In 27 years of police work, he's made gun and drug busts, run hostage negotiations, roamed the streets of Philadelphia as a plainclothes cop and protected high ranking politicians and foreign dignitaries.
And having played semi-pro football and baseball, Penn's new police chief, Mark Dorsey, is by all accounts a force on the playing fields as well.
"He's not one of those desk guys who doesn't know anything," said Chuck Maiellano, who served with Dorsey both 23 years ago in Philadelphia's 19th Police District and as recently as 2001, when Dorsey was Philadelphia's chief inspector of narcotics.
The new campus police chief is a native Philadelphian and will start work at Penn on Nov. 1. He is currently the director of security and safety at La Salle University, where he received a degree in sociology in 2000 by taking night classes.
Dorsey has been at La Salle for the last year, prior to which he was the director of public safety for Lakewood, N.J. He spent the previous 25 years of his career with the Philadelphia Police Department.
Speaking of their days in the 19th District, when Dorsey was in the burglary detail, Maiellano -- who is currently a staff member at the chief inspector of patrol's office -- recalled that Dorsey "made lots of arrests."
"Mark was a skilled police officer, an aggressive police officer."
He added, "He would go to bat for his men. He was 100 percent for his men."
But Maiellano does not believe that this attitude will be a problem. "When Mark has to make the hard choices, he can make the hard choices."
A "taskmaster" was the term PPD officer Scott Lichtenhahn, who served with Dorsey in the mid-'80s in Philadelphia's 35th District as well as in 2000 in the 15th District, used to describe Dorsey.
Lichtenhahn made sure, however, to clarify that he meant it in a "good way," adding that Dorsey is "very thorough."
David Fleming, La Salle's vice president for business affairs and the man to whom Dorsey currently reports, said that Dorsey could largely be characterized by his professionalism and leadership.
"He developed real credibility with the neighbors," Fleming said, adding that Dorsey's level of personal involvement and communication skills were critical in allowing him to reach out to the community.
Wayne Yhost, who replaced Dorsey as director of public safety in Lakewood, echoed many of Fleming's sentiments, saying that when he took over for Dorsey he found "a well-trained department."
In Dorsey's nine months in Lakewood, he was able to "get people to communicate" and work well with the community, said Yhost, who believes that the reason Dorsey left is because it was too far from his family in Philadelphia.
Yhost also served with Dorsey in the past on the PPD and has known him for 35 years. On a personal level, he said, "I think the University will get somebody who is a caring person."
Yhost added that Dorsey, who has a 29-year-old daughter and two teenage sons, "knows what it's like to be a father of a child who's going away" to college.
Maiellano agreed with Yhost, saying that Dorsey "was several ranks above me and always spoke to me on an equal level."
"He would always ask me how my son's doing," Maiellano added. "He was constantly inquiring about kids."
Maiellano's son is now a student at Penn.
"I feel really happy and confident knowing that Mark" is there.
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