Police Chief John Turley wanted to come home

MATTAWA - John Turley was eager to get back to Grant County when he heard in November of 2012 that the position of police chief was open at Mattawa.

He had been just as eager to get away from Grant County in November of 2010 after the sheriff's election left a divided department and then-Undersheriff Turley on the losing side.

Turley moved to Las Vegas after that election. During his stay there he did this and that and even applied for chief of a small-town department.

Mostly Turley drove truck, harkening back to his younger days, when he chauffeured his way through Brigham Young University.

That was Turley's lot when he received a visit from two Grant County commissioners. They were in Las Vegas for training and decided to encourage Turley to call Mattawa mayor Judy Esser and offer his services.

"They thought I was right for the job and that Mattawa was a good fit for me," Turley said.

Turley didn't hesitate. He was aware the Mattawa Civil Service Commission had selected three people for interviews.

Turley wrote Esser an email in which he told her that, if things didn't work out with the three candidates, he would be available, if she needed him, on an interim basis.

Esser looked over the three candidates and scrubbed the list - an action within her power - and called Turley. She offered the 6-month position of interim chief in January.

Shortly after the hire, Turley sat down with Sheriff Tom Jones, whom he hadn't supported in the election, and a couple of Jones's upper level deputies. They ironed out their differences and pledged to work together for the benefit of Mattawa and the area.

At the end of June, Turley continued to run the department without a contract. He went through the civil service process and was hired permanently, or as permanently as a chief can be, in August.

Turley was a near perfect candidate for several reasons. He knew every area, perhaps every road in the county. He knew the sheriff's department and other law enforcement agencies. And he spoke Spanish fluently.

Although he's spent nearly all of his career in Grant County, Turley is not a native, nor has he always been in law enforcement. He was a rancher for 12 years in Utah and Warden.

He worked with Mexican cowboys during those years and reinforced the Spanish he had learned at BYU in the 1960s.

He reinforced it once before in an intensive immersion program just before going to El Salvador and Guatemala on a Mormon mission in 1969.

"We spent all the time in the program speaking only Spanish," he said. "About four months into the mission, I no longer had to conjugate verbs. I could speak without having to think first."

Turley is happy on the job, now that it's permanent. He did, however, apply for the same position at Quincy during the time he was without a contract.

"I thought I'd best not have all my eggs in one basket," he said.

Turley came in second. Not long afterward, he was offered the permanent chief's position here.