Text a Message to the Show Today we return to our conversation with Sheriff Sonny Byerley and his wife Mikaela. This is part two, so you if you haven't heard part one, you definitely need to go back and catch Episode 127 and hear some of the wild stories of Sonny's career: getting shot and stabbed, going through a dramatic officer involved shooting and witnessing the hatred and violence of a big city riot. But in this part of the conversation we see the vulnerable side of the Sher...
Text a Message to the Show Today we're talking to Sheriff Sonny Byerley and his wife Mikaela. I met Sonny and Mikaela because they have begun traveling to police wellness conferences to share their experiences about PTSD. Sonny is a cop's cop: strong, independent, and self-reliant, but he's also a cop who has survived being shot and stabbed on multiple occasions and has endured all kinds of other traumas that a lot of officers can relate to. In today's interview we're going...
Text a Message to the Show In the summer of 2025, one of my patrol officers, Hunter Simoncic, was struck by a car and killed in the line of duty. As part of the grieving process, we are sharing our experiences with you that you might be better prepared for the impossible tasks that immediately follow a line of duty death. One of the most difficult is that of family liaison officer. A family liaison is assigned to the family of a fallen officer, to advocate for the family's needs, to com...
Text a Message to the Show In the summer of 2025 my hometown of Kansas City, Kansas, lost two officers murdered in the line of duty: Deputy Elijah Ming and Officer Hunter Simoncic. Because they were killed just 30 days apart, we had two large, complex, line of duty death funerals at the local major league soccer stadium, one funeral just a few weeks after the other. We are still grieving and trying to process these losses, and as part of that process I wanted to offer our experien...
Text a Message to the Show It's that time of year again to talk about those spooky stories and things that go bump in the night. This time we're looking at San Francisco and talking to friend of the show, JIm Dudley. Jim has been on the show multiple times and just to remind you he's a retired deputy chief from the San Francisco PD with over 30 years experience, he teaches at San Francisco State University, and hosts the Policing Matters podcast. Even though Jim and I both s...
Text a Message to the Show So a few years back I was at a police department promotion ceremony and began chatting with a guest who was an ATF civilian analyst. Every gun story he told was fascinating. Every insight he had on firearms was spot on. He was good humored and friendly, so I asked him right there, would you ever consider coming on the Hey Chaplain podcast? We can talk guns, we can talk the ATF, I just want to get you on the show. He was very agreeable, ...
Text a Message to the Show Medina Baumgart, Psy.D., ABPP is back to answer more questions from cops. She and I put our heads together to make a list of common issues that cops have and I've compiled those concerns and questions (and a few surprise questions the doc hasn't seen yet) and we're going to have her give us her answers and she and I will banter back and forth about them. She's a psychologist, I've been a church pastor for 30 years. She's married to a retired cop, I...
Text a Message to the Show On today's episode we're talking doing something a bit different, something new to Hey Chaplain. I found a cop psychologist who is married to a retired police officer and her name is Medina Baumgart, Psy.D., ABPP. We put our heads together to make a list of common issues that cops have and I've compiled those concerns and questions (and a few surprise questions the doc hasn't seen yet) and we're going to have her give us her answers and she and I will ba...
Text a Message to the Show On today's episode we're talking to Kevin Hardy about artificial intelligence, specifically in how and where it will fit in between the police officer and the chaplain… and can it replace a chaplain, or other helpers, entirely? And I promise that both Kevin and I are actual flesh and blood humans. Really. Kevin's website: https://mwcn.online/ You can request an access link to his zoom meetings on the Events page. Music is by the Whol...
Text a Message to the Show In the early days of this podcast, I began by bringing in patrol officers and asking them a series of about 25 questions, covering all aspects of their patrol experience. From that initial batch of interviews I would pick a topic, stitch together the responses of several officers, and create compilation bonus episodes I called "Firsthand Accounts." It's been three years since I've produced any of those firsthand account episodes and I've been promising t...
Text a Message to the Show On today's episode we're talking to Gregg Lanzen, he's a police and fire chaplain from Indiana who was a firefighter, a medic, church pastor, and a counselor with a doctorate in Psychology. Gregg has all kinds of good things to tell you about building resiliency and some great tips for first responder families. Music is by the Mini Vandals, by Chris Haugen, and by National Sweetheart Hey Chaplain Podcast Episode 122 Tags: Fire, Ambulances, Career, Church, ...
Text a Message to the Show I'm frequently asked about the topic of grief, so here are a few thoughts that frequently come up in those conversations, with special attention to the insights we get from Christianity. Music is by the Westerlies Hey Chaplain Podcast Bonus Episode 44 Tags: Grief, Bible, Death, Emotion, Fear, Funerals, Loss, Love, God, Health, Hope, Pain, Psychology, Remembrance, Sympathy, Trust Support the show Thanks for Listening! And, as always, pray for peace in our c...
Text a Message to the Show Today we're talking about Field Training Officers and the FTO programs that train police officers once they are on the street. Our guest today is Steve Kellams from the Blue Canary podcast. Steve has taught hundreds of police departments in regard to field training issues and how to best run an FTO program and he is a past president of the National Association of Field Training Officers. Resources: Steve's Blue Canary consulting website, including his ...
Text a Message to the Show It's mailbag time! Use the link above to leave a comment or a question and we might use it on a future show! Music is by LesFM Hey Chaplain Update Episode 3Q 2025 Tags: Chaplaincy, Chaplains, ICPC, Law Enforcement, Limited Series, Mail, Microphones, Mini-Series, Podcasting, Radio, Reporting, Training, Kansas City, Little Rock, Arkansas, Kansas Support the show Thanks for Listening! And, as always, pray for peace in our city. Subscribe/Follow here: App...
Text a Message to the Show Today we're talking to Rick James… no, not that Rick James. Richard James is a chaplain with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police from the Vancouver, British Columbia area. He is a former Canadian police officer and has been working in church ministry for several years. He was also a police chaplain in New York State for some time. Rick journeyed across North America and made a visit to my Kansas City studio part of his trip; at the time he held...
Text a Message to the Show Welcome to the Daily ICPC; My name is Jared Altic, and I'm a chaplain with the police department. This is a limited podcast series from Hey Chaplain, which follows police chaplains Jared Altic and Ward Jenkins to Little Rock, Arkansas to attend the annual training seminar of the ICPC, the international conference of police chaplains. This series will provide a daily, behind the scenes look at the convention, and this is our after-action review episode, w...
Text a Message to the Show On this episode we're talking to Dr. Olivia Johnson from Blue Wall Institute. She is a researcher and subject expert on police wellness and specifically on police suicide and she is the jagged little pill stuck in the throat of the huge law enforcement machine that is funneling huge amounts of money at suicide prevention. Today she's going to talk about suicide prevention is broken, primarily because of the things that no body, not the family and not the...
Text a Message to the Show Welcome to the Daily ICPC; My name is Jared Altic, and I'm a chaplain with the police department. This is a limited podcast series from Hey Chaplain, which follows police chaplains Jared Altic and Ward Jenkins to Little Rock, Arkansas to attend the annual training seminar of the ICPC, the international conference of police chaplains. This series will provide a daily, behind the scenes look at the convention, and this is our Day 5 episode. It's cal...
Text a Message to the Show Welcome to the Daily ICPC; My name is Jared Altic, and I'm a chaplain with the police department. This is a limited podcast series from Hey Chaplain, which follows police chaplains Jared Altic and Ward Jenkins to Little Rock, Arkansas to attend the annual training seminar of the ICPC, the international conference of police chaplains. This series will provide a daily, behind the scenes look at the convention, and this is our Day 4 episode. If you as...
Text a Message to the Show Welcome to the Daily ICPC; My name is Jared Altic, and I'm a chaplain with the police department. This is a limited podcast series from Hey Chaplain, which follows police chaplains Jared Altic and Ward Jenkins to Little Rock, Arkansas to attend the annual training seminar of the ICPC, the international conference of police chaplains. This series will provide a daily, behind the scenes look at the convention, and this is our Day 3 episode. What are two gu...