Newest recruitment officer carries on family legacy in law enforcement

By Behind the Badge staff

When Tatiana Raygoza received book-order forms in elementary school, her classmates bought books with them. Raygoza bought CSI kits.

“Anything detective,” she says. “It sounds so cheesy, but it’s a true story.”

Now, many years and a few CSI kits later, it seems apparent that Raygoza was prepping for her life’s work. She’s a six-year veteran of the Santa Ana Police Department who recruits new officers. It’s a role she’s been on for a few weeks, after an initial five-year stint in patrol.

With a talkative nature, love for police work, and eagerness to teach others, Raygoza is a natural fit.

“I think if you’re passionate about what you do,” she said, “it’s easy to talk about.”

Even if a young Raygoza weren’t snatching up CSI kits, she might’ve been destined to be in law enforcement anyway. Her father and mother both worked for the Pomona Police Department. Her father was a 28-year veteran working in SWAT, specialized units, and as a field training officer and detective. Her mother was a civilian employee, handling everything from records and dispatch to detective bureau professional staff.

Initially, her parents encouraged her to find a different career, and to attend college after high school. She did so on a soccer scholarship to New Mexico State. She later completed her degree at the University of La Verne in kinesiology.

Raygoza was inspired after being injured from sports to go into physical therapy. After school she coached soccer, was a personal trainer, and was a rehab assistant at a hospital. But law enforcement was calling her.

“Working in the hospital setting, it was slow … I don’t know if this is what I want to do,” Raygoza recalled.

She turned to a familiar agency: Pomona Police Department. Raygoza passed the background checks and became a corrections officer in the jails. The job got her used to the system and taught her how to handle herself around difficult people, and how to do things confidently around suspected criminals. The position was, as she put it, a good entry point into law enforcement.

She even crossed paths with her father on the tail end of his police career. He was booking someone into jail while his daughter was working in it.

“He’s poker face,” she recalled. “Very professional.”

After a year with Pomona PD, Raygoza felt she needed a new setting, somewhere she wasn’t known already with her family history.

During a Pomona police officer funeral, she discovered that place: the Santa Ana Police Department. At the funeral, law enforcement from around Southern California banded together in solidarity. Santa Ana PD was no exception, and even though they were in a different county and had no significant, frequent interaction with Pomona PD, Santa Ana officers showed up.

In Raygoza’s memory, there must’ve been 100 Santa Ana PD personnel at the Pomona officer’s funeral.

“I remember thinking, ‘That’s special they had so many people from an Orange County agency to show support,’” Raygoza said. “The reputation was talked about a lot at Pomona PD.”

Raygona, who grew up in Baldwin Park, didn’t know much about Orange County.

“I had never heard of Santa Ana at that point,” she added.

Santa Ana PD hired Raygoza in April 2020, during the pandemic. She graduated from the academy in February 2021 and was sworn in. Raygoza says she actually enjoyed the academy. She learned the needed codes, projected her voice, and brought the necessary intensity to the role. And she didn’t mind the intense yelling.

“I’m weird like that,” Raygoza said with a laugh.

Once in Santa Ana, she went through the five phases of training. She studied her paper maps because new officers are not allowed to use the computer maps. She even drove around Santa Ana during her time off to better learn her way around. Once through training, she spent her initial years gathering valuable experience, all while helping her new community.

“Every day is different, and that’s what I loved about it,” Raygoza said. “No amount of training is going to equal experience, right? Training is like the foundation, knowing your platform. But the experience, I think, is where you really develop on what type of officer you’re going to be.”

She loved the patrol officer’s pace and variety. She liked getting to help where she could in a variety of situations, from domestic violence and gang crime to homelessness and narcotics enforcement.

“It’s so fast. That’s what I loved about it,” Raygoza said. “You’re not sitting around with nothing to go to.”

Of course, recruiting is a different pace entirely. She and her partner, Officer John Choi, find themselves in administrative roles. They’ll attend college career fairs. They’ll visit military bases, looking for service members interested in something new.

Raygoza is learning a lot from Officer Choi, who served in the Marines before joining Santa Ana PD.

“He’s a master at recruiting,” she said. “He knows how to speak to people. He’s very well-versed.”

Raygoza said in her new position she has moved into a mentorship role. She has never done anything like recruiting before, but sometimes has fielded questions from young women who, like her, wondered what it’s like being a police officer — and a female in a male-dominated department at that.

“I try to be as genuine as I can,” she said. “I am honest about what the job is. It’s not for everybody. It’s a great profession to be in, but it’s not for everybody.”

Raygoza sees the recruitment role as finding her future partners on the force.

“I want to feel comfortable for them, that they’re going to be capable and successful here,” she said. “We’re going to be dependent on them … I want them to be successful cops and good people. It’s a reflection of our PD. I want to contribute to that. You can’t just complain about something or wish something to be. You have to be the change if you want the change.”

Read more at Behind the Badge.