Kauai Police Department Officer By The Garden Island Shane Sokei wasn’t one of those kids who wanted to be a police officer when he grew up. He just ended up that way. “I fell into it,” Sokei, 34, said at
Kauai Police Department Officer
By The Garden Island
Shane Sokei wasn’t one of those kids who wanted to be a police officer when he grew up. He just ended up that way.
“I fell into it,” Sokei, 34, said at the Kaua‘i Police Department’s Kapa‘a substation recently.
“I saw an ad in the paper. It was not something I planned for.” And, he says, there are no regrets.
“I enjoy meeting a lot of people you wouldn’t normally meet, and the type of people you get to work with,” he said.
Sokei, a nine-year KPD veteran, said the camaraderie with the officers is one his favorite parts of the job.
“We’re a close group” out of Hanalei, Sokei said, adding that officers try and get together outside of work.
The work itself, Sokei added, is rewarding, too.
“It’s a lot more challenging than most (jobs) because it’s different day-to-day,” he said. “There’s something new every day.
You got good days and bad days.” But talking to victims of crime, and fighting with some of the limitations of the job, can be tough sometimes.
“It can be kind of frustrating.
We are bound by certain rules,” and sometimes the public does not understand that, he said. Police officers do a lot “of explaining to people, trying to help them.” As for outside of work, it’s usually spent with his girlfriend, Veronica, and his three children.
“Days off, it’s about spending time with my kids, and doing stuff with them,” he continued.
Sokei, a life-long Kaua‘i resident and a Kapa‘a High School graduate, lives with his family in Wailua Homesteads.
