Cultivating Partnerships to Protect Children

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Cultivating Partnerships to Protect Children

The Texas Department of Public Safety’s Continued Effort for the Interdiction to Protect Children

Derek Prestridge, Captain, Training and Operations, Division Texas Department of Public Safety; Melissa Atwood, Licensed Clinical Social Worker, Victim & Employee Support Services, Texas Department of Public Safety; Michael Bourke, PhD, Chief Psychologist, U.S. Marshals Service; and Lexi Quinney, Senior Manager, Texas Suspicious Activity Reporting Network

Local and state uniformed officers have served on the front lines of U.S. law enforcement for more than a century. Whether enforcing prohibition laws in the 1920s or reducing drunk driving and interdicting drug traffickers in the 1970s and 1980s, police have long served as the first line of defense against criminal activity.