Sheriff Bill Leeper – A message to Nassau County residents

Nassau County Sheriff’s Office Press Release

Submitted by Bill Leeper, Sheriff

As we reach the end of my first year as your Sheriff, I would like to personally thank you for giving me the opportunity to serve Nassau County.

Almost daily I am asked about the various crime trends and significant issues our county will face in the coming years. Without question, one of our greatest challenges is finding a safe balance between today’s challenging economy and providing efficient law enforcement services to our citizens.

While our agency will continue to provide the highest level of service, we will also place a strong emphasis on the reduction of the crime rate through aggressive programs designed to remove violent criminals from our streets. New Crime Prevention initiatives will provide our citizens with valuable Crime Prevention information so they have every tool available to help protect them against becoming crime’s next victim.

As a 36-year veteran Law Enforcement Officer, I know through experience that we must be proactive and also reactive in our approach to fighting crime. By being proactive, we work to prevent a crime from ever occurring. If a crime does occur we must be reactive and quickly respond to the crime through investigation, prosecution and victim advocacy.  I believe that aggressive crime prevention is the key to a continual reduction in the crime rate in our communities. By providing the vital crime prevention information to our citizens, we empower them to help protect themselves and their families every day.

We all know that knowledge is power and having information to protect ourselves against the various crime trends, scams and other criminal activities is one of the most powerful crime fighting tools we can give our citizens. I believe that it takes a community to protect a community and that by partnering with our law enforcement agencies and our citizens; we create the most effective Crime Prevention tool possible to effectively combat crime. In our pro-active approach to protecting our citizens it is also important to consider how we deliver Crime Prevention information. While reaching every citizen with timely Crime Prevention information can be challenging, our approach is to re-channel our delivery methods to take advantage of the various mediums available. Our new model will reach our citizens through social media, schools, civic organizations, homeowners associations, faith based organizations and even our business community.

We will utilize face-to-face presentations, web based services, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Vimeo, television, email, print, and even telephone to deliver crime prevention information instantly to our citizens. In addition to our newly designed Crime Prevention efforts our agency continues to work closely with our local law enforcement agencies to develop partnerships that limit redundancy in investigations and provide jurisdictional coverage throughout the county. Criminals have no boundaries and travel from jurisdiction to jurisdiction committing crimes. Partnerships like our “Police without Borders” program with the Fernandina Beach Police Department and the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office combine resources and are an effective aggressive tool, saving taxpayer’s money by working together to target criminals.

As your Sheriff, I am truly excited about the new vision for the Nassau County Sheriff’s Office and the innovative programs that we look forward to sharing with our community. I am  thoroughly convinced that our combination of Crime Prevention and aggressive law enforcement designed to remove criminals from our streets is the best recipe for keeping Nassau County a great place to live, work, and raise our families.

February 1, 2014 7:30 a.m.