Responsibilities

• Motorized patrol of the streets within in an effort to deter crime
• Responding to emergency and non-emergency calls
• Enforcement of all criminal and local ordinance violations
• Enforcement of traffic laws, investigating traffic crashes, and directing traffic
• Identifying and apprehending criminals within the scope of the law
• Preliminary investigation of crimes, offenses, and incidents
• Generation of comprehensive typed reports on all incidents
• Developing a positive relationship between citizens and the department
• Reducing fear of crime through high visibility and personal contact

The Traffic Safety Unit is a component of the Patrol Division and is staffed with one lieutenant and four traffic officers. The unit is primarily responsible for Village-wide traffic enforcement, major traffic crash investigations, and traffic enforcement planning.

The Bicycle Patrol Unit is a unit of the Orland Park Police Department and is comprised of four sworn patrol officers. The unit is designed to utilize alternative patrol techniques to address all types of criminal activity. Bicycle patrol officers are available for special functions such as block parties and community events. The patrol's objectives include:

• Patrol areas generally inaccessible to a patrol vehicle such as bicycle paths, jogging paths, parks, and sports complexes
• Enhance the community policing efforts by promoting positive contacts with the public
• Promote bicycle safety education with the public and in the schools

The K-9 Unit is a support unit consisting of an officer / handler(s) and their trained police canine. The K-9 Unit is assigned regular patrol duties in addition to their K-9 function. The unit is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The canine unit does provide outside agency assistance based on the department's "Mutual Assistance Canine Policy."

Duties of the unit include:

• Building searches for offenders in hiding
• Assist in arrest or prevention of escape of serious or violent offenders
• Protection of officer and/or others from serious injury
• Field searches and tracking suspects
• Locate lost or missing persons when applicable
• Recover evidence of a crime
• Detect the presence of concealed narcotics

The purpose of this program is to give special attention to homes that are vacant when residents are on vacation and to shorten the time of discovery of a crime should a burglary or other offense be committed. Each home on the Vacation Watch Program is physically inspected three times daily by a beat officer.

Program Qualifiers

If you meet the criteria and wish for a vacation watch to be conducted on your home, you may request an officer to your home to complete the necessary paperwork by calling the Orland Park Police Headquarters at (708) 349-4111. To qualify, you must:

• Live in the corporate limits of the Village of Orland Park
• Be a single-family home (no apartments, condos, or townhouses)
• Be out of town for a minimum of five consecutive days, but less than 30 days
• Be unoccupied during the time of the watch
• Request the watch a maximum of 24 hours prior to departure
• Homes that are vacant for the purpose of a possible sale are not eligible

To assure the utmost care in the collection and preservation of evidence at crime scenes, the Orland Park Police Department utilizes evidence technicians (ETs) and field ETs. An ET is a police officer, who is generally an investigator, that is trained in the accepted methods of evidence collection, preservation, and processing. Their primary responsibility is to process a crime scene.

A field ET is an experienced police officer who is trained in acceptable methods of evidence collection, preservation, and processing, but has primary responsibilities as a patrol officer. The use of field ET allows the rapid response of an ET to any crime scene.