VILLAGE OF MILAN, N.M. – At the latest Village of Milan Board of Trustees meeting, Milan Police Chief Carl Ustupski explained that there have been six shootings across the village over a two-month period, days later a seventh shooting disrupted the village yet again.
“The village is safe,” Chief Ustupski explained, stating that none of the shootings in the village are connected. Most of the shootings across the village have been incidents where an individual would fire a gun into the air, a dangerous practice, and that no resident of Milan was injured.
There were incidents where individuals were arrested, in one instance a man was allegedly attempting to collect money from another, another was an alleged lover’s quarrel where an argument broke out, and another incident was likely a group of children playing with a gun. These incidents are still under investigation.
Chief Ustupski explained that an increased partnership with New Mexico State Police and the Cibola County Sheriff’s Office has helped to patrol the community, but any department would have difficulty looking for an individual who fired a gun randomly and then went into their home afterward.
Chief Ustupski has a plan to address the rise of shootings in the form of new equipment that will revolutionize the Milan Police Department, which up until the 2010s kept most of their records physical, with limited digital record keeping. To counter the rise in violent crime, the Village of Milan is preparing for training which would allow the police department to purchase a heat-seeking drone, the Mavic 2 Enterprise Dual. The moment a call comes in about a potential shooting incident, MPD will be able to deploy the drone and have an advanced look at the crime scene before officers arrive on scene. With heat-seeking capabilities, the drone will allow MPD to see how man people are in a room or house before sending officers inside, Because the drone can fly 44.7 miles per hour, it would be able to keep up with and help navigate officers in the event of a high-speed chase. The drone also records while it’s in the air.
This training is expected to occur in October and will be free to MPD, the department will then work to get the proper licenses necessary to operate and fly the drone before making the final purchase.
“There have been multiple times where this could have been helpful already,” Chief Ustupski explained.
Bringing in new equipment is only part of the chief’s plan to bring MPD into the modern age of policing. With the legalization of marijuana, Chief Ustupski worries that there are multiple drivers under the influence. Being a DWI/DUI specialist before becoming chief, Ustupski wanted to ensure that his officers were trained on how to handle instances where a driver may be under the influence of marijuana.
One of the first contacts Chief Ustupski made was with the Cibola County DWI Compliance Coordinator Joanna Pena. Increasing his efforts to tackle impaired driving, Chief Ustupski contacted the New Mexico Drug-Impaired Driving Training Program – better known as NMDRE, and the New Mexico Department of Transportation to conduct a training class on identifying drug-impaired drivers.
This training will also be held at no cost to agencies that are involved. So far, Milan Police Department, the New Mexico State Police, and the Cibola County Sheriff’s Office have committed to the being in this training. The training will take place February 21 and 22 at Grants High School. Chief Ustupski said that this training will improve his officer’s ability to keep the streets of Milan safe, he wanted to extend a thank you to Grants High School for agreeing to host the training.
The Milan Police Department intends to put their new training to use as soon as they can and are working to bring down the community’s crime. In the meanwhile, MPD has stepped up their efforts to check on businesses at night and are making increased patrols through the village.
The chief said that he has a slew of new plans for the department to reingratiate the police with the community. “We want the police to be people you come to for help, not people you’re afraid to approach,” Chief Ustupski said. As part of this effort, Sergeant Carlos Vallejos explained that the village had a phone call come in asking for the police to go and scare a child into following the rules, he explained that MPD doesn’t do that anymore because they want kids to know that the police are there for them and the community.