IBERVILLE PARISH — For Iberville Parish Sheriff’s Deputy Joe Riche, law enforcement is more than a calling. It’s a life’s journey — one that Riche has invested over 50 years into, all serving the same department in that time.
Riche first heard about an opening with the department in 1972 through a friend who was a deputy at that time. He was first hired by Iberville Sheriff Jessel Ourso, who made him a generous offer to work for the department despite not having any experience in law enforcement.
“He said, ‘Would you be interested?’ and I said, ‘Oh, I don’t know. I don’t know much about law enforcement.’ Well he said, ‘You got to start and learn.”
After meeting with Sheriff Ourso, the young Riche asked what the pay would be.
He said ‘Whatever you’re making now, I’ll give you a $200 a month raise and then another $100 a month raise. That sounded good back in 1972,” Riche said.
Since that time, Riche has spent time working in several areas of the department. Now in his 53rd year as a sheriff’s deputy, Riche says a lot has changed.
“Everything back then was so much easier. The only thing we had to go on calls for, if we went on calls, was most of the time was little boy fights. We’d say to each other ‘Oh I guess ole so and so is in a fight again We knew who it was before we got there 90% of the time,” Riche said. “I think the biggest change I see in crime, it’s in the young people today. We never had that back then — young people shooting each other, raising sand in school.”
To learn more about Riche’s law enforcement journey, watch the above video.
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