Alabama Highway Patrol

Alabama State Troopers
Abbreviation	AST
Patch of the Alabama State Troopers.
Alabama Highway Patrol Door Seal
Badge of the Alabama State Troopers.
Motto	Courtesy, Service, Protection
Agency overview
Formed	1936
Employees	1,268 (as of 2004) [1]
Legal personality	Governmental: Government agency
Jurisdictional structure
Operations jurisdiction*	State of Alabama, USA
Size	52,419 square miles (135,760 km2)
Population	4,627,851 (2007 est.)[2]
General nature	Law enforcement Civilian police
Operational structure
Headquarters	Montgomery, Alabama
Troopers	681 (as of 2004) [1]
Civilians	587 (as of 2004) [1]
Agency executive	Major Herman Wright, Division Chief
Parent agency	Alabama Department of Public Safety
Facilities
Posts	17
Website
http://dps.alabama.gov/Home/wfContent.aspx?ID=40&PLH1=plhHome-HighwayPatrol/
Footnotes
* Divisional agency: Division of the country, over which the agency has usual operational jurisdiction.

The Alabama Highway Patrol is a division of the Alabama Department of Public Safety and is the highway patrol agency for Alabama, which has jurisdiction anywhere in the state. It was created to protect the lives, property and constitutional rights of people in Alabama.

In 1971, the Alabama Highway Patrol became the first U.S. police organization to use down-sized vehicles for regular highway patrol duties when 132 AMC Javelins were purchased.^[3] This pre-dated, among others, the Camaros and Mustangs that were used by other departments years later. The Javelins came with 401 cu in (6.6 L) 335 horsepower (250 kW; 340 PS) AMC V8 engines, and one of the original cars is now part of the Museum of DPS Headquarters.^[4]

Rank Structure

The Alabama Department of Public Safety rank structure is as listed:

Rank	Insignia
Colonel
Lieutenant Colonel
Major
Captain
Lieutenant
Sergeant
Corporal
Trooper

Fallen officers

Since the establishment of the Alabama Highway Patrol, 28 officers have died in the line of duty. The following list also contains officers from when the Alabama Highway Patrol was renamed the Alabama Department of Public Safety.^[5]

Other notable officers

James Bonard Fowler became a significant player in escalating the acute racial conflict that led to the Selma to Montgomery marches in the American Civil Rights Movement.^[6] As a corporal in the Alabama State Police in 1965, he shot and killed an unarmed black man, Jimmie Lee Jackson, but was not prosecuted and convicted for the killing until 45 years later.^[6][7] Fowler is also under investigation in the May 8, 1966 death of 34-year-old Nathan Johnson, another unarmed black man.^[8] Johnson had been arrested for suspicion of drunken driving on US Highway 31 and was fatally shot by Fowler at the Alabaster, Alabama Police Department.^[8][9]

See also

	Alabama portal
	Law enforcement/Law enforcement topics portal

• List of law enforcement agencies in Alabama
• State police
• State patrol
• Highway patrol

References

1. ^ ^{a b c} USDOJ Statistics^{[dead link]}
2. ^ "2007 Population Estimates". Census.gov. 2009-01-07. http://www.census.gov/popest/states/NST-ann-est.html. Retrieved 2010-11-18. 
3. ^ Newhardt, David; Harholdt, Peter; Yates, Brock (2009). Art of the Muscle Car. MBI Publishing. pp. 182–187. ISBN 978-0-7603-3591-8. http://books.google.com/books?id=ovVg_UkqfikC&pg=PA182&dq=Alabama+AMC+Javelin&hl=en. Retrieved 2010-11-18. 
4. ^ "The Alabama State Trooper - AMC Javelin". Alabama Department of Public Safety. 2008. http://www.dps.state.al.us/Information/Javelin.aspx. Retrieved 2010-11-18. 
5. ^ "Alabama Department of Public Safety, Alabama Fallen Officers". Odmp.org. http://odmp.org/agency/33-alabama-department-of-public-safety-alabama. Retrieved 2010-11-18. 
6. ^ ^{a b} Fleming, John (6 March 2005), "The Death of Jimmy Lee Jackson", Anniston Star, http://www.annistonstar.com/view/full_story/2746471/article-The-Death-of-Jimmie-Lee-Jackson?instance=special, retrieved 2008-01-21 
7. ^ Brown, Robbie (15 November 2010). "45 Years Later, an Apology and 6 Months". New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/16/us/16fowler.html?partner=rss&emc=rss. Retrieved 16 November 2010. 
8. ^ ^{a b} Associated, Press (24 November 2009). "FBI: Ex-Alabama trooper Fowler's 1966 killing of black man in Alabaster jail still probed". Anniston Star. http://www.annistonstar.com/view/full_story/4767145/article-FBI-says-ex-trooper-s-1966-jail-killing-probed. Retrieved 3 February 2011. 
9. ^ Associated, Press (24 November 2009). "FBI says ex-trooper's 1966 killing of black probed". Anniston Star. http://www.annistonstar.com/view/full_story/4767145/article-FBI-says-ex-trooper-s-1966-jail-killing-probed. Retrieved 3 February 2011. 

External links

• Alabama Highway Patrol website
• Alabama Department of Public Safety website