Hetrick takes over as township police chief

LIME CITY – It was a long road that brought him to the Perrysburg Township Police Department. And now,
after almost 25 years on the force, Mark Hetrick can now be called "Chief."
The longtime officer and detective succeeded chief Ed Stribrny in the position at the beginning of
February.
"Most little kids probably always want to be a cop, but I always wanted to be one and I just stuck
with it, I guess," Hetrick said of the origins of his interest in law enforcement, noting that he
also had a number of friends and family in the field.
"My family’s from Fremont, but I’ve lived all over the United States growing up, so I don’t really
have a hometown," he said, explaining that his stepfather was transferred a great deal for his
work. Hetrick eventually finished high school in Port Clinton. It was after that that he began pursuing
his career in police work.
Hetrick attended Owens Community College, earning an associate’s degree in law enforcement, and interned
with the Perrysburg Township police department as part of the program. However, after graduating, he was
still too young to join the force – Ohioans had to be 21 to be a police officer at the time – and so in
1983 he joined the U.S. Army and became a military policeman "which gave me three years of valuable
training and experience."
Hetrick was stationed at Fort Sill, Okla., for his entire tour, and was a part of the Special Response
Team and canine unit at the base. With the canine unit, he worked with an all-white German shepherd
named Fuzzy. Work on the canine unit went hand-in-hand with his interest in police work as well as his
experience with dogs growing up.
When asked about whether the officers had a bond with their animals, he said that "most of the time
there is. We had a couple dogs in our kennel that were kind of hard to get along with. You never
consider them your pet but there were some dogs that" were high-strung or violent.
"Fort Sill is a large community, actually," he said, with about 50,000 people, containing
neighborhoods, shopping centers, bars, and other accoutrements of a city. Crimes he encountered as an MP
ran the gamut of domestic situations, fights, and even bank robberies, he said, "just the typical
same things as civilian law enforcement. Then the SRT did the same sort of things like (the Wood County
SRT), you do your building entries," like a civilian force does.
"I got out of the military in August of ’86 and within days I was in the police academy." He
joined the township force that September.
"It was pretty seamless," he said of the transition from military to civilian police work.
"The experience and the training is all similar."
Beginning as a patrolman, Hetrick also worked a little as a dispatcher, and was promoted to patrol
sergeant in 2002, then to detective sergeant in 2008 before his appointment to chief in December. He
acceded to the post Feb. 1.
The married father of two mentioned some notable cases from his earlier work, including a number of
high-profile drug cases as well as the April 2009 murder of Henrietta Foster. Daniel Prater, a township
man charged with the crime, was found dead in his cell at the Wood County Justice Center in June of that
year, an apparent suicide.
Hetrick also recalled a frightening incident from 14 years ago. In January, 1997, while on a traffic
stop, Hetrick was attacked by a man who attempted to take his service weapon away from him and shoot
him. Shattering his right hand in the struggle, Hetrick requiring reconstructive surgery; he was off
work for more than five months.
"Almost ended my career, I guess," he said. The hand still functions, though "I always
know it’s there."
Stating his belief that "we got the best department in Wood County," with good officers and a
great deal of potential, Hetrick said that, as chief, he wants to improve on the work the department is
already doing. His major focus is officer safety, wanting to provide them with the best equipment and
training to enable them to protect both themselves and the public. He is also interested in a
reorganization of the department. The possibility of instituting new programs as time goes on is also on
his to-do-list.