Marion County Sheriff Kevin Cripps has announced Deputy Shane King will be the school resource officer for the Patoka and South Central School Districts.
King will begin work with the two districts when school resumes for the next school year in August.
King along with a second deputy who wants to be a school resource officer, Kevin Berry, are currently undergoing SRO certification training this week in Belleville. They will undergo additional training during the summer.
Cripps expects Berry will be assigned to an SRO position in the future. The Selmaville and Raccoon Grade Schools have indicated they want to share an SRO position, but Cripps doesn’t foresee that starting until at least December because he doesn’t want to take too many seasoned officers off the road at the same time. In addition to the new SRO position at Patoka and South Central School District, Cripps is committed to assigning a deputy to work full-time with the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services.
Both the Patoka and South Central School Districts have signed three-year contracts for the SRO. In the South Central District, the SRO will spend most of his time in the grade and middle school since the high school is in Farina in Fayette County. However, Cripps says while he won’t be involved in law enforcement work at the high school he will still be able to interact with students while teaching classes.
