By Kevin Hendricks – The Paper.
A Rio Rancho woman who spent decades watching law enforcement families quietly struggle in crisis launched a nonprofit to change that — and in less than two years, it has already reached more than 160 people.
Laci Steele founded Steele Got Your Six in December 2024 after years of funding officer support efforts entirely out of pocket — sometimes spending between $8,000 and $16,000 a year. A police chief’s wife, former dispatcher and mother to two officers, Steele said the organization’s name captures its mission: in law enforcement, “got your six” means someone has your back.
“Our mission is to help law enforcement officers and their families,” Steele said. “The main goal is to keep our families together.”
The organization provides financial grants to officers facing medical or financial crises, sponsors family-friendly department events and runs a Family Support Academy twice a year — a program that coaches spouses on how to manage a partner’s occupational trauma.
The trauma behind the badge
Steele, who is also a chaplain, said the academy addresses a gap she has seen across four decades of law enforcement life: officers are trained to survive on the street but not at home.
Research cited by the organization points to the scale of that burden. Steele said while the average person experiences a handful of traumatic events in a lifetime, a law enforcement officer retains roughly 187 traumatic memories that stay with them — scenes like child fatalities that resurface when an officer goes home to their own family.
The result, Steele said, is what clinician Dr. Kevin Gilmartin calls the “magic chair” effect — officers come home and mentally disconnect, a natural decompression response that spouses often misread as indifference.
“They teach them how to survive at work, not at home,” Steele said.
That disconnect carries measurable consequences. Roughly half of first marriages in law enforcement end in divorce, Steele said, a rate that climbs even higher in second marriages. And officer suicides continue to outpace line-of-duty deaths nationally, a trend that has not improved despite increased attention to wellness programs.
“We have more officers killing themselves than are being killed in the line of duty,” Steele said.
The Family Support Academy, which SGY6 first launched in Oklahoma before bringing it to Rio Rancho, aims to interrupt that cycle. Steele said she has personally helped save two marriages through the program and through her chaplaincy work with officers and their spouses.
“Just one makes it worth it,” she said.
Built from personal experience
Steele’s commitment is rooted in her own story. In 2000, her husband survived a shooting in South Florida in which his cousin was shot twice and a police canine was killed. The communication Steele received was wrong — she arrived at the hospital expecting to find her husband among the injured.
“I’ll always remember walking in that room and not seeing him,” she said. “I thought: I’m a widow with five children in South Florida with no family and nobody to call.”
Her husband survived, but the aftermath tested their marriage. He didn’t speak about the shooting for months — and when he finally did, it was to fellow officers at a canine funeral, not to her.
“That was the first time I was ever jealous of law enforcement — that bond, that thin blue line,” she said. “He felt more comfortable telling them than he did me.”
That moment shaped how Steele now counsels law enforcement spouses. Her message: don’t interrogate. Let officers decompress on their own timeline.
“Wait for those little moments,” she said. “When they do download — just listen.”
Growing a community safety net
SGY6 operates entirely independently of the Rio Rancho Police Department — where Steele’s husband, Stewart, is chief — and the city, with no paid staff. All 80 to 100 volunteers — including an active core of 40 to 60 — give their time without compensation. The nonprofit’s board consists entirely of women with ties to law enforcement.
The organization has partnered with Home Depot and received support from the Rio Rancho Kiwanis Club. Its annual awards banquet costs the nonprofit thousands of dollars each year.
Steele said the board recently approved expanding services into other departments. Longer term, Steele said SGY6 is designed as a legacy nonprofit — structured to outlast her and her husband’s time in Rio Rancho, with a board committed to the same mission.
“These officers are very young. Their families are young,” she said. “If they lose this when we leave, I don’t think that would be the best thing for them.”
Support Steele Got Your Six
- Online: steelegotyoursix.org
- Donate: Click the Donate Now button at steelegotyoursix.org, or send payment via Zelle to SteeleGotYourSix@aol.com
- By mail: Checks payable to Steele Got Your Six, Inc.
- In-kind gifts: SGY6 welcomes donated items for event door prizes and gratitude gifts
- Sponsorships: Tiered levels from $100 (Cadet) to $5,000 (Chief)
- Volunteer: Marketing, technology, social media and fundraising committees are actively recruiting
All donations are tax-deductible. At this time, all contributions support law enforcement events and programs in the Rio Rancho area. Steele Got Your Six, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) independent nonprofit and is not affiliated with the Rio Rancho Police Department.