The Deputy You See Everyday- But Do You Really Know Him?

By: Isla Rice

Deputy Maddux is our school police officer but he’s not just that; he is also a first responder for the police and for SWAT. Before working for the school, he did regular patrol. When he gets an emergency, he works with only serious injuries or trauma accidents.

When Deputy Maddux was younger, he wanted to be one of 3 things: a police officer, race car driver, or a construction worker. When he was young, he found passion with the police force from watching movies and TV shows about cops and robbers. He says, “It felt like a calling,” and it would be something he could do and be good at. He has worked for the city of Pataskala for about 10 years. The superintendent saw him working a lot of different sporting events and noticed how good he was with kids. She asked if he would want to be a school resource officer.

One thing he likes to talk about that he doesn’t get to very often, is his 10 years in the military. There are some parts he doesn’t like talking about; like his time in Iraq and Afghanistan. He does like talking about how different the cultures are. He has seen

actual mud huts and how people truly lived in them. Other things he finds interesting about the different ways of living are how they don’t have running water, electricity, or AC. He finds it very interesting how other people in the world live and how “It was a big eye opener” to him.

Another thing he feels that nobody knows about is his family. He has a wife and 2 kids. His wife is a teacher and just got her PhD. He beamed as he said, “Now she is technically a doctor. I love to brag about it.” He has a daughter who is 17 years old and a son who is 18. His daughter is also becoming a teacher and his son is a pilot with his single propeller license. He feels that his kids help him connect more with the students at WMHS. He understands what we are going through the difficult times, emotions, highs and lows, and the stress. “I’ve seen how many hours kids spend on homework night after night, it blows my mind.”

Deputy Maddux views himself as an extrovert at school but a big introvert in the outside world. He likes being a listener rather than a speaker. He feels he is very good at his job. “My favorite part is to solve crimes and dig into cases; unwrap them and figure out during the interview what they are hiding from me.” Once he retires in 10 years, he wants to live in a beach house somewhere near the ocean, waking up to ocean waves crashing in.

During this interview, I've learned so many things about him that I never knew before. He’s always walking around the school with a smile and socializing with faculty and students. A message he would love everyone to know and hopefully stick with is, “Don’t be an echo, be your own voice.” That saying has stuck with him, he then continues to say “Don’t do what everyone else is [doing] and just do your own thing, and if they don’t like it then that's their problem.”

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