Wackenhut CPO

[SecureTN]

Anyone know anything about Wackenhut's Armed CPO's. I worked for them unarmed awhile back, but only talked to a CPO a handful of times.

[gcmc security part 2]

I may have heard a thing or two about them.

I've been one for the last 3 years in March.

First of all CPO is a class of officer and doesn't always mean you are armed but in most offices you are.

Second, to qualify you must have one of the following:

* Law enforcement experience

* Service in the Elite Military Forces, Military Police or combat arms (any time in the Marine Corps counts towards this)

* Graduate of Police/Corrections Academy

* Criminal Justice Degree, Associate or higher

* Career Military (I think most offices are considering 10 plus years as career)

And that's it. No amount of time as a Security Officer will qualify you. Someone can work 20 years for the company as a Upgraded Security Officer (the next lower classification) and if they don't have any of the above will never become a CPO.

If you want my honest opinion it won't be provided on here, pm me and I'll talk more to ya.

[Lawson]

And that's it. No amount of time as a Security Officer will qualify you. Someone can work 20 years for the company as a Upgraded Security Officer (the next lower classification) and if they don't have any of the above will never become a CPO.

If you want my honest opinion it won't be provided on here, pm me and I'll talk more to ya.

Thats not necessarily true. Some people have gotten "Honorary CPO" status before... hell, I basically did. I applied for CPO status under the fact I had worked for a Police Department for a summer as a boating enforcement officer, and they granted me the status. I talked to someone at our office and he said my status wasnt enough to get me that, and the office got it for me.

He also gave me a list of non-qualifying TSOs and USOs that he would grant CPO status to if they asked.

[gcmc security part 2]

That may be true of your office, I've seen it bent around here, but you wouldn't be able to work at another office under that. As well as you wouldn't qualify for any corporate jobs where you were required to be CPO qualified, such as an Area Supervisor, or Operations Supervisor (used to be Manager, Physical Security).

We let people who have been through a Fire Academy become CPOs but technically aren't qualified by corporate standards.

Lately we have been cracking down on it though. In my office without having been to an academy you would not have qualified as a CPO

[sgtnewby]

When I was a CPO (7 years police reserves and community service officer qualified me), our branch took anyone with any military experience, reguardless of what your MOS was...

[gcmc security part 2]

When I was a CPO (7 years police reserves and community service officer qualified me), our branch took anyone with any military experience, reguardless of what your MOS was...

Nowadays, any military service would qualify you for USO.

[Lawson]

In my office, I was able to get my CPO status easily, my buddy (Wackenhut Hickey on these forums, though he hasnt visited in a while) was a combat vet in the US Army who served with an Infantry platoon in Iraq, was told his status may not qualify for CPO, but the guy who served in the Korean War does...

[gcmc security part 2]

Yeah, It's crap and one of the many things I dislike about the company. I had an officer working for me who had been with the company 10 years and couldn't get the site supervisor position I had because it was a CPO position.

[Lawson]

Our office, in all its wisdom, upgraded a USO site to CPO knowing full well we did not have nearly enough CPOs to staff it so a lot of us ended up pulling long shifts... and even then when I asked for them to try to encourage CPOs to leave TSO and USO sites, they wouldnt budge...

[gcmc security part 2]

Our office, in all its wisdom, upgraded a USO site to CPO knowing full well we did not have nearly enough CPOs to staff it so a lot of us ended up pulling long shifts... and even then when I asked for them to try to encourage CPOs to leave TSO and USO sites, they wouldnt budge...

Yeah I hear you, I know of an armed CPO who is taking a PRO shift supervisor position because he knows he will never advance in his current position. A 2 dollar pay cut.

But on that, he is the first person to apply for a supervisor position for the right reasons in my eyes.

[Lawson]

Excuse me for not recognizing the term PRO, I havent been with TWC for almost 2yrs...

[gcmc security part 2]

Excuse me for not recognizing the term PRO, I havent been with TWC for almost 2yrs...

Oops sorry, don't think every office uses them. Property Resource Officer. Basically a USO in a suit. When I was at the hospital before I moved into the office that's basically what I was.

[Black Caesar]

Anyone know anything about Wackenhut's Armed CPO's. I worked for them unarmed awhile back, but only talked to a CPO a handful of times.

I talked about some of my more memorable experiences as a CPO in this post. I got the job because I was a reserve police officer for a small town (when I started, then left to reserve for the college PD) at the time, left the company all together when I got on full time job at the college I work at now.

Not my worst private security experience, nor the best either. Most of the CPOs I met were top notch, retire military or police who had "been there" (and so had little or no "wanna-be" attitudes), had a great work ethic and could be trusted.

Then there were the others...... I took my security commission course via Wackenhut. I remember one guy (who had been a military policeman 20 years and 200 pounds prior lol) answered every "shoot/don't shoot" question SHOOT lol. They still passed him, he ended up getting his weapon taken from him and run off the property by some hoods at a truck stop on I-20...

The problem was that (as has been mentioned in this thread), the entry requirement into the CPO division are to lax, and individual offices can change the rules. We had people who had been contract corrections officers for a few weeks and hadn't even gone through a CO Academy become CPOs.

Wackenhut needed bodies and got them, but it made the CPO program at the office I worked at a joke (and a scam, Wackenhut charges out the ass for CPOs, but the CPOs didn't see a lot of that money, the most I made as a CPO was 10 an hour).

Contrast that with what I experienced working for a Federal Contractor. Alrod stuck hard and fast to their standards (all those guys were retired,reserve or ex military or police or corrections in good standing) and we didn't have near as much of the "nimrodery" on that job as what I experienced with Wackenhut.



EDIT: Quick side note: I wasn't at the post, but I was in the office the day it happened. Their had been a holdup at a bank that Wackenhut had the contract to, at one point one of the CPOs who worked there almost got himself arrested when he told a detective "this is MY jurisdiction and I want you to leave", apparently because the Detective would not "share information" with him.

The Major (who was in charge, the manager was out of town) blew a gasket right there in the office, I heard a part of the phone conversation where he told the CPO to "get your ass to the officer right now" lol. Things like that happened alot, I hated going to the office for my check....