Crowd control: Police work overtime at special events

Jace Radke

Monday, Nov. 19, 2001 | 9:46 a.m.

While Lennox Lewis needed just four rounds to regain his heavyweight crown Saturday night, Metro Police were going the distance to safeguard a crowd of about 10,000 spectators at the Mandalay Bay.

Metro's special events unit ensures public safety at hundreds of major sporting and entertainment events every year through exhaustive planning and the willingness of officers to put in hours of overtime.

"You really have to be ready for anything," Officer Carl Boehmer said Saturday night as he patrolled the Mandalay Bay Events Center, where Hasim Rahman was knocked out by Lewis. "People may see us and say, 'Oh man those guys are being paid to watch the fight,' but with the amount of people at an event like this, we need to be here."

With their presence required in corridors and their attention directed at the crowd, not the fighters, the officers got to see little of the main attraction.

"Whenever you work overtime, you never know what's going to happen," Boehmer said.

The special events unit consists of Lt. Curtis Williams, Sgt. Tom Page and two civilian coordinators.

They organize and dispatch a small army of Metro officers, who volunteer to work overtime for the 1,200 events a year the department staffs, including NASCAR races, college and high school sporting events, The Espy's and other awards shows, casino openings, concerts and boxing matches.

"There has been a heightened sense of public safety since Sept. 11, and we've been getting more requests," Williams said. "Everyone would like to have the presence of Metro uniformed officers at their events."

In order to have Metro work an event, a request must be made to Williams, who sits down with his staff and makes an evaluation. The unit is specific about what events Metro officers can work, Page said.

"We're not going to work as bodyguards, and we can never be the primary security force at an event," Page said. "We don't protect private property or provide security for celebrities, and we're not there to enforce in-house rules. Our concerns are law enforcement and public safety at these large events."

The demand for Metro's presence at such events is on the rise. During fiscal year 1997-98 about 40,000 hours of overtime was reported for special events. In 1999-2000, the most recent year for which statistics are available, officers totaled more than 46,000 overtime hours.

Only officers who are off duty can work overtime for special events. The overtime is allotted on a first-come, first-served basis, and those hosting the events foot the bill.

Hourly wages for officers at special events include, patrol officers at $44, traffic officers at $48 an hour and supervisors, $54. Officers get a minimum of two hours' pay for working a special event, even if they work less than two hours.

Planning for the events starts weeks in advance, as Williams' staff coordinates with security staff at the venues to determine the number of officers needed. In the case of Saturday's fight, where there had been some reported animosity between the two fighters' camps, that meant 22 patrol officers, eight traffic officers, three sergeants and a lieutenant.

While Lewis and Rahman didn't arrive at the events center until around 6:30 p.m., Metro preparations began at 2:30 p.m., with a briefing in the in a corner of the arena under air conditioning ducts.

Page reminded the officers to make themselves visible, then briefed them about a homicide suspect expected to show up at the fight. The man was wanted on a Baltimore warrant, and he had been seen in the hotel the week before.

The officers were divided into different teams: ringside, dressing room, fighter escorts, main entrance, roving patrols and traffic. All of the teams are monitored by the special events unit's civilian coordinators, who acted as dispatchers in the arena's security office.

The agenda for the night was to be visible to fight fans and to assist security if someone needed to be kicked off the property.

Officer Chris Whatley drew duty at the main entrance, where thousands of fans filed slowly through turnstiles as the casino's security team checked bags and tickets.

"You never know what you'll get at one of these," Whatley said as he and his partner noticed Baseball Hall-of-Famer Dave Winfield making his way through a turnstile. "I was at the 'Fan Man' fight and the Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield ear-biting incident. Sometimes it can get a little crazy."

During 1994's fight between Holyfield and Riddick Bowe, Henderson resident James Miller, who identified himself as "Fan Man," crashed his motorized paraglider into the ring at an outdoor arena at Caesars Palace.

"I was at ringside, and we had seen him circling the area before the fight, but there wasn't much we could do about it," Whatley said. "Then he came down and got tangled in the light fixtures. I was standing over George Foreman next to the ring, and Holyfield and Bowe didn't know what was going on.

"I remember thinking that it looked like something out of a movie, and that I couldn't believe someone could be that stupid."

With Saturday night's fight indoors, there were no worries about the "Fan Man," but Whatley did find himself taking on the role of firefighter.

"Some guy threw his cigarette butt in the trash and the next thing you know, it's on fire," Whatley said.

Whatley used some bottled water to douse the smoking can.

Officers Boehmer and Steve Connell patrolled the arena's circular concourse, which was packed with fans, including a rowdy British group singing a song about Lennox Lewis to the tune of "Walking in a Winter Wonderland."

Boehmer said he understands the need for Metro at large events, when he thinks about the trouble such large numbers of people could cause.

"With this many people, things could get out of hand fast, and we could have a riot on our hands," Boehmer said. "I worked an Oscar De La Hoya fight at the MGM Grand last year, and we had a fight in a luxury box. There were 30 guys going at it and just myself and another officer to pull them apart."

Saturday's fight was relatively quiet: Only seven people were kicked out, fraudulent ticket holders were turned away, and there was no sign of the homicide suspect. After Lewis knocked out Rahman in the fourth round, however, things got a little intense for officers stationed around ringside, Page said.

"We jumped up onto the ring after it was over because of the animosity between the two camps," Page said. "It was a little more than we'd normally do, but we wanted to make sure that we could keep both camps away from each other, and keep anyone in the crowd who got a little too excited out of the ring."

The exchange between the fighters, in the end, was little more than a congratulatory handshake, but the officers were ready for more.

After the main event officers stood by at the press conference, and were able to leave about 11 p.m., after putting in 8 1/2 hours of overtime.

Metro evaluates each event to make sure that officers acted accordingly, and to review any new techniques or methods for future events, Williams said.

"This department holds its members accountable, and we have a responsibility at these events," Williams said.

Working in unique situations with television cameras and celebrities could make focusing a little tougher for officers, but they say any star-gazing wears off quickly.

"You're not Ray Charles out there, so you do see some unusual things," Williams said. "You go in knowing you're going to be in a different situation, but you're there to work and the fascination wears off.

"You see Dennis Rodman and his 900-member entourage get turned around by security at a turnstile, and it ceases to be a novelty after a while."

Despite the strange sights and long hours, Williams sees special events as a chance for police to broaden their experience and become better officers.

"It really gets you out of the realm of everyday law enforcement and makes you look at things differently," Williams said. "It's an excellent environment for officers to learn about diplomacy and to see things from another side. It's not something you can pick up from the academy."

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