Writer

Amy Laboda

Advocacy, service and compassion are just three attributes that earned Lt. Pat Lawrence this year’s MD Helicopters Law Enforcement Award at Heli-Expo 2016. Without top cops such as Lt. Pat Lawrence, the ground-based units in Michigan’s largest metropolitan areas would lose a huge tactical advantage over the bad guys.
Lawrence enlisted with the department in 1994, graduating as a member of the 110th Trooper Recruit School. He was assigned to the Caro Post and transferred to the aviation unit in 1999. Lawrence has also served as a pilot with the Michigan National Guard for 30 years. 
In 2008 Lawrence was chief pilot and commander of the Michigan State Police aviation unit. His leadership was instrumental in rebuilding the unit after the economic downturn. During that time the unit dropped from five helicopters and three airplanes to just two helicopters and three pilots, at a time when the crime rate in Michigan’s three most populous metro areas exploded.
Lawrence established a schedule to patrol Detroit, Flint and Saginaw on a nightly basis, rotating the duty among the three remaining pilots and two helicopters. In that time period Lawrence flew more than 1,000 hours patrolling the cities and flying other missions, including search-and-rescue, marijuana eradication and disaster response. As a flight instructor in both fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft, Lawrence was able to keep costs down for the unit and hire, and then train, two new pilots in 2014. He also established a tactical flight officer training program. 
During those tough years Lawrence did not succumb to apathy about the challenges and limitations the economic downturn had dealt his department. Instead he vigorously lobbied state lawmakers to expand the state police aviation unit. He took the governor and several state legislators on demonstration flights to show them firsthand why the state desperately needed aviation law enforcement assets. 
Lawrence’s efforts were finally rewarded in 2015 when the Michigan legislature approved and purchased a third law enforcement helicopter. Most recently he played an active role in the department’s purchase and authorization to fly an unmanned aircraft system (UAS), which established the Michigan State Police as one of the first police agencies in the nation to successfully obtain statewide flight authorization from the FAA for UAS law enforcement missions.

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