Several law enforcement agencies in area counties, including Custer County, have formed the Central Nebraska Special Response Team(SRT).
The SRT was formed in the summer of 2020 by Howard County’s Sheriff Office in St. Paul. The Custer County Sheriff’s Office joined the response team shortly after it was formed, right after the SRT assisted with courthouse security during an auction.
Howard County Sergeant Paul Tartaglia explained how the SRT came about.
“Given manpower issues we decided that we would reach out to places like Custer County, Sherman County, Nance and so on and see if maybe they had people that were interested and they did. It kind of just snowballed from there into what it is now, where it’s just hey we’ve got a group of people that are interested in continuing their training and learning new skills and new techniques using new technology and other assets that allow us to kind of operate in the role of a swat team.”
Tartaglia told KCNI/KBBN that recently the SRT team has been working with schools to help them be prepared for situations that prompt a school lockdown.
“Centura kind of started that ball rolling. They let us come in, they did a lockdown, we went in, unlocked the doors, got the kids outside, just went through kind of what would come when it was time for them to leave the school after something like that. It’s been really good and it sounds like there are quite a few other schools that would like to have us come in and help them out.”
Custer County Deputy Casey Edelman mentioned an incident which prompted the county to join the response team.
“We had an incident a couple of years ago where an individual had made threats pertaining to an auction that was taking place at the courthouse, and so we contacted the SRT. They came over, did an assessment for us, and then provided a lot of the guys that they had on the team to come over and assist us with the security during this auction. Everything went really well, and they were trying to add more counties to it, and as it so happened I attended the academy with Mr. Tartaglia who’s the team commander. And so, Dan(Custer County Sheriff Osmond) approached me afterwards and said ‘Hey, would you be interested on being on that team and being the Custer County Deputy for the team’ and I said sure.”
Edelman said the team is using the latest technology and techniques to help them diffuse crisis situations.
“Drones are huge now. We’re really getting into the drone stuff, both interior and exterior drones. We’re also getting into more advanced, less lethal munitions, stuff like that. Night vision, thermals, all that stuff. We’re really leaning hard into crisis negotiation right now, so we’re trying to get funding for drop phones so you could talk with barricaded suspects and try to resolve situations as peacefully as possible without having to use any type of violence or even less lethal munitions. If we can negotiate a situation that way that’s the way we’d like to do it.”
Edelman said the SRT would like to expand from a current membership of 24-25 to around 30. Other partner agencies committed to the team include the St. Paul Police Department, as well as Sheriff offices in Merrick, Sherman, Custer, Nance, Boyd, Rock and Brown counties.
