Kim Thomas

Kim Thomas was a detective with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, where he retired at the end of his career in the Forgery Detail, Major Crimes Unit. His several other investigative assignments included a joint operation with the FBI targeting an organized crime group of Romanians who defrauded Vegas casinos of $34 million using stolen credit cards and on the U.S. Secret Service’s task force SWIFT, which went after a group of meth-amphetamine addicts that was estimated to have defrauded the Vegas economy of over 100 million dollars from counterfeit checks, credit cards, IDs and currency.

Kim formerly worked in construction, drove a limousine, did executive protection, and ran a martial arts school. While a member of the U.S. Air Force, and later as a civilian contractor, he worked on top-secret electronic projects at Nevada’s weapon testing ranges.

As the Cold War wound down, he joined Metro in 1992. A sixth-degree black belt in Katai-te Ryu karate, Thomas scored 100 percent on the Metro physical test even though he was, at 36, one of the older members of his police academy class. While a patrolman he distinguished himself as the fastest runner in numerous officer-and-felon foot races, and was one of the athletic officers assigned to the innovative and famous bicycle patrols on the Las Vegas Strip.

Born in 1956 in Michigan, Thomas was the son of a career Air Force man. He has lived in California, Germany, Sweden, Costa Rica, Kansas, Mississippi, and Texas. Now, he lives in Las Vegas part-time and other places the rest. In 1974, he graduated from Rancho High School and went to UNLV where he often grew bored and so continuously changed his Major. In 2000, he settled on English and received an undergraduate degree. In June of 2005, he was awarded his MFA degree in Creative Writing from UNLV. This first novel was his thesis.