BRANSON MO NEWS:
Police Chief David Jones will retire on December 22, 2017 after more than 40 years with the Warsaw Police Department. To retire, according to official definitions, means to leave one’s job or profession and cease to work. Not so for Jones who said he will be “slowing down, but not staying idle for too long.”
Getting ready for retirement is a process of dealing with facts, feelings, and often some uncertainty about the future. Jones said he has been thinking about retiring for a while. He was eligible to retire seven years ago, but he was only 55 and not at all ready to do so.
“But now that the paperwork is in, that’s it,” he said, matter-of-factly, “It’s been a good run.”
The chief talked about how his law enforcement career began. He was born in Branson, MO. His family returned to Missouri from Louisiana in 1972 and settled in Warsaw. He had no plans or intentions to become a police officer, but he said the police chief at the time, Wilbur “Skipper” See, kept asking him “How old are you now? Come and see me when you’re 21 and I’ll make you a police officer.”
See asked that question again in 1977 when Jones turned 21. “Go to Sedalia and buy a gun and holster,” See told him, “then come back and get your uniform.” So that’s what Jones did, and how he became a reserve police officer, working weekends. His on-the-job training began when Chief See handed him the keys to a police car and sent him out on patrol.
Jones became a full-time officer with regular patrol duties in 1992. Since then he has held every rank, promoted from Corporal to Sergeant, then to Lieutenant until appointed Chief of Police in July 2004. His mentors were chiefs of police he …
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