Headshot of Nuno Tavares, MA

Nuno Tavares, MA

Lieutenant (Ret.), Placer County District Attorney's Office

Nuno Tavares, MA

Nuno Tavares has been in law enforcement since 1996. He retired as Lieutenant with the Placer County District Attorney’s Office in 2023. He oversaw various units, including cold case homicide, special investigations, fraud, and the Special Projects Unit.

Prior to joining the management ranks, Lt. Tavares was assigned to numerous positions, including over ten years on narcotics task forces. He also investigated auto theft, crimes against persons, public assistance fraud, and cold-case homicide. In 2007, Lt. Tavares was one of the lead investigators in Placer County’s only “no body homicide,” securing a conviction and sentencing the defendant to 53 years. This case received national and international coverage and was covered by several crime shows, such as 48 Hours, Forensic Files, True TV, and most recently, on Discover ID. He has also received various local and statewide law enforcement awards.

Since 2007, Lt. Tavares has been a certified law enforcement instructor for the California Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST). As a POST instructor, he teaches for the Institute of Criminal Investigation’s core detective school, homicide investigation course, and sexual assault investigation course. In addition to teaching, Lt. Tavares has been invited numerous times to participate in curriculum development and training videos for California law enforcement as a subject matter expert. Lt. Tavares has been the recipient of the statewide award for excellence in training for POST.

Lt. Tavares served on the Placer County Deputy Sheriff’s Association (DSA) board of directors for more than eight years. During that time, he chaired several committees, including contract negations, political action, and also serving as president. In 2016, he was appointed to the California District Attorney’s Investigators Association (CDAIA) board where he currently sits as an Executive Board member.

Lt. Tavares has earned a Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice and Master of Arts in Leadership from St. Mary’s College of California. In his spare time, Lt. Tavares enjoys traveling, cooking, and playing drums.

Degree Programs

Education

BS in Criminal Justice - St. Mary’s College of California
MA in Leadership - St. Mary’s College of California

Associations

International Homicide Association
California Homicide Investigators Association

Certifications

POST Management Certificate
POST Level 3 Instructor
Student Reviews
  • "Professor Tavares was an engaged and enthusiastic instructor. He constantly engaged the class and often led some great discussions."
    -Summer '24 Student
  • "Professor Tavares was great instructor who was heavily involved in the discussion boards providing valuable insights and injects. Assignments were graded in a timely manor even when he advised he would be traveling. Excellent job!"
    -Summer '24 Student
  • "Professor Tavares was hands down one of the best instructors I've ever had. He was incredibly engaged with the students, constantly reached out to us/provided feedback, and quickly graded assignments. He wanted us to succeed and provided us with the necessary tools and constructive feedback to do so. I could tell that he truly cared about us."
    -Fall '23 Student
  • "I hope to have Professor Tavares for a future LEPSL course. I appreciated his feedback weekly and enjoyed all the perspectives and conversations on the DB. His communication, and prompt feedback to the assignments allow for smooth transition going into the following week of work."
    -Fall '23 Student
  • "Professor Tavares was a wonderful professor, graded fairly, and provided honest feedback"
    -Fall '23 Student
  • "Lieutenant Tavares was an excellent instructor. He provided pinpoint feedback on what was needed to make a great ePortfolio. When you followed his feedback, he recognized it."
    -Summer '23 Student
  • "Great capstone course. Lt. Tavares definitely contributed to my success throughout the course with timely and thoughtful feedback that helped me create a better ePortfolio."
    -Fall '22 Student
  • "Professor Nuno M. Tavares did an amazing job of guiding us through our Capstone project. Thank you, professor, for your feedback and the time spent teaching us."
    -Fall '22 Student
  • "Professor Tavares was great he took his time to explain each procedure along the way and provided helpful feedback. I also like that he was down to earth and comfortable enough to share his personal life with us in the "announcements" page. He was transparent and graded my work fair and impartial."
    -Summer '22 Student
  • "Prof Tavares shows dedication to our law enforcement community and commitment to the LEPSL students' success. I honestly have nothing but praise for the faculty for providing us with the support for our academic and professional growth during this extraordinarily challenging time! I feel reassured and confident having the backing of the LEPSL community to tackle the challenges of 21st-century public safety."
    -Summer '22 Student
  • "Instructor Tavares was exceptional. I appreciated that he took the time to list the number of responses I left on each DB weekly; this caused me to focus on leaving the same or more responses from week to week. He also took time to explain the loss of points on any assignments, which is huge for me; we are investing a lot of time in these classes, and I want to know why I lose credit so I can improve. I'd gladly take any class he taught. Thank you."
    -Spring '22 Student
  • "Professor Tavares was very responsive to questions and was very active in the discussion board. He provided detailed feedback to assignments that I was able to apply to the following modules to better my style of writing."
    -Spring '22 Student
  • "Professor Nuno was an absolute professional who cared about his students. He was very engaged and communicative."
    -Fall '21 Student
  • "Prof. Tavarez is very knowledgable, has a broad range of experiences in law enforcement that he brought to the class. He is approachable, very engaged, and did a great job getting the class through would can be very challenging material."
    -Summer '21 Student
  • "Professor Tavares was very active with us on the DB's and his experience led us in the discussions and provided good suggestions. He quickly graded our work and had good advise for our project. I liked that he had us have a Zoom Meeting option as this helped us connect with him and our other students."
    -Summer '21 Student
  • "Professor Tavares is a top notch professor who provided strong leadership and guidance through his feedback after each module."
    -Spring '21 Student
  • "Professor Tavares has given me the most beneficial feedback through my time in the LEPSL program leading to significant improvements in various areas."
    -Spring '21 Student
  • "Professor Tavares was one of the most engaged professors I have ever had. He was extremely responsive and provided great input."
    -Spring '21 Student
  • "Professor Tavares communicated to the class extremely well and encouraged all students to take advantage of the discussion boards. He was flexible and understanding when I made a mistake and his feedback on assignments were wheat motivated and guided me during my project! It was easy to see how much Professor Tavares cared about his students."
    -Spring '21 Student
  • "I thought Nuno did a great job in being involved engaged and a mentor. He provided feedback on my product that allowed me to change the product and make it better. He does a good job helping his students deliver a polished and professional product. I appreciated his honesty."
    -Spring '21 Student
  • "Professor Nuno Tavares regularly offered respectful supportive insight to help keep the discussion board topics flowing."
    -Summer '20 Student
  • "Professor Nuno was easily the most involved instructor to this date that I have experienced. This is my 9th class and can attest to professor Nuno's participation in all areas of this course."
    -Summer '20 Student
  • "He was extremely involved in the discussion boards, left detailed and valuable comments regarding our posts and papers, and frequently emailed the group. Very impressive."
    -Summer '20 Student
  • "I must share what a great instructor Professor Tavares is, and how he kept everyone motivated during the 7-week course. I had Professor Tavares on a previous course and always recalled how involved he was in the discussion boards. Again, he did not disappoint and challenged us to really dig deep and provide personal stories that most of us could relate to in one way or another. By far, Professor Tavares was able to get the best out of all of us in our own discussion boards, and his own posts highlighted his ability to bring strangers into meaningful conversations."
    -Summer '20 Student
  • "Professor Tavarez was engaging and provide great feedback. He was always promptly returning e-mails and he was very active on the discussion board. He provided a lot of positive feedback, which helped build my confidence."
    -Summer '19 Student
  • "Professor N. Tavarez was outstanding in his instruction, engaging the students during discussions, providing feedback, spoke about his experiences, and pushing the student to learn not just from him but our co-students, via presentations and readings. Professor Tavarez afforded a positive learning experience in the material he covered."
    -Spring '19 Student
  • "Nuno Tavares is one of the most professional and "squared away" instructors I have had the opportunity to deal with in this program. He fully understands the struggles of his students and does his best to accommodate any issues a student may have. His policy on discussion boards helps keep the conversations flowing and encourages students to continually communicate. He also allows a little more of "informal" discussions which helps make the class feel more of a traditional in-class feel. I have seen other classes discussions die because of the more strict policies in which the students were only communicating the bare minimum, but in Nuno Tavares's classes, the discussions reach hundreds of replies. He is also fair in his grading and gives great tips that have helped me improve my writing."
    -Spring '19 Student
  • "This course has been my favorite and it has to do a lot with Professor Tavares' engagement and weekly updates. Especially in the discussion boards, Professor Tavares keeps conversations interesting and provides his own personal experiences which a lot of us can identify with. His communication is great and it made the course enjoyable."
    -Spring '19 Student

Capt. Tim Gately, Redmond Police Department
MS-LEPSL Alumnus

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