By Jeff Kenney Staff Writer
CULVER — One of Culver’s public servants will join the list of several visible faces to move on to other horizons this year. Jeremy Somerville, completing his fifth year as a Culver police officer, has taken a position with the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department and has completed his last week in Culver.
Somerville, originally from Indianapolis but raised in North Judson by his grandparents, has several reasons for his move to the big city, but chief among them is a lifelong dream of service.

“I’ve always wanted to help,” he says. “Everything I’ve done up to this point in my career has been geared towards going back to Indy. I want to attempt to make a difference in one inner city child’s life. I grew up in a poverty-stricken home; the areas we lived in that weren’t the best. When I was older, I was raised in a nicer environment by my grandparents, and I saw a different side of life. You get an idea that you want to make a better life for yourself and for people in general.”
Somerville started his law enforcement career working in Indianapolis processing inmates. “That was the start of seeing people coming in and out of the system,” he recalls. “If you can change them early enough, you can make a difference.”
He then worked for the Westville Correctional facility as a prison guard, and Marion County sheriff’s department as a corrections officer. “(At Marion County), we had juvenile offenders tried and sentenced as an adult. We have an epidemic, we really do. That made my desire to be a police officer even stronger, to help those kids.”
Somerville left Marion County and was hired in Culver on Oct. 28, 2002, five years to the day from his official date of resignation.
Along the way, Somerville married his wife Alissa, whom he met in school in North Judson. The two have been married just over three years. They will journey to Indianapolis where Jeremy will join a police force larger than Culver’s population, over 1,600 sworn officers.
He feels that his tenure in Culver prepared him in unexpected ways for the challenges of his new job. “This job has been a blessing because it gave me the opportunity to mature as a police officer and made me realize that being a small-town officer is not as easy as it looks,” he reflects. “It gave me a new respect for the professionalism demanded of a small-town police department.”
“This is a good place to start a career (in law enforcement). It gives you an opportunity…to spread your wings. I’m indebted to Culver. This community gave me the opportunity to become an officer.”