Lincoln County Sheriff Shane Johnson stepped into the SVI Radio studio on Tuesday, Sept. 9 for his monthly report. Sheriff Johnson touched on the county response to the Willow Creek Fire, an arrest made following an investigation in a hit and run incident in Alpine, and the recent LOTOJA race held over the weekend.

(0:00) Joining me live in studio this morning with a monthly report (0:02) from the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office is Sheriff Shane Johnson. (0:06) Good morning, Sheriff. How’s everything going today? (0:09) Morning, Duke.
Good. How are you doing? (0:10) How you doing? All right. (0:11) Appreciate the time this morning, as always, and touching base (0:14) on what’s happening around Lincoln County.
(0:16) Of course, the big event over the last couple of weeks (0:18) has been the Willow Creek fire burning south of Smoot. (0:22) Wanted to pick your brain on that as far as how the local agencies work with them, (0:26) with the Forest Service type agencies, and maybe take us back (0:30) to the the very first day when that started on a on a Friday morning (0:34) heading into the afternoon. (0:36) How does the local dispatch and the sheriff’s office and local firefighters, (0:41) how does how does all work with the Forest Service? (0:43) So we we communicate with Forest Service Dispatch (0:47) and that group quite a bit because of (0:50) how much Forest Service area we have in Lincoln County.
(0:54) So that relationship there has been established. (0:57) And so when something like that happens, we obviously call (1:02) the units that were responsible to dispatch local fire, (1:05) but also notify Forest Service and then they get on top of that (1:09) and start rallying resources to go take a look. (1:14) It obviously grew really quick, really fast.
(1:18) It started out small, which is what happens with them, (1:21) those type of fires. (1:23) But the coordination is from that point (1:27) and even to now has been really good (1:30) through our emergency manager, Jay Hokanson. (1:33) He is in touch with them daily.
(1:36) We’ve supplied resources (1:39) as far as the old armory, which is a county building now. (1:42) They’re camping out there. (1:44) They have their command center out of there.
(1:45) So when when it did come time (1:49) for some evacuations, they coordinated that with us. (1:52) And as we had deputies out there making contacts and getting people (1:58) evacuated, helping them out. (2:00) So the communication has been really good.
(2:04) And we it’s good to see that (2:07) that appears to be under control at this point (2:10) and that it’s just a matter of time before it’s (2:14) something that’s going to be that it’s going to go away. (2:17) But pretty frightening. (2:19) And for a lot of people for quite a while.
(2:24) Yeah, no, no doubt, without question. (2:25) And you talk about the evacuations before before the (2:29) the evacuation zones went into effect. (2:31) They they, of course, closed the campgrounds and and that type of thing.
(2:35) All red flats and everything up in that area. (2:38) Was search and rescue involved with with making sure people got out of there (2:41) and all that kind of stuff as far as out of the forest area? (2:44) Yeah, we do use search and rescue in in situations where we need a big group. (2:50) They’re trained in a lot of different things and they can they have good (2:54) communication, they can rally a group pretty quick with their paging system.
(2:59) All people that are willing to help and that are competent. (3:02) So they were used in the beginning to help with traffic control (3:06) and anything else that needed to be done. (3:09) A page went out for search and rescue.
(3:12) So they’re really good at helping out. (3:16) And again, the group that’s trained together and work well together (3:20) and communicate well, and so they’re they’re a good resource. (3:23) You mentioned emergency management.
(3:25) Jay Hogan’s and Stephen Malik always do a great job there. (3:27) And it’s it’s a good reminder to to to try and get set up for that code red system (3:32) that emergency management uses countywide, right? (3:35) Yeah. You can go to the county website and register for that.
(3:38) And so you get notifications when the county puts them out. (3:43) We’re pretty we’re pretty selective when we put something out. (3:47) It’s just not general.
(3:48) If you get something, it’s because you need to be aware of it. (3:51) So it’s it’s a good system. (3:54) It’s worked really well in the past.
(3:55) It worked well for this. (3:56) So it’s it’s something that if you haven’t got registered on that, (4:00) go to the Lincoln County website, Lincoln County, W.I. (4:04) dot gov and get registered for code red. (4:07) It sounds like overall, things went pretty smoothly (4:10) as far as the county standpoint and how it responded to this fire.
(4:14) And like you said, it grew pretty quick and things were (4:17) got a little dicey there on that, especially that Saturday night (4:20) when it burned right up next to the up next to the pass. (4:22) But now that you can kind of reflect on it, any any learning experiences (4:28) from this or anything that the county can say, all right, (4:30) maybe we can do this better in the future if it were to happen again. (4:33) Yeah, I I can’t think of anything (4:38) in looking back.
(4:40) I mean, those those type of incidents are beyond, (4:45) you know, there’s always this discussion goes about states (4:48) and we ought to take over the forest. (4:49) This is a good example of that. (4:51) We don’t have the resources to deal with a fire like that locally.
(4:55) And so you need the Forest Service, those well-trained firefighters (4:59) that come in that are used to dealing with this. (5:01) They have the equipment. (5:02) They have the know how.
(5:05) So, you know, as soon as we can get those groups here, the better. (5:10) I’m sure there’s things that that we that we could look at and improve. (5:14) But the communication is the biggest thing.
(5:16) And and the way that that grew, (5:20) I don’t you know, the conditions were just so that that allowed that to happen. (5:24) That Saturday night, I had deputies out working on evacuations. (5:28) I came out and drove up there to see if they need any help, make sure (5:31) they had everything they need and to see a fire right up against, (5:35) you know, on the top of the south end right against the road is pretty alarming.
(5:38) No doubt about that. (5:40) It’s not not what we want to see. (5:43) Again, luckily, we’re in a place now where we’re out of the woods.
(5:47) No pun intended. (5:48) But we’re, you know, looking looking up and the weather’s cooperating (5:52) a little more to to handle that fire. (5:55) Thank you.
(5:56) Kind of Sheriff Shane Johnson in studio this morning with the weekday wake up. (5:58) Well, Sheriff, switching gears here last time you were on, (6:01) we talked about the ongoing investigation, at least at that time (6:04) to that hit and run incident, which occurred in early August in Alpine. (6:09) And since you’ve been on the air, there’s actually been an arrest made in that case.
(6:13) Yeah, we we got someone in custody. (6:16) He was charged with hit and run and leaving the scene (6:19) of an injury accident. (6:21) Fortunately, the injuries were not severe enough (6:24) that it was a serious injury accident.
(6:27) So that affects what the individual was charged with. (6:31) But we through a series of tips and search warrants (6:35) and evidence left at the scene, we were able to track down (6:38) the driver and make an arrest on that and get him in front of a judge. (6:43) So we’ll see how that plays out in the future.
(6:45) But that’s been charged and in the court system now. (6:49) This is one of those cases where, as as I was reading through the process (6:54) on how it all lined out, (6:55) shout out to your detectives in your apartment who went through this (6:58) because they they really had to do some digging here (7:02) and to get everything kind of circled in and finalized before (7:05) before they went final with it. (7:07) Yeah, yeah, they did a good job.
(7:11) Detective Gardner, we when we have something like that, (7:13) we usually get him involved. He’s he’s very good. (7:16) He has a lot of contacts and he’s he’s been around here a long, long time.
(7:20) A lot of know how and has developed some resources over time. (7:25) So he does a great job. (7:26) Our deputies, Deputy Nelson, worked hard on that and (7:31) did the search warrant, some of the search warrants and arrest warrants.
(7:34) So, yeah, appreciate the work that those guys did (7:37) and to get an arrest on that so we can move on. (7:41) Thank you, County Sheriff Shane Johnson. (7:43) This morning in the weekday wake up sheriff.
(7:44) Anything we missed you like to touch on? (7:46) I just say two things real quick. (7:48) The 80s definitely the best as far as music. (7:52) But last Saturday was a lot of, you know, a lot of traffic.
(7:57) We appreciate the people’s patience and driving and (8:03) and being aware and being safe. (8:07) I get it’s a frustration for if you’re trying to get somewhere that day. (8:11) But we had good results.
(8:16) We have a good relationship with those people coming through. (8:18) It’s I know there’s different differing opinions, but it’s a chance (8:22) to show off our great community and we another good job was done there. (8:27) So appreciate people’s patience with that.
(8:30) And I’m not aware of any incidents that happened, at least in Lincoln County. (8:33) Yeah, there was a there was an incident. (8:36) I’m not sure where it happened, but it was more of a medical that resulted in a (8:40) when you have a medical on a bike resulting in a crash.
(8:43) It was an elderly gentleman. (8:44) I talked to Brent, the organizer and oldest. (8:50) He was the oldest individual to ever complete (8:53) loaded a couple of years ago when he was trying to beat that record (8:56) and had a medical incident.
(8:58) And so that was unfortunate. (9:00) But yeah, very little incidents. (9:02) And to be honest, they’re very proactive.
(9:05) We certainly saw the potential for a problem in the narrows with that construction. (9:10) We placed a deputy there during for five hours during the day. (9:14) That was paid for by the Latoya group in order to allow us to do that, (9:20) to make sure that we had compliance there, but also just, you know, (9:24) seeing that that was a potential issue where everybody comes together there (9:28) and it’s only one way.
(9:31) So and I talked to this morning. (9:34) We didn’t have any issues. (9:35) Everybody did a good job and followed the light and was safe.
(9:40) So that’s what we want to see. (9:41) All right, Lincoln County Sheriff Shane Johnson, the studio sheriff, (9:44) as always, it’s a pleasure. (9:45) Thank you.
Thanks to this weekday. (9:46) Wake up this morning on SBI Radio.