When a threat reaches Valley shuls, Det. Mike Hillman's word usually gets there first

When a threat reaches the Valley's shuls, the first word usually comes from one man. For at least seven years, Detective Mike Hillman of the Phoenix Police Department has been the department's liaison to the Police Chief's Jewish Advisory Board, and the person rabbis, shul presidents and security volunteers write to when something feels wrong.

Bomb threats on a Friday. A suspicious car on Yom Kippur. A shooting at a shul in another state and the question every kehillah asks the next morning: are we next? Through all of it, Det. Hillman has been the one who answers.

He is not Jewish. He has described himself as a Christian, and in 2019 he told Jewish News: "I tell people I'm the most Jewish Christian you'll ever meet."

For the Valley's Jewish community, his work has meant something simple and rare: a detective who answers, who warns the shuls before trouble arrives, and who has stood watch at a Valley shul for more than two decades. Families who have never heard his name have davened more safely because of him.

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Ask the people who have worked beside him, and the answers come back warm and fast.

Rabbi Levi Levertov of Chabad, a Phoenix police chaplain who has led the Jewish Advisory Board, told Kol Phoenix this week: "He always wants to help out, and he'll guide anyone on where they need to be and who they need to talk to for any potential incident or event. He is a mentch who cares."

It is nearly the same thing Rabbi Levertov said about him in 2021. Five years later, he has not changed his mind.

Alan Zeichick, who served as the board's vice chair, put it this way: "Detective Michael Hillman has been a real friend of the Jewish community in Phoenix and across the valley. He's stood with us, literally, protecting our synagogues. I've seen him work tirelessly when members of our community have concerns or (heaven forbid) incidents."

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The pattern goes back years. When the Chabad of Poway shooting happened in April 2019, Det. Hillman asked precinct commanders to send patrol cars past the Valley's shuls. Asked about it afterward, he said simply that it makes people feel a little safer.

On Yom Kippur 2021, a man in a dark car asked a shul's guard questions that did not sit right. Det. Hillman passed the warning to nearby shuls through the board.

In December 2023, when a wave of hoax bomb threats hit synagogues across the country, including in Arizona, his statement went to the board and from there to the shuls.

And in March 2026, after the attack on Temple Israel in West Bloomfield, Michigan, Phoenix police offered training to local congregations, and Det. Hillman told Jewish News: "The Phoenix Police Department deeply cares about our Jewish community."

His instruction to the community has stayed the same the whole time: call 911 first, then let him know.

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On December 2, 2025, at its annual gathering in Scottsdale, the Arizona Faith Network gave Det. Hillman its Community Hero Award, citing decades of compassionate service and his work against antisemitism and hate crimes. State Rep. Patricia Contreras was honored alongside him.

AFN also recorded an interview with him that played at the gathering. You can watch it here.

For years he also worked off-duty security at Temple Chai in north Phoenix, which Jewish News counted at 22 years back in 2019.

In 2021, describing what he wants every shul to understand, he said it plainly: "We're here, we support you and we're providing the security we can for you."

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Police work in a frum community is quiet work. Shuls do not answer the phone on Shabbos and Yom Tov. Most of what a liaison does never makes the paper: the note that arrives before Friday afternoon, the patrol car that slows down on a Motzei Shabbos, the call returned the same day.

In our mesorah, hakaras hatov, recognizing the good someone has done for us, is not a courtesy. It is an obligation. The kehillah owes Det. Hillman a great deal of it. Every Shabbos that passes quietly, every Yom Tov that ends with nothing to report, carries a little of his work inside it.

Kol Phoenix thanks Det. Hillman, and every officer who stands outside our shuls so the rest of us can daven inside them. Some people get thanked at retirement. We wanted him to read it now.

How we reported this: drawn from Jewish News of Greater Phoenix coverage from 2019 to 2026, the City of Phoenix's pages on the Community Response Squad and the Police Chief's Advisory Boards, Arizona Faith Network's award announcement and video, Cronkite News' 2023 reporting on the city's advisory boards, and statements given to Kol Phoenix this week by Rabbi Levi Levertov and Alan Zeichick. Det. Hillman agreed to this profile and gave Kol Phoenix the board's makeup; he was not interviewed for it, and his years with the department are not public. This is a profile, not a Phoenix Police Department statement, and the department was not asked for official comment. The publisher is rabbi of Congregation Phoenix Torah in Phoenix. Corrections and additions are welcome at [email protected].