RICHMOND HEIGHTS, Ohio — Lt. Denise DeBiase has worked at the Richmond Heights Police Department for more than 20 years. Recently, she’s been working with the department’s newest addition: Angel, the K-9.
“As a police officer, you can step out into the world and help people in their times of need,” she said. “Most of the time, people want to help other people, but they’re not sure how to do it. But we always have an opportunity to do it because people are always calling us for help.”
These days, you may find the RHPD veteran out and about with Angel.
“Angel is our community policing K-9,” DeBiase said. “It was really the brainchild of Chief [Thomas] Wetzel. He said we should really just get something, that we could have outreach to the community because we’re always trying to think of different ways that we can do that.”
Angel is a 14-month-old white German Shepherd who is trained to provide support to not only officers, but also citizens.
“When somebody is in crisis, you want to redirect their emotions and feelings towards something that’s calm and natural,” explained DeBiase. “That’s what she does. That’s her purpose.”
In regard to community policing, it is notable that DeBiase is breaking barriers as a woman in law enforcement. Statista, a market and consumer data company, reports in 2020, only 13.1% of full-time law enforcement officers were female. For male officers, it was 86.9%.
DeBiase said she is proud to serve.
“Females are more of a nurturing, motherly type of person that comes to a call that they can talk with,” she said. “I’m a mom to a lot of people. I’m a mom to my son, but I’m a mom to the community members. To me, they recognize that. So being a female, it’s been great because you bring a whole different aspect to the to the calls that you go on.”
DeBiase said Angel is the perfect addition to the community.
“She is the calm to any storm,” she said. “That’s the perfect animal; the perfect partner that you ever want to have.”
