Larry Payne’s life’s work is reflected in his three decades of service to Richland County
By W. Thomas Smith Jr.
In January 2018, then-Lieutenant Larry Payne was one of three Richland County Sheriff’s Department (RCSD) deputies featured in a national POLICE1 article which examined the department’s unique and first-of-its-kind pre-PTSD conditioning programs: A period of pre-post-traumatic stress disorder counseling and training which all of RCSD’s newly hired deputies would receive during entry level training before they ever hit the street. They still do: Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott conceived of, developed and instituted the program in 2016. Lt. (today Captain) Payne was one of the initial primary instructors.
And why not? No single deputy or law enforcement leader had experienced more traumatic stress than Payne. No one understood the mental, physical, and emotional dynamics associated with PTSD better than he. According to Payne in the 2018 article: “In the past, there was this misperception that you would be perceived as weak if you admitted that you were somehow struggling a bit emotionally. That wrong thinking in-and-of itself was and is the biggest problem.”
Then, as today, his words ring true with experience. In Nov. 2006, Payne was involved in a near-fatal shooting in which a suspect shot at him 15 times with a .22 caliber rifle: Two rounds struck Payne, one round in the leg, the other round struck his collarbone and deflected downward, penetrating and collapsing one of his lungs. Still, Payne managed to return fire with his Glock 40: Firing 16 shots with three striking the suspect’s vehicle.
“The shooter escaped,” said Payne, who today serves as captain (essentially commander) of RCSD’s Warrant Division. “But after a three-day manhunt, he was captured and is now doing 30 years.”
But it wasn’t over for Payne who spent a lot of time physically recovering. “And there were the potentially dangerous (to me) emotional struggles that I did not initially recognize,” he said.
Payne was in self-denial. “At first I didn’t think anything was wrong,” he said. “Not really.”
But Payne’s struggles were recognizable to Sheriff Lott who directed him to counseling.
“There I learned quite a bit about myself,” said Payne. “And I didn’t like it.”
Payne discovered he harbored feelings of himself “being the victim,” he said. “It made me second guess myself. Here I had served eight years on the department’s Special Response [SWAT] Team, and yet my response to being shot in the chest and leg was to shoot his car.” Payne admitted that thoughts of suicide had even crept into his head.
Fortunately for Payne, it was counseling and EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) therapy that changed, perhaps saved, his life. “That and a very patient boss [the Sheriff],” he said.
After EMD therapy, Payne quit taking meds. He no longer needed them. “I had been drinking and taking prescription Xanax, which is a recipe for disaster,” he said.
Today, Captain Payne is man completely devoted to “and loving work,” he says. “I pray multiple times a day, and I regularly train at the gym. That and friends are now my therapy.”
As head of the Warrant Division, “Everyday brings something new,” said Payne. “Some days we serve warrants all day [within the county]. Some days we [himself and at least one other deputy] are flying across the country picking up prisoners.” The Warrant Division has in fact returned 20 extradited persons from 20 states in six years.
“It’s a great life and incredible work,” said Payne. “Largely because of a boss who cares and has always believed in me.”
According to Payne, that caring and “believing in him” has also been fueled with quite a bit of forgiveness.
Payne, who joined RCSD in 1995 was fired in 1999 after a relationship with a girlfriend who at the time got him into some minor regulations-breaking trouble. “As the Sheriff rightfully said at the time, ‘I didn’t fire you.’ You fired yourself.”
Payne added: “I loved working here so much, and he knew it, so I was willing to start back on the ground floor, if he would have me.”
Lott did, and Payne rejoined the department – driving a paddy wagon to and from the County detention center – in 2002. He was then back on the road, SRT, and elsewhere.
Prior to joining the Warrant Division in 2019, Payne spent seven years in Internal Affairs. “Interesting to me that years after my firing, the Sheriff put me in charge of internal affairs; a division from where I was fired many years before.”
After 30 years, where does Captain Payne see himself in five years? “Here at RCSD if we still have the same boss,” he said.
[Pictured – Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott and RCSD Captain Larry Payne.]
– W. Thomas Smith Jr. – a former U.S. Marine Infantry leader – is a New York Times bestselling editor and a special deputy with the Richland County Sheriff’s Department.
