Lloyd Whisenant

I was born in Fort Meade, Maryland and raised in north/west New Jersey. I have a Bachelor of Science degree in Criminal Justice.

In 1995 I began my career with the Newport Beach Police Department as a Reserve Officer. I attended Reserve Academy 3 at the Orange County Sheriff’s Training Academy in Anaheim, Ca. After approximately one year in transportation, I realized I wanted to become a full time officer. In 1997 I attended the OCSD full-time academy in Garden Grove, Ca. and was sworn in as a full time officer.

Serving in patrol my first year was pretty basic, but my best memories were in field training where I successfully drove a brand new Chevy Caprice patrol unit under the Arches Bridge on PCH that at the time was flooded. My FTO (Craig Fox) warned me that the water was too deep, but I assured him I could make it. As I gave it the gas, it wasn’t long before the unit began floating and we were filling with water. As we floated in the water for about 45 minutes, we were finally pulled out by a not so happy tow truck driver who had to dive under water to hook us up. I don’t recall exactly, but I’m sure I got marked down on driving skills on my training evaluation that night.

My first year of solo patrol I mainly worked nights on the east side with a fellow ex- reserve, Dave Kresge. At that time we only had two officers working eastside, as Newport Coast was not developed yet.

Within my first two years I became a P.O.P. Officer for the east side and eventually was assigned to Chief’s office as Environmental Services Officer. During that time I became involved in the Explorer Program as an Advisor. A position I held for over 15 years. I was elected twice to serve as the Orange County Law Enforcement Explorer Advisor Association President. My fellow advisor was Stan Bressler. I never worked patrol or any full-time positions with Stan, but Stan and I were advisors together for the 15 years I was involved in the program. Stan started the Explorer Program decades earlier and the thousands of lives he impacted always impressed me. We would continually run into past Explorers of the program who commented about how much he impacted their lives.

I worked at the department for almost twenty years and enjoyed every assignment I worked. My least favorite was day watch patrol as an officer and eventually as a Sergeant. There just wasn’t any better shift than either mid or night watch.

Interviewed by Stan Bressler

My final assignment was my most challenging. The last five years of my career were spent as the Personnel Sergeant. This was at a time when we had a lot of sworn and non-sworn personnel retiring. This created a need to fill those positions as quickly as possible. I don’t know the count but I do know we hired a lot of good people during my 5 years in that assignment.

I retired in June of 2014 and moved with my wife Susie to Eastern Tennessee where we have an 18-acre hobby farm. We raise sheep, goats, chickens and other animals. When we’re not working on the property, we enjoy spending time on the lake.

Over my 19 years of working at the Police Department I had the opportunity to work with a lot of great people.