On the Record: Billings Police Chief Rich St. John says goodbye after 45 years of law enforcement

On the Record delivers insights and opinions from Montana’s most influential newsmakers and experts in conversation with the reporters and editors of Montana Free Press.

Retiring Billings Police Chief Rich St. John sat down with Montana Free Press to discuss changes in policing and crime in Montana’s largest city. Hired in 1981, he’s been with the department for 45 years in various roles, including commander of the SWAT team, bomb squad and hostage negotiations. 

With a population of 122,000, Billings far exceeds the next-largest city, Missoula, at 80,000. Missoula has two-thirds of Billings’ population, and Great Falls and Bozeman have half. 

“We are big,” St. John said. “We are at least twice as big as [many] of our sister cities and [their police] departments as well.”

St. John said people ask why Billings isn’t doing some of the same things other Montana police departments are doing.  

“Well, we’re not because we’re bigger and have different … issues to speak of,” he said. 

St. John holds an undergraduate degree from Rocky Mountain College, where he sits on the board of trustees, and a master’s of public administration in criminal justice from City University in Bellevue, Washington, his home state. He was hired as chief in 2005. St. John also spent more than 30 years as an assistant football coach at Skyview High School and hired some former players — and later their children — as officers. 

St. John is known to make a quip. He said one lighter memory of his time on the job was one year when PETA, or People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, learned that the department was handing out free turkeys in lieu of traffic tickets in the days before Thanksgiving and sent a bunch of “Tofurkys” for officers to distribute instead.  

“I will say that once it got out, we had Tofurkys, there were zero traffic violations,” he said. “Everybody was very well behaved for the time.” 

St. John will clock his last day on Sept. 30. His plans for retirement include getting better at golf and fishing, being on time more often for grandkids’ sporting events, traveling with his wife and figuring out Medicare. 

This interview has been edited for length and clarity. 

MTFP: Walk us through some of the changes in the job of a Billings police officer between when you started and now.

St. John: When I started in the ‘80s, cocaine was the drug that we saw here. We saw some violence out of that. The drug dealers would be fighting for turf. There were a lot of bars. Prostitution was prevalent. Those were just kind of rowdy years. We had a handful of career criminals that we dealt with. Sometimes you’d end up in some sort of bar fight, and at the end of the day, you get them arrested and they’d compliment you and call you by name. 

If we had one homicide a year, two homicides a year, that was a big deal. It dominated the news. 

(There were five homicides in Billings in 2025 and 15 in 2024, according to the department’s annual report.) 

We spent an awful lot of time on residential and commercial burglaries. One of the things that was stressed was that you needed to thoroughly patrol your beat at night. You’re expected to be out, driving the alleys, walking, checking windows. If you came to work the next day and did not find a broken window or a door that had been kicked in on your beat, you heard about it. There was some ribbing. 

In the ‘90s and early 2000s, people would build meth labs in their basement, which caused a lot of problems for landlords. No agencies in Billings could handle the cleanup. The Drug Enforcement Administration had a unit in Idaho that would come in hazmats and clean stuff up. The Legislature passed a law that cracked down on the ingredients needed to make meth. That put an end to local labs, and now almost exclusively the stuff comes from other countries. 

St. John said other problems toward the end of his tenure have been youth gang violence and a rise in mental health crisis-related calls. Also, changes to state law designed to better serve domestic violence victims mean police now must identify a primary aggressor and make an arrest, instead of simply separating the two people. St. John said the change creates more work for police but is an important step in breaking the cycle of violence.  

MTFP: Should people feel safe in Billings in 2026? 

St. John: Yes. I think they do. We’ve made significant progress on violent crime. That was our No. 1 strategic goal. We have very few random acts of violence here. 

We had a terrible spree of homicides driven by youth gang activity. That was one thing where I didn’t realize the scope of the problem. We had an expert we hired from another department, a bigger city, who came in and told me, “You’re missing some stuff here.” So we retooled our Street Crimes Unit and said, “Go get a handle on this problem.’”So you’ve seen that a lot of the homicide cases have been cleared up. It’s all related. They all knew each other. 

We have reduced violent crime over the past several years. 

Since the 1990s, the national crime rate has trended downward, but Billings fought a growing crime rate until recent years, the FBI Crime Data Explorer shows. In 2023, the department celebrated a decrease in violent crime, according to its annual report. St. John credits, in part, a public safety mill levy passed in 2021 that funded additional hires and enabled the department to do more proactive policing. 

MTFP: Troubles during your tenure have included technicians stealing painkillers from evidence and sexual misconduct cases between a civilian employee and sworn officers. Did the public get the accountability they were entitled to?

St. John: Absolutely. It’s unfortunate and embarrassing that that happened. But we were transparent with it. All were investigated thoroughly. The thefts were prosecuted. People may disagree with the discipline that I gave out, but we also have union contracts to uphold. I’m inclined, if it’s not catastrophic, to offer some grace. I gave second chances, and all of those individuals who are still on the force have flourished. 

It takes eight months to hire and train new officers. You, as a citizen, have a lot of money invested in these officers. They wouldn’t be here if they didn’t do a great job. 

MTFP: What are some accomplishments you’re proud of?

St. John: I’m very proud of the fact that we were able to win the trust of the citizens, not once, but twice, to grow the department [through public safety mill levies]. It was necessary. 

It’s very satisfying to watch this group of individuals on staff work through complex problems. Be creative. Have the interaction that we do with the public. Watch them go out and do stuff without having to say, “Oh, I better call St. John and ask permission.” 

We take care of our young officers on the front end. When our new hires come on, we pull them aside and tell them: Open a deferred compensation right now. Due to your pension, you won’t have Social Security. You also need to have friends outside of the department. They will call you on your paranoia and keep you grounded. 

MTFP: What will be the most important trait of the new chief of police?

St. John: Continue to engage the community. Make yourself available. Be as responsive as you can. Build trust. Build credibility. Put deposits in the Bank of Goodwill, is what I call it. When you go out in the community and meet different groups, some are law enforcement-friendly; some are not. But always build those relationships. And then when something bad happens, you have something to withdraw.