For Denver police, “Daddy” Spence provided calm, humor when things got tough.
At the Denver Police Department, Sgt. Dale Spence was known as Daddy Spence. His troops, especially those who worked under him in the gang unit, recall a fearless leader who provided reassuring calm and sometimes humor when times got tough.
“You have supervisors a lot of times that put themselves before the troops, but he wasn’t that way,” said Denver police Detective Nick Werth. “He cared more for us it seemed than himself getting a promotion. Because of that, he had the friendship and respect of everybody who worked around him.”
Spence died Nov. 11 at the age of 74, after suffering what family members suspect was a heart attack. He had just said goodbye to his son, Justin, a deputy at the Adams County Sheriff’s Office. The two had returned from a three-day pheasant hunting trip. Justin was driving home when he got the call alerting him that ambulances and squad cars had converged at his father’s home in Denver where he had dropped him off.
Spence is survived by his son, Justin, and his wife, Janet. He first laid eyes on Janet while sipping a beer in the Cherokee Grill after a long shift at the police department early in his law enforcement career. He told a friend present at the time that Janet, who worked in the police radio room back then, was the woman he was going to marry.
Funeral services will be held at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday at Horan & Mcconaty Family Chapel, 9998 Grant St. in Thornton. Burial will be at 1:30 p.m. Tuesday at Fort Logan National Cemetery, 3698 S. Sheridan Blvd. in Denver. Attendees are asked to gather at staging area B.
Spence’s career with the Denver Police Department spanned 1974 to 2004. He worked as a sergeant in the gang bureau, SWAT/METRO bureau, internal affairs, vice unit as well as districts one, two and three. During his time at the police department, he received two merit awards, five chief’s citations, 14 official commendations and numerous letters of appreciation. His writeups reveal that he was a diligent officer, one who worked tirelessly in 1981 to develop an informant that lead to the arrest of a man wanted in nine armed robberies. In another case in 1982, he helped negotiate the surrender of an intoxicated man who had been firing gunshot rounds from a third floor apartment.
Later in his career, Spence went on to work as a sergeant at the Metro Gang Task Force. In that role, he helped secure convictions in the killing of 34-year-old Paul Bueno, who was slain after he agreed to give testimony against drug dealers.
After retirement, Spence and Janet split their time between Denver and North Carolina, where they bought a second home with eight acres in the Smoky Mountains. He was raised as a child on a ranch in Wyoming and always had a fondness for hunting and rural areas, according to family members. He helped host rodeos in Adams County, encouraging urban officers who knew nothing about roping to pitch in.
Spence received a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star for his service in the Army during the Vietnam War. He was awarded the Purple Heart for injuries he received when he stepped on a booby trap and a punji stick shot up into his foot. He removed the stick himself, wrapped his foot and continued hiking through the jungle, Justin recalled.
Spence received the Bronze Star for refusing to take his assigned seat on a helicopter after a firefight broke out, according to Justin. Instead, Spence stayed behind to fight and help patch up the wounded. He gave his helicopter seat to another injured soldier, Justin said.
“He was helping people that no one else could,” Justin said. “That’s the type of human being he always was. He was always the first one to step up, and the last to leave.”
Spence once gave a ride home to a disabled woman in a wheelchair he came across at Denver International Airport and wheeled her into her front door, recalled Spence’s niece, Lisa Davis, who idolized Spence so much she also chose a career in law enforcement, becoming a Lakewood police officer.
Denver police Detective Danny Perez recalled that one night when working a gang unit shift, he had to call Spence to explain he had clipped a trash bin with his squad car while giving chase to a person with cocaine who he arrested.
“I was freaking out,” Perez recalled. “But he showed up, and he giggled and told me to calm down and told me it was going to be OK and put the entirety of the incidence into perspective. He took me from where I was to a place where I was laughing with him.”
Robert Fuller’s fondness for Spence was so great that when Fuller became a sergeant in the Adams County Sheriff’s Office, he asked Spence to pin his sergeant’s badge on him, eschewing the tradition of having his wife perform the ceremonial role. Fuller wasn’t the only one to give Spence that honor. Denver police Sgt. Thomas Rowe, now in homicide, also asked Spence to pin his badge on him.
“He was a cop’s cop,” Fuller said. “He was the kind of supervisor that supported his troops, but he was relentless in the pursuit of justice.”
Fuller recalled the two often laughed about how once when checking up on a gang witness they had in custody in a jail in the hinterlands of Colorado, they discovered the witness was having sex with a female deputy. Spence reported the deputy to her superiors, who fired her.
Justin followed in his father’s footsteps and chose a career in law enforcement. He was left with poignant memories of a loving father. He recalled that as a young child he watched his father put up the family’s commemorative Winchester “Legendary Lawman” rifle for auction to help pay the bills for another police officer who was injured and unable to work.
“I always razzed my dad, ‘You gave away my rifle,’ ” Justin recalled. “Well, this year, we went to a gun show, and they had that same commemorative rifle.”
While Justin wandered off, his father stayed behind to tell the story to the gun dealer. He ended up buying the commemorative rifle at a discount so he could give it to Justin.
“He bought it right there and then,” Justin said. “That’s just the man he was.”