When Alex Chenche was a young boy growing up in Ventanas, Ecuador, he had one dream: to become a police officer.
“When I was little I would see police out there helping people,” he said. “Since then I always wanted to be a cop.”
The road from that small Ecuadorian city to the Southold Town Police Department was a long one for Chenche, and it took determination and a lot of hard work. In November 2014, it paid off when he was offered a job with the Southold PD.
“I couldn’t believe it,” he says, remembering that phone call. “It was my dream come true.”
Born in 1982 in Guayaquil, Ecuador, Chenche was only a few years old when his parents divorced and his father moved to the United States. While he was growing up there was talk of him joining his dad in the States, but, says Chenche, “I was an only child, my mom’s baby and she didn’t want to let me go.”
After graduating from high school, the decision was made for Chenche to join his father in America. Although there were opportunities for him in Ecuador, his family felt that the best thing would be for him to emigrate and so, at the age of 17, he joined his father in Brentwood, NY.
When Chenche arrived on Long Island in March of 2000, he didn’t speak any English.
“No English,” he says. “Not one word.”
One might think that a 17-year-old who has just moved to a new country where he didn’t speak the language and didn’t know anyone might feel overwhelmed or frightened, but not Chenche.
“I immediately fell in love with the place,” he says. “I felt like I belonged here and I assimilated into the culture really fast.”
Chenche knew that without being able to speak English his opportunities were limited, so he got to work right away. He enrolled himself in ESL classes at Suffolk Community College, at the local library and at the high school.
“I was just attending classes all day,” he remembers. “I took a part-time job at a factory when I wasn’t in school. My goal was just to learn the language.”
And then the September 11 attacks happened.
“I was 18 years old at the time and it touched me very deeply. I felt like I had to do something, so I decided I would join the military. I wanted to do my part.”
Because he was still learning English, Chenche had to wait a few years before he could join the military. He spent that time continuing his education; going to ESL classes, reading English language newspapers, always with a Spanish/English dictionary nearby to look up new words. Finally, after graduating from SCCC in 2004 he was ready. He took the necessary tests and joined the U.S. Army.
After training for a year to become a surgical technician, he became part of a medical unit that was called to Germany to assist with casualties coming in from war zones in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“Seeing what I saw there changed me as a person,” he said. “It made me realize even more not to take anything for granted. It was rough, but we got through.”
Chenche spent about eight years in the Army assisting on different missions; he was a sergeant when he finally left in 2012. He took a job at Peconic Bay Medical Center as part of the OR team and soon met the woman who would become his wife.
He married, moved to the North Fork and continued working at PBMC while attending nursing school. But he never abandoned his goal of becoming a police officer.
And then in July of 2014 he got a call from the New York Police Department. He’d been hired.
He dropped out of nursing school to attend the police academy in Manhattan, commuting four hours a day. He was two weeks shy of graduating when he got the call from the Southold Town Police Department offering him a job there.
“It changed my life,” he says, his excitement over receiving that call still fresh in his mind. “I felt like my dream just came true.”
So he started at the police academy all over again, this time in Suffolk County.
“I did two academies back to back,” he says. “Six months in one and six in the other.”
He completed the academy in May of 2015 and began his career as a Southold Town police officer, becoming — to the best of their knowledge — the first Latino officer in the department’s history. He had just finished his field training two days before he was called to the horrific limousine crash on Route 48 in Cutchogue that killed four young women and injured six other people.
“It was really bad,” he recalls. Chenche credits his military training and his experience treating casualties from the battlefield in helping him handle the trauma of dealing with the crash.
Although Chenche has seen his share of tragedies while working as a police officer, for the most part the job is everything he hoped it would be.
“I love talking to people and doing whatever I can do to help,” he says. “This is one of the best jobs to do that. Now that I’m in this department I come across so many people from different backgrounds and there’s the sense that we help them and it makes me feel happy that I’m doing good.”
Part of his job as one of only several Spanish-speaking Southold police officers — and the only Hispanic — is to assist on calls where language is a barrier to law enforcement. He is able to explain situations to people in their own language and assist them in getting the help they might need.
Chenche has also accompanied Juvenile Aid Bureau officer William Brewer into the schools to speak to ESL students when the need has arisen.
“I feel a connection to those kids and I think they feel the same way,” says Chenche. “I tell them that when I look at them I see myself 17 years ago. I share my story with them and tell them that anything is possible. I reassure them that I’m here to help protect and serve them.”
Alex Chenche wouldn’t change anything about his life, he says.
“This is my American dream,” he says. “Anything is possible if you set your mind to it, have determination, work hard and do the right thing.”
