Marshal prospect is from poor home with rich tradition

Jace Radke

Wednesday, Dec. 8, 2004 | 9:54 a.m.

Las Vegas Paiute Tribe Police Chief Theodore "Ted" Quasula will be on his way to Washington, D.C., next week for interviews as he continues the process of becoming the U.S. marshal for Nevada.

For Quasula, 54, it is a journey that started in small home without power or indoor plumbing in Northern Arizona outside a Hualapai reservation. It was there that Quasula, a member of the Hualapai tribe, said he learned about pride, tradition and respect from his grandmother.

"She was the backbone of the family and basically raised me," Quasula said Tuesday at his office at the Las Vegas Paiute tribe's 18-acre reservation in downtown Las Vegas. "She taught me the right things to do and how to be respectful.

"We were extremely poor money-wise, but rich in family support."

After talking about his childhood in Seligman, Ariz., located between Flagstaff and Kingman on Interstate 40, Quasula laughed and said, "It sounds like one of those stories where you're walking to school in the snow. But it was all a blessing in disguise because I think it made me a stronger person."

Quasula was nominated by Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., to replace Richard Winget, who retired as marshal earlier this year.

"My law enforcement career keeps getting better and better," Quasula said. "I've been lucky. When I was 21 I knew that law enforcement was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life."

He had worked jobs as a gas station attendant and hotel clerk but found his calling in police work as he studied police science and administration at Northern Arizona University.

At 21 Quasula was an officer with the Flagstaff Police Department looking to work nights because that's where the action was. The night shift for Flagstaff officers meant responding to the bar brawls that would often spark up at the bars in the rougher parts of town.

Quasula, who has graying hair and a stocky frame, said that the excitement of working the busy night shift wore off as he realized that he had bigger aspirations.

"You're young and it seems like that's where you want to be, but winter nights in Flagstaff get cold," Quasula said. "I had to carry five or six pens with me because the ink would always freeze.

"The big thing was that you had to make sure that the drunks got in for the night so they didn't freeze."

After two years as a patrol officer, Quasula joined the Bureau of Indian Affairs as a criminal investigator in 1974, and rose through the ranks of the organization to director of the bureau's office of law enforcement services in 1990. Quasula served in that position for 10 years, developing the bureau's Indian Police Academy, detention, inspection and evaluation programs as well as internal affairs.

During his service as a director, Quasula also served as acting Bureau of Indian Affairs director for Phoenix for a year beginning in 1996. He oversaw 1,200 employees and a $235 million budget as an acting area director.

"My goal was to retire at 50 and do something else," Quasula said.

In 2000 he accomplished that goal for a short time and moved with his wife, a federal prosecutor, to Las Vegas from Albuquerque.

Because of his years in law enforcement with Indian Affairs, Quasula was quickly tracked down by tribes looking for advice in how to run their tribal police departments, and a new consulting business was born.

That business led him to the Las Vegas Paiute Tribe, which had been through several police chiefs and scandals in its police department. After helping the tribe conduct two unsuccessful searches for a new police chief, Quasula agreed to take on the job. He was hired in January 2003 to reform the department.

"There have been some bumps in the road, but what we've advocated is that the police officers are part of the community," Quasula said. "There were good officers here when I came on board, but there was a lack of leadership.

"Now the officers are a part of the community. They are getting out of their cars and saying hi to people and shaking hands."

After the first of the year Quasula will assist the tribe in finding his successor.

Ensign has forwarded his nomination of Quasula for the marshal post to President Bush for approval. The nomination is expected to be accepted by Bush, clearing the way for Quasula to start tracking down fugitives and protecting the federal judiciary, of which his wife, as an assistant U.S. attorney, is a part.

But his home life is what gives Quasula "a little bit of an edge going in," it's the fact that he has "experience working within the federal government," Quasula said.

"I also have been able to meet and network with the sheriff, undersheriff and the other law enforcement officials in Nevada."