There is so much negativity and bad publicity about police and the black community, but no one ever talks about the good police. Truth be told, there are more good ones than bad. Yet, the media always tend to portray the bad ones and never acknowledge the kindness and exceptional work of the good ones. So, let’s forget about those few bad seeds and shine a light on some of the good police.
New York natives, Dre and Ralph (referred to by Dre as H) are Baltimore City police detectives and two of the good ones. They pride themselves on being honorable and decent police officers who genuinely care about people; they love connecting and maintaining a rapport with them.
Dre and Ralph were so inspired by being upstanding police they started a podcast as an outlet to share cop stories and to engage with people from different walks of life. Their podcast will make you think, laugh, and hear other people’s perspectives on an array of topics.
Here is my conversation with Dre and Ralph of the Silverback Chronicles Podcast.
Tell us a little about yourselves and what led the two of you to become police officers.
Dre: I always wanted to be a cop since I was a little kid. So, I wanted to be in NYPD but doing the recession, they weren’t hiring so Baltimore took me in as their son to become a cop in this wonderful city.
Ralph: Same thing for me, I’ve always wanted to do the law… I’ve always wanted to play football, which I did. And after football, you gotta choose what’s next in life to be a professional. So, being a policeman is always something that I was inspired to do because I saw the bad side and I saw the good side. So, I wanted to be a part of the great law enforcement brother and sisters that do the job the right way. Like with Dre, New York had a hiring freeze, and a friend of the family who was a detective told me about it. And I took my talents down to Baltimore. They hired me in six months and we’ve been here eleven plus years, seven in protective.
Later, you both quit policing to become detectives. What made you do that? What do you love about what you do now?
Dre: Well, we’re still active; we didn’t quit policing, we just got promoted. We went from a uniformed officer to a detective capacity. So, H (Ralph), he’ll tell you more about it. He’s in a unit where he provides security to city executives. So, that’s like what he specializes in. Whereas, I specialize in investigating non-fatal shootings. But we’re both detectives. So, we’re still in the same role just with more specialized skills.
You have a podcast called, Silverback Chronicles Podcast. What is the significance of the name and what is your mission?
Ralph: Well, the significance of Silverback Chronicles, that was the name of our squad when we patrolled in the streets. We had a squad of ten to fifteen people including females. And we looked at ourselves as silverbacks; we all protected each other. We love what we do. We held each other accountable. We worked out after work. We worked a lot of overtime. And we carried ourselves the way officers should carry themselves. And everybody in the neighborhood and the departments loved us. They gave us recognition worldwide for how we carried ourselves, as far as a big family.
And Dre got hurt almost three years ago, and his brother Manny came up with the concept of doing a podcast. He said, “You guys have so many stories. You guys should go to this platform so the world can know about what you do.” And Dre brought that to the attention and he was like, “We should do this.” And me, him, and Triple C, we sat down and put a game plan together, and it just got extremely successful. And here we are. You know, the Silverback Chronicles Podcast is for the world to know. Everybody has an opinion. Yes, it’s law enforcement based but it’s not just law enforcement, it’s about everybody. We’re all about bridging the gap between law enforcement and the community; letting the community know that there are real, true, genuine officers out there that serve and protect and do the job the right way. We hold those bad officers accountable, those bad seeds in the department. And that’s what we’re about, we’re about change. We’re about bridging that gap, we’re about laughing and having fun and letting people know police officers are still amazing. We do our job thoroughly. We love what we do, and we just love having fun while doing it.
Dre: Triple C is our engineer. H (Ralph) is my best friend and we were partners in patrol. So, when the seed was planted, I knew out of everybody I know, it would have to be H to do this with me. Triple C is my neighbor who’s also in the federal government. He growing up was a DJ. So, he was very technically sound with the equipment. So, it was just a beautiful collaboration. You know, we have H who’s very outspoken, and we have Triple C who’s very good on the technical side, and it just became this beautiful thing.
Sometimes you invite police officers to tell their stories on your podcast, what is it you want to accomplish by doing that?
Dre: We invite like H said, it’s for everybody. We invite first responders you know because that’s the first resource that we have… first responders across the country. So, we invite them because we like to show everybody that’s listening that we are human beings. You know, like H before this had a football career. You know there has been plenty of officers that fight professionally. There’s plenty of officers that are amazing cooks. There are plenty of officers in communities putting sneaker drives together, or you know, putting coat drives together in the wintertime and doing Toys for Tots.
You know, the news media doesn’t follow these first responders that are doing this on a daily. The news media only portrays us when we make a mistake and then they exploit that mistake to make it seem like we did this maliciously. When you know, in the line of work that we do, we play this game if we lose, we don’t go home or someone else doesn’t go home, unfortunately. But at the same token, while we’re not playing that game, we’re in the community reaching out trying to help people because first responders… we care. We have big hearts regardless of what everybody will say, we don’t do this job to get rich; we literally help people.
Ralph: Sometimes, it can be a thankless profession and we’re okay with that. We wanted to give ourselves and every office and any person that’s leading on the front lines a voice because everybody has a voice. You know, some people can’t deal with the job, so the outlet is they come on our podcast and they feel great because they get all that out. We’re more than just policing. You know, policing is what we do as a profession. We bring more than just policing to this world with our personalities. And we just want the world to understand, listen, we’re not robots and a lot of times police are not going to talk like we talk. And that’s what’s attractive and appealing as well, that the world can see, oh these guys are not just regular police, but they’re amazing police. Their great personalities are a recipe for greatness.
As a result of your podcast, what impact has it had on people? What feedback have you gotten from other police officers and your listeners at large?
Ralph: Everything we’re getting back is positive. We’re getting back, “This should have been done.” The feedback is amazing. We have A-list celebrity actors that love what we’re doing and they want to come to join us in what we’re doing. And we’re changing the landscape of policing. We’re letting everybody know, we’re serious about this, we’re having fun, and we’re bringing a realness to the police that nobody has seen.
What is your opinion about the relationship between police officers and the black community? How do you think it can be better?
Dre: I think there’s a miscommunication. In this city of Baltimore, the majority of the police officers are black and we’re serving the black community. I think the news media tends to blur the lines a little bit because we’re in communities and we’ve been told, I can’t count how many times, “Thank you for being here. Thank you for bringing a little bit of safety to the neighborhoods.” So, the communities want us there, but the media has run with this agenda so far that now everyone believes there’s an issue with law enforcement and the black community, and it really isn’t. If you look at every major city, the majority of those police officers are from black communities and we just decided to serve them. So, like H was saying with this podcast, we’re the first ones to state this. Like, we’re in communities and what the media is saying is wrong. Because the media shows up for an incident, we’re here day in and day out.
Ralph: Just to piggyback on what Dre said. We’re out there, they love what we’re doing. If there’s any confusion, I would say overall, we speak for us, we speak for a lot of the officers on the job and there are some of our counterparts that are intimidated by these inner cities. And my biggest thing with that is it’s okay to be intimidated. But what way can you bridge that gap than by going out and speaking to them and having those uncomfortable conversations? Because that’s the only way you really bridge that gap and let the people know who you are, because let’s face it, some of our brothers and sister are not from inner cities, which makes our building a rapport a lot easier because we’re from them. That’s why we getting better with that and letting our counterparts know it’s okay to be intimidated because you’re not from that culture. So, it behooves us to get out there with them to let them know who these people are, and in return, you build that rapport; it starts with a conversation. That’s the only way we’re going to get better.
Because of your experience and the great work you’re doing on your podcast, you’ve been hired to be consultants on the new HBO show, We Own the City. What was it like to be a part of that show?
Dre: We were blessed with this great opportunity through Justin Fenton who actually wrote the book. I came on as a consultant. And I felt like my job there was to make sure we (police officers) were portrayed in the right light. You know because sometimes, nothing against the writers… the writers were amazing, the producers were amazing. Everyone was super, they loved first responders but I also understand that Hollywood, the camera, and the audience like overdramatized police work. So, I was so happy they brought me on to keep everything honest.
And of course, through that, H has his debut coming up on episode 3. You gotta make sure to watch it. One thing about H is when the camera comes on, he knows what to do. He was given a role and he knocked it out of the park. So, we were just blessed with the opportunity. And I want to mention the director, Reinaldo Marcus Green, who also just won an award for King Richard starring John Bernthal and Will Smith.
Ralph: It was an amazing opportunity. I want to give a huge shoutout to John Bernthal. He’s just an amazing man, he means so much. It’s deeper than the business, it’s the brotherhood… the foundation. And we had him on our podcast, he asked have I ever acted, and I told him no. And he told me I was a natural. When they asked me if I wanted to do it, of course, you gotta go through the interview process, and I passed it with flying colors. And just seeing me and him acting together and watching him, I mean he’s an amazing worker. I watched how he performed and got pointers from him and the likes of Jamie Hector. I’m going to continue to do it because it was phenomenal and I can’t wait for it to come out.
What’s next for you?
Ralph: Ah man, me and Dre, we like just masterminds of our future and we love policing but we just know it’s more in store for us. We’re taking advantage of any opportunity given to us. We’re going to continue podcasting and the movie thing, we definitely want to continue that. We met so many wonderful people and groomed so many wonderful relationships… the sky is the limit. And we’re going to take control of any given opportunity. And make this city a better city for everybody to come and enjoy it. Getting that bad element out of here and always keeping smiles on people’s faces; that’s what we’re here to do.
Catch up with them by clicking these links: Website │ Instagram │ Facebook
Writer: Debbie Stokes is a contributing writer. Follow her on Instagram: @iamdebbiestokes
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