I Spent 30 Years as a Cop — These Are the Calls I'll Never Forget | Kristen Ziman
October 27, 2026
AI Summary
5 min readKristen Ziman spent nearly 30 years in law enforcement, rising from a police cadet at 17 to become Aurora, Illinois’s first female police chief. In 2019, she led her department through a mass shooting that left five people dead and five officers wounded. She later served on the Department of Justice team that reviewed the Uvalde school shooting response. In this conversation, she walks through the calls that shaped her career, the culture she navigated, and the lessons she carries from a profession that demands both toughness and the willingness to unlearn it.
The Path from Cadet to Chief
Ziman grew up in Aurora, the only child of a police officer father and a stay-at-home mother. She decided at age ten that she would become a cop, and that decision shaped her adolescence. She avoided drinking at high school parties because she wanted to stay eligible for the police academy. At 17, she became a police cadet — an intern — while her friends went away to college. She earned an associate degree at a local community college and was sworn in as a patrol officer at 21.
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What you'll learn
- 1 (03:05) **Early Inspiration and Path to Policing** - Kristen describes being inspired by her father’s actions as a cop and deciding at age 10 that she would become one.
- 2 (08:09) **Ambition, Mentorship, and Breaking Barriers** - Kristen explains she never initially aspired to leadership because she saw no women in rank, until a lieutenant saw potential in her.
- 3 (10:07) **Stigma and a Pivotal Lesson from a Female Mentor** - Kristen discusses the 12% female representation on the force and a powerful lesson learned from her field training officer.
- 4 (14:49) **First Surprising Realities of the Job** - Kristen shares what surprised her when she first became a cop: the feeling of being on a team and the level of human dysfunction.
- 5 (18:14) **Causes of Gang Violence and Lack of Remorse** - Kristen offers her perspective on why gang violence is so prevalent and the emotional state of perpetrators.
- 6 (20:36) **The Ebb and Flow of Public Perception** - Kristen contrasts the public’s view of police after Rodney King in the 90s with the reckoning after George Floyd.
- 7 (26:34) **Training vs. Real Life: The First Real Gunfight** - Kristen describes the moment her training kicked in during her first real-life shooting as a patrol officer.
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Show Notes
Kristen Ziman spent nearly 30 years in law enforcement, rising through the ranks to become the first female police chief in Aurora, Illinois, history. In 2019, she was leading the department when a gunman opened fire at the Henry Pratt Company, killing five employees and shooting five police officers. In this episode, Kristen takes us through her career in policing, the toughest calls she responded to, the challenges of leadership, and what it was like leading her department through a mass shooting.
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Connect with Kristen Ziman:
Website: https://kristenziman.com/
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Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick:
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Timestamps:
00:00 The Active Shooter Call
01:04 Growing Up Around Policing
03:47 High School and the Police Cadet Program
06:22 Moving Up the Ranks
08:19 The Women Who Came Before
13:05 Surprises of the Job
15:01 First Body Bags
16:15 Gang Violence and Senseless Killings
18:53 The Public's Perception of Police
23:02 Running Toward Gunfire
26:24 The Stress of Training
27:21 Growing Callous
30:07 Becoming a DV Detective
34:02 Why DV Cases Are So Hard
37:26 From Patrol to Sergeant
40:36 The Lieutenant Test
47:39 Life as a Lieutenant
48:43 The Helicopter Crash
53:08 Preparing to Be a Leader
55:31 Chosen as Commander
58:16
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