Michael J. Heidingsfield is the Senior Assistant Sergeant at Arms for Police Operations and Homeland Security for the United States Senate and has held that position since August 2008. In that capacity he directly oversees the Senate’s preparations for security of its members, the protection of the Senate both as a complex of facilities and as an institution, the counter-terrorism measures employed to ensure enduring constitutional government and the overarching law enforcement and security measures necessary to guarantee continuity of operations and government. He has served as a senior participant and advisor for such National Special Security Events as the 2008 Democratic and Republican National Conventions and the 2009 Presidential Inauguration.

Preceding this appointment, Chief Heidingsfield served for eight years as the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Memphis Shelby Crime Commission in Memphis, Tennessee. Prior to his move to Memphis, Chief Heidingsfield served for eight years as the Chief of Police and Director of Public Safety for the City of Scottsdale, Arizona. His law enforcement service in Arizona and Tennessee was preceded by a fifteen year tenure at the Arlington (TX) Police Department, leaving there as the senior deputy police chief after having been selected through a nationwide recruitment to lead the Scottsdale Police Department. At the time of his retirement from the City of Scottsdale, he was accorded the title of Chief of Police Emeritus.

Prior to the start of his law enforcement career, Chief Heidingsfield served as an active duty Air Force officer at the conclusion of the Vietnam War and retired in 2004 as a full colonel in the Air Force Reserve assigned to the Security Forces Directorate at the Pentagon. He was called to active duty in the wake of the attacks of 9/11 and served as a team chief in the Air Force Crisis Action Center in the Pentagon. His Air Force career took him to Europe, Central America, Southeast Asia and the Persian Gulf.

He received his BS degree in Criminology from Florida State University in 1973 and his MA degree in Liberal Arts from Texas Christian University in 1990. While at Florida State University, Chief Heidingsfield was an Air Force scholarship recipient and a distinguished graduate of the ROTC commissioning program.

He is a published author and speaker in the fields of criminal justice policy, policing, leadership and ethics, and has presented before the International Association of Chiefs of Police, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Major City Police Chiefs Association, Police Executive Research Forum, US Navy Post Graduate School and at Oxford University, England. Chief Heidingsfield has provided advice to the Israeli National Police on the issue of violence de-escalation, to the Bermuda Police Service on international law enforcement accreditation and has served as a trainer for the Ministry of Public Security in Costa Rica. He received three gubernatorial appointments for criminal justice posts in the State of Arizona and has served as a subject matter expert for the Defense Threat Reduction Agency at Camp Delta, Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, Cuba on the security of Taliban and Al Qaeda detainees. He also served as an instructor on leadership for the Indonesian National Police executive corps and for a 20 year period was an assessor and team leader for the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies.

While on a 14 month leave of absence from the Crime Commission from 2004-2005, Chief Heidingsfield served in Baghdad as the Contingent Commander for the US Department of State’s Police Advisory Mission in Iraq. His role was leading the effort to retrain and reconstitute the Iraqi Police Service, overseeing a staff of 1000 in doing so and traveling throughout Iraq. He survived five attempts on his life during that mission. He was also selected in 2007 to serve as a member of the Congressionally-mandated Independent Commission on the Iraqi Security Forces, again traveling to Iraq. Most recently, he was asked to serve as senior police advisor and subject matter expert to the President’s Special Envoy to the Middle East for Regional Security. Both his Iraq Commission and Middle East Special Envoy work was done at the request of and under the leadership of now National Security Advisor, General James Jones.

Chief Heidingsfield is a graduate of the Senior Management Institute for Police, generally considered the most advanced police executive training in the country with faculty drawn primarily from the Harvard University Schools of Business and Government. Finally, he currently serves on the Board of Directors for the National Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism in Oklahoma City.