Glenda Deese
Former Assistant Director of Public Safety
11/2003 - 11/2006
Major Glenda F. Deese is a career State Trooper who joined the Alabama Department of Public Safety as a State Trooper Cadet in 1980, becoming the first African-American woman to complete the Trooper Cadet program.
She was promoted to Trooper in 1981 and served in the Highway Patrol Division, assigned to the Selma Post. She transferred to the Alabama Criminal Justice Training Center upon her promotion to Corporal in 1988, where she served as Assistant Basic Training Coordinator. Promotions continued at the Training Center and as Sergeant, she assumed responsibility for Basic Police Training and later as Lieutenant, she served as Assistant Commander of the Training Center.
In 1997, Deese was promoted to Captain and appointed as the State’s Chief Driver License Examiner. Two years later she was promoted to Major and named Chief of the Department’s Administrative Division, in this position she managed the Department’s budget, personnel, payroll, grants, legal, public information, planning and research, and executive security functions.
Nov. 1, 2003, Gov. Bob Riley appointed Deese as Assistant Director of the Department of Public Safety. In this capacity she assisted with budget, personnel administration and directing the day to day activities of the Department.
Dec. 1, 2006, Deese resumed her rank as Major and is currently designated as the Special Projects Coordinator for Colonel J. Christopher Murphy. Deese is the first Major to ever be assigned at the Alabama Criminal Justice Training Center in Selma. Her primary function is oversee the day to day operations and personnel of the Training Center.
A native of Selma, Glenda Deese holds a Bachelors degree in Business Management from Concordia College.
She is married and has three children.