As a general rule of thumb, we keep the newspaper out of the news. We report the news, to be sure, but rarely do situations involving the newspaper or its staff warrant news coverage. However, that changed Friday morning when a voicemail was received that was left Thursday night, making serious threats against our police department.

We quickly reached out to the LPD with this information, an officer responded promptly to the LDN office, captured a recording of the message, asked the employees of the newspaper to alert the LPD if the individual called again, then left to investigate.

Less than seven hours later, an arrest warrant had been issued for the man responsible for making those threats, and the LPD had a good idea of where the suspect could be found – in Florida.

To be fair, the man who left the recording did use his real name, a phone number associated with him and was also arrested in Troup County for similar threats made in 2017. Identifying this suspect was likely not overly difficult.

In any event, the LPD responded to this threat quickly and seriously, as well they should have. Threats of this nature simply have to be taken seriously in this day and time, and the LPD did just that in this case.

The small part the newspaper played in this story was relatively insignificant, but it did allow us to once again see how the LaGrange Police Department handles situations they encounter with professionalism and efficiency. The same is true of the Troup County Sheriff’s Office, which supplied an old mug shot of the suspect to us in less than 10 minutes of the request.

We recognize that not all media outlets are as fortunate as us to have such transparent law enforcement agencies. Our brief encounter with the LPD on Friday reminded us how lucky we are.