Deputy from Kings County wins Tactical Flight Officer of The Year

KINGS COUNTY, Calif. ( KSEE/KGPE ) – The Kings County Sheriff’s Office is celebrating their Tactical Flight Officer Sr. Deputy.

Eric Johnson, a Hanford native, won the Tactical Flight Officer of the Year award at the annual Airbourne Law Enforcement conference in Houston, Texas, among nominees throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe.

“I’m super excited that I was chosen. There’s a lot, there’s probably hundreds of people that were just as qualified as me. So, I’m just really excited that I was chosen,” Johnson said.

He reflects on the mission he is most proud of, and one of the missions that got him nominated.

“A mid-80s gentleman that, I say escaped, he climbed out of a window. He had dementia and climbed out of a window of an assisted living facility. And we found him multiple miles away from the facility at night in the cold, laying face down in a grape vineyard,” Johnson said.

Johnson has worked at the Sheriff’s Office for 19 years and has been a part of its Air Support Unit since 2022.

His missions are carried out on both a helicopter and a plane.

“When the guys on the ground, officers, the females and males that are that are chasing these people rely on me to help find them and get this person in custody and make this the community safer is just, it’s a blast,” Johnson said.

Johnson is now training to get his own pilot’s license.

He hopes it will make the Kings County Sheriff’s Office Air Support Unit more versatile.

“Sometimes we have a call out in the middle of the night when the airplane is not available and there might be a tactical flight officer available, but no pilot available. So if I’m a pilot, I can jump in the airplane and basically help complete the mission. That wouldn’t have been completed if I didn’t have my license,” Johnson said.

Sr. Deputy Johnson hopes he will have his pilot’s license at the beginning of next year.

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