Officer Paul Douglas Hulsey, Jr., Beaumont Police Department, Texas

Officer Paul Douglas Hulsey, Jr.

Beaumont Police Department, Texas

End of Watch Tuesday, March 22, 1988

Paul Douglas Hulsey, Jr.

Officer Hulsey was shot and killed while investigating a Chevrolet Corvette with stolen plates. He had spotted the vehicle in a hotel parking lot and learned that it was stolen after running its tags. He requested backup after learning which room the suspect was in from the hotel manager. His backup officer was sent to another call involving a pedestrian fatality so Officer Hulsey approached the suspect as he came out of his room.

A violent struggle ensued and the suspect was able to retrieve a gun from the room and fatally shoot Officer Hulsey. Officer Hulsey had no idea that the suspect was wanted in Florida for killing a 14-year-old girl and in Indiana for killing a 16-year-old girl and robbing a bank. The suspect was later apprehended and subsequently received death sentences in Florida, Indiana, and Texas for the murder of at least four other victims. He was executed on December 9, 1997.

Officer Hulsey had been with the agency for eight years. He was survived by his wife, two daughters, his mother, his father (a former Galveston Police Chief), and other family members.

Bio

Age 30
Tour 8 years
Badge Not available

Incident Details

Cause Gunfire
Weapon Handgun
Offender Executed in 1997

murder suspect, stolen vehicle

Most Recent Reflection

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March 22, 2018:
Remembering Beaumont TX Police Dept Officer Paul Hulsey who was shot and killed in the line of duty 30 years ago today, March 22, 1988. I was working that night and will never forget the action and series of events leading up to his killers capture several hours later. Sad day for BPD and Paul’s young family. Paul was my first Field Training Officer (FTO) when I came out of the academy in 1984. He was a “teacher” in all aspects of police training. He never played mind games or tried to be intimidating. Of course, he called me “rookie” around the station, and played the usual rookie hazing rituals of making me sit on the front row at shift meetings, writing the shift lineup on the chalkboard, etc. He made me come to work 30 mins early every night (unpaid of course) to read all the offense reports from District 8, our beat, so I’d be informed and aware of what’s going on. But on our first night in the car, we loaded up, checked equipment, and then he calmly told me his job was to TEACH me, not to “run me off.” HE said if he ended up “running me off,” it would mean that HE had failed, not ME. He told me he would not hesitate to jump my ass if he had too from time to time, but he intended to spend 6 weeks TEACHING me, and that he hoped that someday if I became an FTO, I would do the same, look at it as teaching, as training, not as simply scaring rookies, not intimidating rookies. I did later become an FTO, and always remembered his style and approach to training, as well as policing in general. Paul was a go-getter, a hide-in-the-bushes and chase drug dealers kind of guy. Yet he was just as passionate about treating all people we contacted or dealt with or arrested, with dignity and respect. And he was just as thorough about checking on the elderly folks in our beat He taught me the value of something as “bothersome” as changing a porch light for an elderly widow in a high crime neighborhood. It was effective community policing before any PhD wrote a book on the subject. He was an amazing cop, dad, husband, teacher and partner. He’s been gone 30 years, but he’s still missed and his impact is still felt by many like me. I left Beaumont PD after 17 years, in 2001 before becoming a Chief of Police at Abilene Christian University Police Dept. For 34 years and counting, I’ve tried to live up to the standards set by Paul.

Jimmy Ellison, Chief of Police
Abilene Christian Univ. Police Dept.

March 22, 2018