My internship with the Austin Police Department’s North Bureau Investigations Unit involved performing many different tasks. I either started the day by following a detective on one of their many cases or assisted the administration with various tasks. When job shadowing with the detectives, it includes having any witnesses and/or the victims come to the Police Department to give a written statement about what occurred in the crimes committed against them. Working with the detectives, I also made calls to the detectives’ victims to inform them on the status of their case. With some of the detectives, I rode out with them to the jail and also to people’s homes to get statements. Besides just going to the jail or a person’s home, I have been to pawn shops to confiscate stolen property, I got to go on a search warrant of someone’s house to look for stolen property and also sit behind the video recorder of an interrogation room. I was only allowed to observe, once we have left the area the detectives asked what I observed and thought. I also helped with logging in old case files to be destroyed from 2000 to 2003. The administrative aide also had me scanning all of the paperwork that has been hand written into the computer.
My days at the Austin Police Department North Bureau Investigation Unit have not once repeated themselves. Every day, I never knew what to expect, if I will be going to take a statement or doing computer work. Austin Police Department does not have a set routine so do not expect as an intern to have a set routine. Every day is a completely new experience.