BOISE, Idaho — The Boise Police Department (BPD) said farewell to a woman who made a difference in the lives of many domestic violence victims.
Detective Sherri Cameron started with BPD as a patrol officer in 1998, responding to various service calls. She later became a crime scene investigator, responding to calls involving family violence almost daily.
"I would spend more time with the victim and the family because I'd take photographs or collect evidence," Det. Cameron told Channel 7. "So, I saw a little bit more to those domestic calls than what the traditional patrol officer deputy would see."
She heard hundreds of victims' - and children's stories. Speaking up for kids is what pushed Det. Cameron to pursue a full-time career helping them.
"So often children don't have a voice," she said. "So that's really what drove my passion for it originally, is I wanted to do more."
In 2012 when a position for Boise's first domestic violence detective opened up, Det. Cameron went for it. She's spent the last twelve years as Boise's sole domestic violence detective.
"I did the work because I believed in it," she said. "I did the work so that children would have a voice and I did the work because I wanted victims to know that they had other choices than staying in a home where they lived in fear."
On April 26, Det. Cameron retired.
"I think anytime you get to the end of a career, right, the ending of one chapter, it's filled with mixed feelings " she said.
She spent her last day, going back to where she started - on patrol. Her 19-year-old son joined her for one final dispatch sign off.
This was his first time in the patrol car with his mom - he was too young the first time around. It was the perfect ending to her career, she said, and that her son is interested in law enforcement.
"The pride that I have to see that my son wants to follow and do some of the work that I've done, it's more than I could have ever expected or hoped," she said.
BPD shared the video of her singing off on Facebook. The post received hundreds of comments congratulating her - including some from her former victims.
"The comments were unbelievable," Det. Cameron said. "They were... the comments, the reposts, the outpouring of love and support was more than I can even explain," she said.
A survivor that Det. Cameron helped, shared this statement with KTVB: "Officer Sherri is not just (an) officer. She's the backbone and the voice for the voices that can't speak for themselves, but she definitely taught me to have a voice for myself and to hear my little girl say, "Mommy I'm so proud of you."
The department held a retirement party for Det. Cameron, where other officers, her family, and former victims came to celebrate her.
"If I did my job right... For the last 12 years, with those families and specifically with the children, my hope, my legacy is that those children will never enter the system," she said.
BPD has filled the position after Det. Cameron's departure. Cameron said, the new detective has been a patrol officer with BPD for almost two years, and that he shadowed Cameron before she left.
Cameron said, she's a call away if he ever needs her.
This is not the end of Det. Cameron's work with domestic violence. Over the last decade she's held trainings for law enforcement agencies, teaching them about domestic violence.
Even in retirement, she will continue to teach, she said.
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