Tybee Breeze

“ Welcome to Ty-B. Please obey all laws and rules
of the beach to make TY-B a better place
to visit and live. Have a good day.”
--Chief Jimmy Price
20
Commendations
On a dark April night, an hour past
midnight, Communications Officer Melanie Smith
spotted what she thought might be a car’s
headlights on high beam coming down Van Horne
Street. She wasn’t sure because she was seeing
it in the monitor of one of the station’s video
surveillance cameras. The camera over the front
door of the station looks out at the parking lot in
front of the station, but also manages to see a
couple of blocks down Van Horne Street as well.
Tybee Breeze
...On the beat
with Tybee Police Chief
Jimmy Price & Major Chris Case
The light in the camera got brighter, but
didn’t seem to be coming closer to the station.
Puzzled now, Dispatcher Smith left her work
station in the 911/Disptach office and stepped to
the front door to get a better look. Seconds later
she was back at the radio, paging out the Fire
Department and the on-duty officers. A pickup
truck parked partially under an elevated residence
near the corner of Van Horne and Fort Streets was
in full blaze, with the flames starting to ignite the
outside wall of the house itself.
The first officer arrived in three minutes,
woke up the inhabitants of the house, and got them
safely outside. The first fire truck arrived in eight
minutes, and the fire in the bed
of the truck was quickly put
out. The truck was
completely destroyed, and
was towed away in case it
reignited. Damage to the
house was minor, but would have been much
worse—maybe catastrophic—if it hadn’t been for
the alert actions of Dispatcher Smith.
GBI Crime Lab Audit
We were visited recently by a team from
the local GBI Crime Lab in Savannah. The Georgia
Bureau of Investigation operates a number of
regional crime labs in the state, and has been
tasked with inspecting local police departments’
marijuana identification capabilities.
Although identifying marijuana might seem
like an easy thing to do—many officers see the
stuff all the time in routine
street policing—the state
provides technical training
in the identification and
weighing of the plant. The
reason for this is to provide