[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 12]
[Senate]
[Pages 17112-17113]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        TRIBUTE TO TERIGI ROSSI

 Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, today I would like to join the 
Massachusetts relatives and friends of Massachusetts native son Terigi 
Rossi in celebrating 15 remarkable years as a police officer in Dallas, 
TX, the last 10 as a member of that city's elite SWAT Team.
  The name Terigi Rossi may be familiar to television viewers. Officer 
Rossi was featured in ``Dallas SWAT,'' a reality television series on 
the A&E Network that followed members of the Dallas SWAT Team in 2006-
2007. The TV cameras captured the gritty, life-on-the-line experiences 
of Officer Rossi and his fellow SWAT Team members, but they also 
followed them home,

[[Page 17113]]

showing the family life of officers whose lives are always in danger 
but who always put family first.
  In Officer Rossi's case, viewer had an intimate view of a man who 
with his fellow officer is called out to capture a bank robbery suspect 
barricaded inside a garage, or responding to another call, trying to 
stop a suspected drug dealer from destroying evidence. But when the 
work day is done, the cameras followed Officer Rossi through training 
for an amateur boxing match, then back home where he cooks chicken 
cutlets for dinner with his wife Grace and their two sons, 15-year-old 
Antonio and 11-year-old Terigi. Then, it is off to his part time job as 
a security guard to supplement the family income.
  As a prosecutor in Middlesex County in the 1970s, I worked with 
hundreds of police officers. And it was clear how much we ask of these 
officers. They are required to be many things to many people--minister, 
social worker, keeper of the peace, the lawman with the courage to face 
the armed suspects at great personal risk. And since the late 1960s, 
some of the best of these lawmen have been recruited into elite 
tactical units to perform dangerous and high-risk operations--lawmen 
like Terigi Rossi.
  Terigi Rossi grew up on Harley Avenue in the city of Everett, MA. He 
graduated from Malden Catholic High School where, not surprisingly, 
this 6-foot 230-pound athlete was a lineman on the football team, 
playing offense and defense. He graduated from Suffolk University where 
he was recruited by the city of Dallas to serve on their police force, 
one of the largest in the Nation, with 2,977 sworn officers and 556 
civilians.
  And I have to say--Massachusetts's loss was Texas's gain, because 
Terigi Rossi would have been a great addition to any police force in 
our State. Just look at the 15 years this always-on-the-go officer has 
spent on the Dallas police force, including 10 years with the city's 
always-ready-to-go 50-member SWAT Team as a specialist in gas and 
chemical weaponry.
  Officer Rossi's family and friends back home in Massachusetts, 
particularly my friend Tom Ciulla, are justifiably proud of his record 
of public service. I join them in celebrating not only his 15 years in 
a police uniform but also his 10 years in the armor of the Dallas SWAT 
Team. And I send thanks to Grace, Antonio and Terigi for their support 
of Officer Rossi. They know as well as any that law enforcement 
officers are never off duty. They protect the public any time and any 
place that the peace is threatened. And we should give them all they 
help they need.

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