South Dakota Police Commission Rejects ‘Exceptional’ Law Enforcement Student Over Past Marijuana Convictions

“I want to use my story as a way to connect with the community and show them that change is possible.”

By John Hult, South Dakota Searchlight

A Colorado native and former teenage runaway with a criminal history who moved to South Dakota with her children and became a top student in a law enforcement program won’t be allowed to become a police officer in the state.

The state Law Enforcement Officers Standards and Training Commission voted unanimously on Wednesday to deny certification for Samantha Hamm.

Commissioners commended her story of self-improvement after a troubled young adulthood and encouraged her to look for work in the criminal justice system, but said the details of a 2020 marijuana arrest were too concerning to certify her.

Hamm’s case was one of two contested hearings that took place Wednesday at the George S. Mickelson Criminal Justice Center in Pierre. The second involved former Mobridge Police Officer Nick Bratland, a training officer who was fired this year for sending dozens of sexually explicit messages to a female trainee over Instagram.

Bratland told commissioners he’d struggled with sleep and post-traumatic stress from a 2006 explosion in Afghanistan during his military service that left him scarred, and that he doesn’t remember much of his conduct as a result. But he also said there was no excuse for his behavior and did not deny the allegations.

The commission voted to revoke Bratland’s certification.

Officer candidate says she was forced to be a prostitute

Hamm was convicted of prostitution in 2010 after an arrest in Aurora, Colorado. It came after an undercover sting operation during which local officers responded to a Craigslist ad and set up a meeting with her in a hotel room.

During the contested hearing on her certification in Pierre, Hamm told commissioners she’d run away from home at 13, and again at 16, “trying to find anyone that loved me,” and fell in with the people who prostituted her.

Hamm said she was “forced to be a prostitute,” and that she was beaten and not allowed to leave.

“It started slow, with these people taking me into their home, feeding me, promises of a good life, nice cars, money, and then it slowly progressed into prostitution,” Hamm said.

Her arrest was a blessing, she said, because it made her a liability and allowed her to get away.

“It opened my eyes to a lot of things,” she said.

She said at the time, when she was 18, she was unaware that her driver’s license had been suspended, which was another of what law enforcement commission staff referred to as “a litany of criminal offenses.”

Hamm apologized for not disclosing the suspension.

Marijuana arrest scrutinized

In 2020, Hamm was arrested for felony marijuana possession in South Dakota after a traffic stop by a state trooper. The trooper found the remains of a marijuana joint in a baggie with marijuana, as well as eight separate 1-ounce baggies of marijuana, a pistol and hundreds of dollars in cash, according to Hank Prim, law enforcement training director for South Dakota.

Hamm later pleaded guilty to felony marijuana possession and received a suspended imposition of sentence. Such a sentence clears a charge from a person’s record after a period of good behavior. Hamm’s public-facing criminal record is now clear, but police have access to information on charges scrubbed from public searches.

Hamm told commissioners that she’d grown up around marijuana in Colorado, which became one of the first two states in the nation to legalize recreational cannabis in 2012. The other state was Washington.

When asked about the individual baggies, she said they’d come from different dispensaries. She was also asked about the amount, questioning how long it would take her to smoke that much marijuana.

“I smoked quite a bit,” Hamm said. “I would think three or four times a day.”

As with the prostitution arrest, Hamm described the situation as a wake-up call. She’d long hoped to become a police officer, but said it wasn’t until her arrest that she realized that it was illegal to have a handgun with that much marijuana in South Dakota.

At that point, she said, she decided to stop smoking weed altogether, in hopes of working in criminal justice and being a role model to her two children.

Were she given the chance to be an officer, she said, her personal experience would help her connect with others in need and build bridges between law enforcement and people living the kind of life she once led.

Holding back tears, she described her desire to be an officer, and said “I am determined to demonstrate that I am capable of doing so with the highest level of professionalism, compassion and integrity.”

“I want to be a part of the solution, building trust between law enforcement and the community. I want to use my story as a way to connect with the community and show them that change is possible.”

Commission: Marijuana situation is ‘a lot to digest’

The head of Lake Area Technical College’s law enforcement program, former Watertown Police Officer Chad Stahl, said he first met Hamm as a student, and that he didn’t become aware of the extent of her criminal history until well into her time at the school.

Even after that, Stahl said, he sees her as a strong candidate. She was “an exceptional student,” he said, especially considering that she’d started the program as a single mother in her 30s.

“There was no cause to believe that she would not be an exceptional officer,” Stahl said.

Brent Kempema, the lawyer heading up the hearing on the commission side, didn’t say much in his closing arguments, saying that the evidence “speaks for itself.”

“I’ll let the commission make the decision as to the veracity of whether or not 8 ounces of marijuana possession is personal use,” Kempema said. “That’s obviously a large amount.”

After going into a closed executive session to deliberate, Commissioner Steve Allender, the former mayor and former police chief of Rapid City, moved to deny certification for Hamm.

He cited concerns about the amount of marijuana in the 2020 arrest as a prime reason.

The commission has forgiven marijuana use by some officers in the past, but Allender said the 2020 situation was too serious to brush off.

“That simply does not work for us in terms of a standard,” he said. “There’s a lot to be said in terms of the proximity in time, the amount, the cash and the gun. There’s a lot to digest there, and so today, 2024, this doesn’t seem to pass muster.”

But Allender also told Hamm that she ought to pursue a career in criminal justice. He said her personal story can serve her in any other role she’d choose in the profession.

“I don’t think any of us think your degree in law enforcement was wasted,” he said. “Your personal change is not unnoticed. Your desire to be better for your children and your community is admirable. In fact, if more people felt that way, we’d have better communities.”

Mobridge training officer loses certification

Bratland’s hearing came about two hours after the vote on Hamm’s situation. The former Mobridge officer had been a trainer for the department, a position he described during his hearing as both mentor and supervisor. He trained three officers in total while serving in that role, he said, and sent the harassing messages to the third. She was the only female among his trainees.

Bratland said he only remembered sending one of the sexually explicit messages to her, but admitted at the start of the hearing that he’d sent them over Instagram. He also admitted to sending a message to the harassed officer’s boss claiming she’d been “making up” stories about him.

Through multiple rounds of questioning, Bratland said he only remembered sending one message.

“If I quick-count here, there were more than 20 of a sexual nature,” Allender said. “Were all these sent while on duty?”

At one point after his behavior was reported, Bratland told a supervisor that he’d meant to send “the” message to male colleagues and had accidentally sent it to the female officer.

Despite his explanation of sleep deprivation, he told commissioners he knows his conduct was wrong, and that he expected to be punished for it.

“I have no excuse. I messed up, that’s why I’m here,” Bratland said.

At one point, Commissioner and Division of Criminal Investigation Director Dan Satterlee asked Bratland if he’d forgotten anything else during the time he was missing so much sleep, such as traffic stops or interviews.

Bratland said he doesn’t have lapsed memories.

“During your duties, the only part you don’t remember is this part?” Satterlee said.

The commission voted to revoke his certification after around half an hour in executive session. The commission’s next meeting will take place in Sioux Falls on October 30.

This story was first published by South Dakota Searchlight.

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