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Jack Thilberg named Island’s top cop

COURTESY PHOTO |  Detective Sergeant Jack Thilberg, center, was honored by the Kiwanis Club of Southampton as the Shelter Island Police Department’s Officer of the Year on January 22 at the Atlantis Hotel in Riverhead. Joining Det. Sgt. Thilberg was Shelter Island Police Chief Jim Read and Police Clerk Linda Klenawicus.
COURTESY PHOTO | Detective Sergeant Jack Thilberg, center, was honored by the Kiwanis Club of Southampton as the Shelter Island Police Department’s Officer of the Year on January 22 at the Atlantis Hotel in Riverhead. Joining Det. Sgt. Thilberg was Shelter Island Police Chief Jim Read and Police Clerk Linda Klenawicus.

Detective Sergeant Jack Thilberg, who led a five month investigation with multiple law enforcement agencies into the distribution of narcotics on the East End, which led to three arrests, has been named Shelter Island Police Department’s Officer of the Year.

Det. Sgt. Thilberg, a 26-year veteran of the force, was honored January 22 at the Southampton Kiwanis Club’s annual East End Police Awards dinner held at the Atlantis Hotel in Riverhead.

The arrests came about through Det. Sgt. Thilberg’s’s coordination of personnel from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Investigations, the U. S. Postal Inspection Service, the U. S. Department of Justice, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the U. S. Secret Service, the New York State Police, the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office and the Southold Town Police Department.

Over the course of the investigation, numerous packages were tracked, intercepted, and seized through the execution of search warrants. The shipments, via United States mail, contained quantities of drugs and controlled substances including fentanyl, alprazolam, cocaine, and oxycodone. Counterfeit U.S. Currency was also seized during the investigation.

Building on that investigation, Det. Sgt. Thilberg conducted an investigation into a burglary at an Island establishment where the contents of a safe had been stolen, including approximately $20,000. A suspect was identified who had left the country with a companion and was in the Bahamas.

With the assistance of Homeland Security, U.S. Customs and the Bahamian Royal Police Force, the suspect was located and monitored. When the suspect and his companion returned on a later date to New Jersey’s Newark Liberty International Airport, Det. Sergeant Thilberg, along with other officers, apprehended them.