Two men who were on opposite sides of the justice system influenced Westerville Police Chief Charles “Cappy” Chandler’s career path.
Before Chandler was born, his father, Randy Chandler, worked as a police officer in Mt. Gilead while his uncle, Gary Chandler, was prosecuted for a homicide involving three trials, the first of which Chandler sat through parts of. His uncle was ultimately acquitted.
“I think that experience kind of helped shape my interest in law enforcement and more,” Chandler says.
Chandler has been in law enforcement for nearly three decades including almost 20 years in Westerville. In addition to numerous military honors and law enforcement awards, Chandler is the second vice president of the Ohio Association of Chiefs of Police, a former president of the Franklin County Police Chiefs Association and currently sits on the Education Committee of the Ohio Association of Chiefs of Police and Ohio Criminal Sentencing Commission.
Prior to moving to Westerville, Chandler joined the U.S. Army Reserve when he was 17 years old. He went into basic training between his junior and senior years of high school. While serving in the reserves, he attended Columbus State Community College, where he is now an adjunct facility member in the criminal justice program.
Chandler also serves as an instructor in Columbus State’s Ohio Peace Officer Training Academy.
“Education is important,” he says. “Our community colleges are important.”
After time spent in the reserves and earning his associates degree, Chandler’s first law enforcement job was in Mt. Gilead at the same department where his father once served. He was sworn in the day after turning 21 in 1994.
Though he never knew his father as a police officer – because by the time he could remember, his father was working for a railroad company – Chandler saw photos of him in uniform throughout Mt. Gilead’s municipal building.
“He took a lot of pride in the fact that I made it my career,” Chandler says.
He worked for Mt. Gilead for about three years and then worked for the city of Marion for another four. When Westerville police began expanding its division in 2000, Chandler applied on the last possible day. Before becoming the city’s police chief, Chandler says he cherished his time as a detective, working with the drug enforcement administration task force for the central Ohio region.
“It’s been a really interesting career and a very rewarding career,” he says.
At the encouragement of his colleagues and mentors, Chandler continued his education in criminal justice administration at Columbia Southern University in Alabama. It was there where he grew interested in becoming a police chief.
In addition, he’s a graduate of several public administration and law enforcement executive programs such as Creating Public Value from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, the Northwestern School of Police Staff and Command, the Police Executive Leadership College and the Certified Law Enforcement Executive program.
“I don’t think you’re ever too old to learn,” he says.
He became the community’s police chief in August 2019, tackling and weathering several big-ticket items such as the campaign to construct the multimillion-dollar police court facility, working with law enforcement counterparts on security of the Democratic presidential debate, the COVID-19 pandemic, the civil unrest revolving around the police treatment of Black Americans and the rollout of body cameras.
Chandler is now working to have the police department nationally accredited by the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies.
“It seems like I got 10 years of experience in a year and a half,” Chandler says. “It really has been trial by fire.”
During the Democratic presidential debate at Otterbein University in October 2019, Chandler worked with CNN, Columbus police, Otterbein and other community partners – though Secret Service wasn’t involved at that point, he adds – to make the event go off without issue. There were protests, but no arrests related to the debate that week.
Outside of working in an intensive job, Chandler is an avid film lover, particularly quirky and British films such as The Gentlemen and Legend. He also enjoys watching Western films and other old films his father and grandfather enjoyed watching on television.
It was a time, Chandler says, when there were only three or so channels and there wasn’t internet compared with the streaming services available at the touch of a button during the pandemic.
“I think I might be like most people. I’ve finished Netflix in the past year, the entire thing,” he jokes.
He and his sister, Melissa Shipman, a retired state patrol dispatcher, both invested in screens and projectors to watch films outside in their back yards over the past year. Chandler became particularly close with both of his sisters since their mother died when Chandler was just 24 years old.
Chandler’s other sister, Joey Chandler, works out of state as a journalist and the two share some inside jokes as their professions often interact with each other.
“I’m really in a transition part of my life as far outside of work with getting the chief’s job and both of my kids are young adults,” he says. “Between all that, I’m finding my way and both my sisters are a big part of that.”
Brandon Klein is an editor. Feedback welcome at bklein@cityscenemediagroup.com.