'Top Cop'

Tifton police officer honored

Angie Thompson

TIFTON — Tifton police officer Dorminey McCrae recently received the National Association of Police Organizations’ “Top Cop” award in recognition of his actions during a dramatic rescue at a local grocery store.

McCrae and others from Tifton traveled to Washington, D.C., where he received the honor.

McCrae responded April 7, 2008, to a robbery in progress at Tifton’s Piggly Wiggly on North Tift Avenue. A man was holding a young female clerk hostage at gunpoint. McCrae slipped into the store and found the robber and the clerk in the office. Seeing the girl was in danger, McCrae fired one shot that struck the robber in the head. The clerk escaped unharmed.

McCrae told members of the press at a conference in the city’s courtroom Friday that he really didn’t know what to say. He described the young female clerk as brave, but said he was just doing his job.

Just prior to McCrae shooting the suspect in the forehead, McCrae said the clerk made eye contact with him and mouthed the words “shoot him” twice.

“That was very brave of her,” McCrae said.

It wasn’t the first time McCrae had confronted someone with a gun.

“Every situation is different,” McCrae said. “They usually put the gun down and cooperate.”

Tifton Mayor Jamie Cater attended the award ceremony with McCrae and members of McCrae’s family. Cater said Thursday that when John Walsh called out McCrae’s name “I just about passed out.”

“Dorminey McCrae not only saved lives but he put Tifton, South Georgia and all of Georgia on the map,” Cater said.

McCrae said he feels humbled by the whole experience but enjoyed meeting President Barack Obama, who presented him with the award, and Vice President Joe Biden and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, who joined McCrae and those with him in the Roosevelt Room of the White House.

Tifton Police Chief Jim Smith said that McCrae was a humble police officer.

“I for one know I’m blessed,” Smith said. “I know I have the best in the world. They have been trained well. I can’t think of anything else that has happened to the City of Tifton like this.”

McCrae said that his career as a police officer was not planned. He was attending college and considering a degree in dentistry when he decided to go to the college’s placement center and look for a job. A staff member there said there was an opening at the police department. He got the job.

McCrae was chosen for the award along with an officer with the Phoenix Police Department who stopped an armed offender while he was off duty; 14 officers with the Los Angeles Police Department for their actions during a dangerous standoff with an assailant who was responsible for four deaths; a Palm Beach County Sheriff’s deputy who responded to an unwanted person call that turned into a dangerous exchange of fire; two Boise, Idaho, officers who put their lives at risk and were burned trying to rescue two residents from one of the most damaging fires in that city’s history; a Skokie, Ill., officer who stopped an armed robber who was shooting into a crowded street; a deputy of the Jefferson (Louisiana) Parish Sheriff’s Office who confronted three men who were fugitive robbers; an officer with the Dewitt Township (Michigan) Police Department who was shot in the face when he responded to a domestic violence call but managed to drag himself to a position to return fire; two Kansas City Police Department officers who responded to a burglar alarm and found a homeless man sleeping in the building’s underground parking area and helped the man get on his feet with housing and other services; an off-duty officer with the Philadelphia Police Department who witnessed a violent car accident while he was on his way home from the hospital where his wife had just given birth but rushed to the scene to help the victims; and seven members of the International Drug Enforcement Administration who planned a five-year undercover operation that brought down Monzer Al Kassar, a man responsible for supplying the weapons that were used in the 1985 Achille Lauro high-jacking.

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