It’s Day 2 of Public Service Recognition Week and our celebration of community heroes is in full swing. Yesterday, we introduced you to newly retired County Executive Melissa Peacor of Prince William County and Code Compliance Investigator Jeff Loeffler (read Sunday’s post). Today, we introduce the second community hero out of Prince William County: Sergeant Saemi Kitchens.

Sergeant Kitchens began her career with the Prince William County Police Department as a patrol officer in 2003. Since then, she has also served as a detective with the Criminal Investigations Division’s (CID) Major Crimes Unit. At the Prince William Chamber of Commerce’s 28^th Annual Prince William Valor Awards in 2014, Sergeant Kitchens and her colleagues were awarded with an “Investigative Merit Award” for their work identifying and prosecuting a man who set fire to a Baptist Church in the community.

“Police-Community Relations” is a topic that has permeated the media and national conversation for many years now. In today’s community hero video, Sergeant Kitchens explains how it’s done correctly: “we don’t just go out there and make arrests and issue tickets; we’re trying to help them and better the situation.”

“Every day is unpredictable, you just don’t know what you’re going to get…Even if you can help just one person, you know that you’ve made the biggest difference for that one person.”

– Sergeant Saemi Kitchens, Police Department, Prince William County, VA