Spunaugle reflects on 2024

The Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office has finished up an active 2024.
Montgomery County Sheriff John Spunaugle broke down the calls and arrested the office tackled in 2024.
“We had 4,246 citations, 214 arrests, here at the sheriff’s office. We had 51 K-9 deployments. We were dispatched to 5789 calls. Those are the calls that the deputies answered, and resulted in activity. All told, dispatch took in 10,682 calls, and of those, 1,076 were rescue calls. We had 228 accidents in the county, and we booked in 449 inmates. Much like last year, I’d say the arrests were mainly disputes or drug and alcohol related,” Spunaugle said. “Last year we had more than 12,000 calls, so while we didn’t have a huge decrease, it’s still an improvement, and better than going in the other direction. It was pretty much a normal year for us.”
One type of calls that Spunaugle said ended up being difficult were calls in relation to someone being scammed.
“Unfortunately, people fall for them and some people fall for them really hard. Some send several hundred dollars in a scam, and some send several thousand dollars. Then they come to us and it’s frustrating because we have to tell them there’s little to nothing we can do. We don’t have the technology or the resources, and then we have to try to send them on up the chain to the federal authorities,” Spunaugle stated.
In 2023, Spunaugle said the sheriff’s office utilized small claims court to collect outstanding room and board bills, which was very beneficial and brought in more money. Last year, they took things a step further.
“We have actually contracted with a collection agency. So there’s a specific timeline which gives released inmates an opportunity to either pay off room and board or make payments. Once it becomes delinquent, that goes to collections, and we sell off the debt to collections, and they go collect the money, and that has been proven effective. We are very aggressively going after money owed to the sheriff’s office, and this is honestly the first time in the 27 years I’ve been here this has ever been done,” Spunaugle explained.
In addition to collecting those funds, Spunaugle said they are also implementing ways to get funding by way of housing outside inmates.
“We started housing Polk County juveniles again just about a month ago, and we’re back on the list. That’s good revenue for the county to bring that in. I’m actually thinking about, particularly through Polk County, trying to maybe increase that revenue by offering some prisoner transports. That’s still in the process, but we’re striving to try to get a lot more revenue coming through. Let’s face it, the jail’s not a moneymaker, but we’re trying to do something that will be a benefit to the county. We’re also in discussions regarding housing federal inmates. That’s another opportunity to bring revenue into the county, and we’ve got to be here anyway,” stated Spunaugle.
The sheriff’s office has also seen low turnover in 2024, with retention overall being strong, since unlike the Red Oak Police Department, there is no reserve deputy program, something that ceased several years ago.
“The reserve program was very strong when I was in the reserves, but times have changed. That’s being felt everywhere, police, fire. Everybody has to work, and there was a day when everybody worked in town. Now not everybody works in town. Some of it comes down to the work schedules, and some of it comes down to requirements. The restrictions that were put on them for there to be qualified as a qualified reserve meant they couldn’t afford it. You spend a lot of your own time and money and then don’t get paid,” Spunaugle said.
As for the vehicle fleet, Spunaugle said they are doing everything possible to make every dollar count.
“We are driving all Tahoes and pickups now. We have no sedans, you can hardly even get a sedan anymore. Police vehicles are so expensive. The increase in just the last few years, since COVID, is astronomical. Seven years ago, we were buying Tahoes for $36,000. You are hitting $50,000 now, and then you have to spend another $15,000 or $20,000 getting it outfitted,” explained Spunaugle. “We have changed on our fleet a little bit because of the expense. We are reusing basically anything that we can possibly reuse. It used to be that most of that stuff you changed out because of lifespan. But  now, if it does not require replacement or if it is a plug and play part, we are reusing them until they go bad. Also, we’re taking our cars out 20,000 to 35,000 miles longer. We only budget to replace one car per year.”
Mother nature also provided some tests for the sheriff’s office, starting with two major snowfall events that made traveling treacherous.
“Snow is very trying, because we can’t really get around anywhere. And then you have people that are out and about, and then they end up in an accident. But in the same token, we got good road crews. So within 24 to 36 hours, we’re moving pretty good again. In an emergency situation, secondary roads has always been good to work with on that, or if we need to close a road because of road damage,” Spunaugle commented.
While Red Oak has its own police department, the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office is contracted with Villisca and Stanton for law enforcement services, and the sheriff’s office also serves other communities like Grant, Elliott, and Wales. Spunaugle said at some point, there may be consolidation.
“I don’t know if it’ll come here in my time, but there may come a time when we have county-wide contracted law enforcement, It’s here, it’s just not in this county. You look around us, there’s a lot of counties that aren’t far from us or that border us that are county-wide.”
The other major weather event the sheriff’s office tackled were multiple twisters towards the end of May. Spunaugle said it was a busy afternoon. 
“We had a tornado here at Red Oak and then another near Villisca. I was south of town and watched the Red Oak tornado come right to town. And, of course, I tried to follow it in. Red Oak, and Montgomery County got really lucky on that one because it was right here at the law enforcement center. The ladies here in the front office saw stuff in the air. Had that stayed on the ground and gone through town, it would have been devastating,” Spunaugle stated.
Making things additionally difficult was the fact that a second tornado was on the ground outside Villisca, approaching Hacklebarney Park. Deputy Todd Dollen was evacuating campers and ended up riding out the tornado in his vehicle when he was blocked from taking shelter. Had steps not been taken, the situation could have turned deadly.
“We had tornado sirens that morning and it didn’t amount to anything. A lady I checked on in the morning was later evacuated by Todd when the afternoon tornado was confirmed. After the tornado went through, there was nothing left of her camper. It was completely flat and demolished. You wouldn’t even have known it was a camper if not for the axle being there and that’s it. The tornado tossed it a couple hundred feet maybe, across the road. The County Conservation department also lost a building. A grain bin got uprooted that landed next to another camper. Everyone was very lucky. ”
Spunaugle said not only did the deputies deal with the immediate tornado threat well, they also did a great job in handling the after effects.
“They monitored the situation for a number of days as people were getting cleaned up, making sure the people who were supposed to be there were, and making sure no one was there that shouldn’t have been. Tornadoes are all different. You just can’t expect what you’re going to have to do,” Spunagule said. “You can train all you want, but until it happens, you don’t know how it’s going to go. We were also lucky because, while the only thing that took place in the county was property damage, if either tornado had shifted paths, even a little, it could have gone right through downtown Red Oak or through downtown Villisca. The Villisca tornado passed within a quarter mile of my son, Jared’s, house. If it had shifted that quarter mile, it would have hit him.”
With 2024 behind us, one of the things Spunaugle remains steadfast on is tackling the issue of drugs in Montgomery County.
“It is never going to go away and I have said for many years, if we can stay two steps behind it, we are keeping up. Because that situation is evolving all the time. We try to be as proactive as possible, and you have to be proactive in drug enforcement. You cannot be reactive, We look for evidence and create our own investigations, we do not wait for something to happen. The guys are really good at going and looking for stuff that is happening versus waiting for something to happen,” commented Spunaugle.
When it comes to tackling the drug trade, Spunaugle said the two K-9 officers and their handlers provide an increased benefit.
“We have them on both sides of the shift. Our deputies run an eleven and a half hour shift ,so having a dog on each side it just helps. It helps relieve some of the burden of having one guy and one K-9 who is doing it all, and splits up the duties. Plus, it makes a dog a lot more accessible so we can have a dog out at some point in time out every day of the year,” Spunaugle said. “We also are able to assist counties and towns that don’t have access. We have been over to Mills County and we have been over to Adams County and Cass County. The Red Oak Police Department calls us out quite a bit. Probably the bulk of our deployments are from the police department. We have two good dogs, and it is a very good program, one that will probably never go away. K-9s are a tool now that it is a normal in law enforcement if you can afford them.”
Spunaugle said the dogs can come in handy when drug evidence isn’t readily visible in a traffic stop.
“There are situations where the dog may be the only tool you have to get something started. Or in some cases, the dog being deployed is not used as the sole reason in making an arrest, but as a confirmation. There are a lot of different situations where the dog can be used, especially in apprehensions. Often, the dog doesn’t even need to be deployed. You may have to take a suspect into custody and having that dog’s presence there made things go a lot better. We have even deployed a dog in our jail when we get unruly or violent situations. They can be quite loud in a jail cell.”
Spunaugle said he has one mindset as the sheriff’s department moves through 2025: stay steady.
“I still really want to pursue this housing of inmates. I think it can be a good thing for us, that’s on the priority list. And of course, being proactive and just keep going. Everything is going good now. We have an excellent staff, I can’t say enough about them. I’m wanting to keep them all happy. We have a good group and that makes it easy to come to work. “