t have any problems taking orders from a 24-year-old officer,” Craddock said. “I know he’ll have more experience.”

Older Recruits in Demand

The Police Department is not the only area law enforcement agency to bring in prospective officers over 40. The Sheriff’s Department also opens its doors to older recruits.

“It doesn’t happen with great regularity but it’s not a rarity either,” said Sheriff’s Personnel Manager Tom Reed.

In Los Angeles, the Police and Sheriff’s departments both have age limitations, as do most federal law enforcement agencies.

For the most part, the older San Diego recruits have had no problem holding their own with their younger counterparts in the classroom or in the rigorous academy training. As a rule, academy instructors say, the older recruits have a lot more common sense.

“They tend to be a steadying influence on the others,” said San Diego Police Sgt. Dave Jones, academy coordinator. “They are much more capable of working through adversity.”

The older recruits receive no special treatment at the academy, Jones said. “They must meet the physical standards--no exceptions,” Jones said.

To graduate, the recruits must pass a standardized physical training test and complete classroom instruction.

Training Gets Tougher

The training starts off lightly and gets progressively harder, Jones said. Some of the training includes carrying a 155-pound dummy 15 feet in a timed exercise, racing the clock on a 99-yard obstacle course, and timed endurance runs.

Most of the physical training is done on an asphalt parking lot at Miramar College, where the academy is held. The lot has been dubbed the “Grinder” because of the heat generated from the asphalt.

David Sorbie, 44, inquired about getting his son a job with the the San Diego Police Department and instead signed up himself. He was among five others over 40 who graduated from the most recent academy class in July. The group now must complete field training, on patrol with a senior officer, before being assigned to permanent duty.

Sorbie, who retired in 1986 after 20 years with the New York Police Department, said he plans to be a San Diego police officer “as long as they let me.” Sorbie is now at the department’s Northern Division.

Being a Rookie Again

For Sorbie, the department offered a chance to feel like a rookie again. “To tell you the truth, I had no idea that San Diego would hire me,” Sorbie said. “When I found out that they would, I thought it was intriguing.”

Police recruiters talked him into taking the department’s entrance exam. He was 42 at the time.

“I told my wife, and she said, ‘Go ahead.’ I enjoy police work, I’m too young to retire,” Sorbie said. As for concerns about his age, “Well, they say ‘life begins after 40.’ ”

Gordon Lau, 44, was in the same class as Sorbie. Lau spent three years as a reserve officer before enlisting in the regular department. He joined the reserves to find out what police work was like, and found that he enjoyed it. Like many of the older recruits, Lau spent time in the military. He is a retired Marine Corps gunnery sergeant.

“Being a Marine, you had to keep fit,” Lau said. Despite his conditioning, the physical training did not come as readily as the academics.

“It’s not as easy as a young guy. You really have to put out 100% or more at my age,” Lau said.

Adjustment Is Difficult

Now that he is in field training, on the graveyard shift at the Southeastern Division, it hasn’t been a smooth adjustment. The pressure, he said, is similar to that of the academy.

As for generational differences, “Sometimes I feel out of place,” Lau said. “Only the supervisors are about my age. But the young people are easy to get along with.”

William Day, who will turn 43 Tuesday, likes the camaraderie of the police force.

“This is not for everybody,” Day said. “You see the best and the worst of society.”

Day, another retired Marine, said the younger students at the academy “were surprised at what I could do.” But it hasn’t been easy for him in field training either.

“Being a rookie, there’s a lot to learn,” Day said. “One of the hardest parts is listening to the radio. You have to know what everybody else is doing in your area. You have to learn your area, the streets.”

Day said the academy training was hard but “nothing I couldn’t do.”

“I don’t think any of us (older recruits) were intimidated by the instructors,” Day said. “People my age, this is not our first job. We knew what (the instructors) were trying to do.”