Yesterday was another decent day. I ended up with a felony arrest for a female that felt she could fight a police officer. While I was busy doing paperwork for the District Attorney's Office, an officer requested another unit to give him a criminal trespass warning. I told radio I was on the way to help him out.
I arrive on scene to see the officer with Sarge. If you remember from previous posts, sarge is a regular "homeless" ( I say homeless in quotes because he has a home but choose to stay at an intersection for the majority of his waking hours) and habitual drunk. Sarge has been issued a criminal trespass warning from every business in the area of the intersection which he frequents. He always causes disturbances and we try to avoid arresting him for sanitary reasons but we're not always lucky.
On this day, Sarge found himself the furthest east anyone had ever seen him. He was harassing the clerk of a gas station and....surprise!- the clerk wanted him issued a trespass warning. This officer I was assisting is actually preparing to move back home to another state. I was joking around that he'll definitely miss moments with Sarge and his oh-so familiar stench.
Tuesday, May 26, 2015
Monday, May 25, 2015
Staying Late--Never Fails
So yesterday was a pretty good Sunday. All signs pointed to getting off on time to start my week.....then at a little short of 30 minutes before I'm supposed to head back in I get a call for a vehicle accident involving a fire truck.
I arrive on scene and see the fire truck blocking about two lanes with debris in the road. Apparently Fire was heading to a call lights and sirens when they came up on two vehicles ( a car and a white SUV). The car moved to the right (as you're SUPPOSED to do), while the SUV froze up and stopped. The fire truck went to move into the opposite lanes of traffic to go around the SUV when all of a sudden the SUV crossed the double yellow lines and ran right into the fire truck.
The SUV sustained heavy damage to the driver side and the fire captain even said it looked like the front axle was broken from the way it wasn't really turning around. For whatever reason, the SUV took off at a high rate (or as high a rate as it could) speed and fled the scene. We searched nearby areas for the SUV as it couldn't have gotten to far, but were unsuccessful.
Meanwhile, Fire's Internal Affairs and a battalion chief came out to the scene to conduct their investigation. I had to wait forever for our crime scene technician to come out and take photographs of the city damage to the truck.
If you ever see an emergency vehicle coming up on you remember this: SLOW DOWN AND MOVE TO THE RIGHT. This really is the safest way for us to navigate to important calls.
I ended up getting off work at midnight as opposed to 1030pm...
I arrive on scene and see the fire truck blocking about two lanes with debris in the road. Apparently Fire was heading to a call lights and sirens when they came up on two vehicles ( a car and a white SUV). The car moved to the right (as you're SUPPOSED to do), while the SUV froze up and stopped. The fire truck went to move into the opposite lanes of traffic to go around the SUV when all of a sudden the SUV crossed the double yellow lines and ran right into the fire truck.
The SUV sustained heavy damage to the driver side and the fire captain even said it looked like the front axle was broken from the way it wasn't really turning around. For whatever reason, the SUV took off at a high rate (or as high a rate as it could) speed and fled the scene. We searched nearby areas for the SUV as it couldn't have gotten to far, but were unsuccessful.
Meanwhile, Fire's Internal Affairs and a battalion chief came out to the scene to conduct their investigation. I had to wait forever for our crime scene technician to come out and take photographs of the city damage to the truck.
If you ever see an emergency vehicle coming up on you remember this: SLOW DOWN AND MOVE TO THE RIGHT. This really is the safest way for us to navigate to important calls.
I ended up getting off work at midnight as opposed to 1030pm...
Sunday, May 24, 2015
"That's a Big Boy!"
Hey all, sorry I haven't written in awhile. I had a trainee during a very busy week and then went on vacation for a bit to the beach. The beach getaway was nice and I got a chance to see two of my friends get married in a beautiful ceremony.
My trainee was really good to say the least. He has to work on his radio skills but he has a lot of potential. His father is a retired professional wrestler ( I thought that was pretty cool). He hadn't really done any traffic stops with his previous Field Training Officer, so we managed to get a lot done. I didn't want to focus so much on writing tickets but just dealing with people on stops. He handled himself very well.
One of the days that week, we responded to the parking lot of the shopping mall on my beat for a vehicle break-in. We arrive on scene and there's an elderly lady who stated her gun was stolen from her car. The lady normally carries her .40 pistol in her purse but had recently hurt her ankle and the extra weight was too much for her. She placed the gun in between her driver seat and the center console (it was left visible from outside the car). In a rush to get into the mall however, the lady left her car doors unlocked and the pistol was stolen. The lady was very appreciative of the things we do everyday and thanked us for doing our job in such hard times and even went one step further by thanking us for dealing with the crazy juveniles that are out causing the crimes. She shared the story of how she brought back her grandson from the streets and how he's a very productive member of society (he was in the car with her).
Toward the end of the week we ended up arresting a juvenile for shoplifting. I walked my trainee through the extensive and tedious juvenile process. We were at juvenile court dropping off the arrest paperwork when an officer asked for another unit to deal with a hostile male off his meds. We weren't exactly close to him but we started to head that way anyways. In the background we could hear the male going "Fuck you man!" on the radio. The backup officer arrived and keyed up going "This is a big boy! We need more units! This guy is HUGE!". After hearing that, I hit my lights and showed the trainee some first hand tips about driving safe and fast amid a tense blood pumping situation. We arrived on scene and I hopped out of the car (narrowly missing another officer arriving on scene---that could have been bad). We rush to help get the male under control as paramedics loaded him on a a stretcher and restrained him with physical restraints. I was curious walking back to the car about what the original call was. When I looked at my MDT I noticed the man was 15 years old. I was shocked. He was about 6'7 and easily 300lbs and he was 15 years old. Thankfully everything went safely and the kid was taken to the hospital for a much needed mental evaluation.
My trainee was really good to say the least. He has to work on his radio skills but he has a lot of potential. His father is a retired professional wrestler ( I thought that was pretty cool). He hadn't really done any traffic stops with his previous Field Training Officer, so we managed to get a lot done. I didn't want to focus so much on writing tickets but just dealing with people on stops. He handled himself very well.
One of the days that week, we responded to the parking lot of the shopping mall on my beat for a vehicle break-in. We arrive on scene and there's an elderly lady who stated her gun was stolen from her car. The lady normally carries her .40 pistol in her purse but had recently hurt her ankle and the extra weight was too much for her. She placed the gun in between her driver seat and the center console (it was left visible from outside the car). In a rush to get into the mall however, the lady left her car doors unlocked and the pistol was stolen. The lady was very appreciative of the things we do everyday and thanked us for doing our job in such hard times and even went one step further by thanking us for dealing with the crazy juveniles that are out causing the crimes. She shared the story of how she brought back her grandson from the streets and how he's a very productive member of society (he was in the car with her).
Toward the end of the week we ended up arresting a juvenile for shoplifting. I walked my trainee through the extensive and tedious juvenile process. We were at juvenile court dropping off the arrest paperwork when an officer asked for another unit to deal with a hostile male off his meds. We weren't exactly close to him but we started to head that way anyways. In the background we could hear the male going "Fuck you man!" on the radio. The backup officer arrived and keyed up going "This is a big boy! We need more units! This guy is HUGE!". After hearing that, I hit my lights and showed the trainee some first hand tips about driving safe and fast amid a tense blood pumping situation. We arrived on scene and I hopped out of the car (narrowly missing another officer arriving on scene---that could have been bad). We rush to help get the male under control as paramedics loaded him on a a stretcher and restrained him with physical restraints. I was curious walking back to the car about what the original call was. When I looked at my MDT I noticed the man was 15 years old. I was shocked. He was about 6'7 and easily 300lbs and he was 15 years old. Thankfully everything went safely and the kid was taken to the hospital for a much needed mental evaluation.
Tuesday, May 5, 2015
Officer Needs Immediate Assistance!
So this week started off with a good slow Sunday. Normally the state highway patrol takes care of our accidents on the interstate during the week. Unfortunately on the weekends, they become our problem-and part of my beat is on the interstate. I got sent to an accident call that had been holding from the previous watch for over two hours. When I finally get there, I think both parties had had enough of waiting. It turns out a 16 year old brand new driver followed too closely and slammed into the rear of a company vehicle from out of state. What a way to start your driving career. Thankfully nobody was hurt and both vehicles were still drivable.
Monday was where the excitement really peaked. My beat partner had to stand duty outside of the mayor's house. Meaning I had to take care of calls on her beat. While I'm taking care of calls (in particular at this time- a missing adult) on her beat, a fight with a weapon call pops up on my beat. The caller stated a male with no shirt on was in a dispute with another male and had a pistol in his hand. While on the call with 911 the male fired a single round into the air. The dispatched officer arrived on scene and went to make contact with the male who then fled on foot.
The officer gave chase and called it out on the radio. Due to the fact that the male had a weapon in his hand the call was upgraded to an officer needing immediate assistance. When a "help call" goes up like that, everything you're doing gets put on the backburner and every officer in the city starts racing to where you are to help you. The officer jumped several fences and ran through several backyards before losing sight of the male around a house. At this time I arrived on scene and we knocked on the door of the house. An elderly female came to the door and we asked if a shirtless male ran into the house and she said yes. She then called for him to come to the room and he was detained. The male started complaining he could not walk and could not breathe. We carried him to the patrol car and an ambulance was called to check him out as a precaution. The elderly female (who turned out to be the male's aunt and owner of the house) started yelling at my sergeant, asking if "all these" police cars and people were really necessary. My sergeant looked her dead in the eye and said "Why yes ma'am THEY ARE.". She started giving us a huge verbal buffet and she was detained while we finished our investigation and calmed down.
Our next focus was on trying to find where the gun went since the male did not have it on him. The male told us he ditched the gun in some bushes. A K9 unit was called out to help in the search but we managed to find the gun under a bush at the next door neighbor's house. Our crime scene investigation unit came out and processed the gun, which was a revolver. Inside of the cylinder was one spent shell casing. The gun actually came back stolen from a case handled by the ATF and the suspect was a convicted felon. Hopefully he'll actually see some good time.
Not too long after helping that officer out with that call, I was dispatched to a possible burglar in a residence. A lady was coming home to her apartment with her young daughter and stated when she went to push open her door it felt as if there was someone on the other side preventing her from opening the door. My partner and I raced to the location and using the callers keys cleared the apartment room by room. Nothing was disturbed and when we went in, in fact, we ended up setting the alarm off ourselves. It was good to help put the lady's mind at ease but crazy how nothing was actually what it appeared (which tends to happen a lot with this job).
After the events of the day, I was backed up on reports and stayed late to get them finish. I was in the parking lot of a beauty supply store on my beat within eyesight of a dollar store when a call came in for a commercial robbery at the dollar store. At this time of the night there were not many cars and I immediately pestered the dispatcher for a suspect description and direction of travel since I was already right there. She couldn't provide me with any of that and I made my way to the store. It turns out the attempted robbery occurred about 20 minutes prior to the 911 and they had just decided to call (after almost waiting until the morning to call.....).
A male was outside of the store waiting for a female to walk her home when a white car with tinted windows pulled up. Two black males exited the vehicle with handguns and approached the male. They told him to face the wall, not move, not look at them, and not say a word. One man kept the gun to his head and the other tried to get in the dollar store. Fortunately the doors were locked (it was after closing time) and they could not get anything. Both males then hopped in the car and took off. I would have loved to have gone after them if I had known about it earlier....
Monday was where the excitement really peaked. My beat partner had to stand duty outside of the mayor's house. Meaning I had to take care of calls on her beat. While I'm taking care of calls (in particular at this time- a missing adult) on her beat, a fight with a weapon call pops up on my beat. The caller stated a male with no shirt on was in a dispute with another male and had a pistol in his hand. While on the call with 911 the male fired a single round into the air. The dispatched officer arrived on scene and went to make contact with the male who then fled on foot.
The officer gave chase and called it out on the radio. Due to the fact that the male had a weapon in his hand the call was upgraded to an officer needing immediate assistance. When a "help call" goes up like that, everything you're doing gets put on the backburner and every officer in the city starts racing to where you are to help you. The officer jumped several fences and ran through several backyards before losing sight of the male around a house. At this time I arrived on scene and we knocked on the door of the house. An elderly female came to the door and we asked if a shirtless male ran into the house and she said yes. She then called for him to come to the room and he was detained. The male started complaining he could not walk and could not breathe. We carried him to the patrol car and an ambulance was called to check him out as a precaution. The elderly female (who turned out to be the male's aunt and owner of the house) started yelling at my sergeant, asking if "all these" police cars and people were really necessary. My sergeant looked her dead in the eye and said "Why yes ma'am THEY ARE.". She started giving us a huge verbal buffet and she was detained while we finished our investigation and calmed down.
Our next focus was on trying to find where the gun went since the male did not have it on him. The male told us he ditched the gun in some bushes. A K9 unit was called out to help in the search but we managed to find the gun under a bush at the next door neighbor's house. Our crime scene investigation unit came out and processed the gun, which was a revolver. Inside of the cylinder was one spent shell casing. The gun actually came back stolen from a case handled by the ATF and the suspect was a convicted felon. Hopefully he'll actually see some good time.
Not too long after helping that officer out with that call, I was dispatched to a possible burglar in a residence. A lady was coming home to her apartment with her young daughter and stated when she went to push open her door it felt as if there was someone on the other side preventing her from opening the door. My partner and I raced to the location and using the callers keys cleared the apartment room by room. Nothing was disturbed and when we went in, in fact, we ended up setting the alarm off ourselves. It was good to help put the lady's mind at ease but crazy how nothing was actually what it appeared (which tends to happen a lot with this job).
After the events of the day, I was backed up on reports and stayed late to get them finish. I was in the parking lot of a beauty supply store on my beat within eyesight of a dollar store when a call came in for a commercial robbery at the dollar store. At this time of the night there were not many cars and I immediately pestered the dispatcher for a suspect description and direction of travel since I was already right there. She couldn't provide me with any of that and I made my way to the store. It turns out the attempted robbery occurred about 20 minutes prior to the 911 and they had just decided to call (after almost waiting until the morning to call.....).
A male was outside of the store waiting for a female to walk her home when a white car with tinted windows pulled up. Two black males exited the vehicle with handguns and approached the male. They told him to face the wall, not move, not look at them, and not say a word. One man kept the gun to his head and the other tried to get in the dollar store. Fortunately the doors were locked (it was after closing time) and they could not get anything. Both males then hopped in the car and took off. I would have loved to have gone after them if I had known about it earlier....
Monday, May 4, 2015
A Week of Foolishness
So last week was pretty eventful around the country with everything that was happening in Baltimore. You can be mile away and still get the same animosity from certain people for things you were not involved in.
On Sunday, I backed up my partner on a dispute call at a gas station on her beat. We get there and this guy won $500 on a scratch off ticket. He was upset and could not understand that the gas station did not have $500 on hand to give him to claim his prize....so he called 911. This particular guy does nothing all day but drink beer and buy lotto tickets. We were able to talk and calm the guy down and let him know that if he came back in a few hours they would be able to pay him his money. I can guarantee this money will just go towards beer and lotto tickets. Oh the things I would do with $500 cash....
Monday I got a chance to put my child victim skills to use. We received a call about a 7 year old boy who was molested by his father. Typically in these types of calls we do not speak to the children as what they experience are traumatic events. It takes a trained person in my state to interview the child in a forensic interview where the environment is extremely child friendly. We arrive on scene and the mother is hysterical. We try to ask her what happened and she insists we talk to her son. I try to explain to her that we need her as the adult to explain to us what happened. She started to break down in tears as she stated she was in the room as the boy's father was groping and basically masturbating the son under the covers. We called for an ambulance who escorted the mother and her three kids to the hospital for evaluation and the interview with detectives. I asked the mother if I could go inside of the apartment to get pictures of the crime scene and she refused. I contacted the detective and told them the mother refused and I was told to secure the entrance of the apartment for a search warrant. I ended up waiting two hours before the detective told me I was ok.
Tuesday, I got sent to a late call a few minutes before I was supposed to go home. An elderly female at a senior high-rise called 911 to say over $4,000 worth of jewelry was stolen from her apartment. This particular female is wheelchair bound and has a nurse come in every day to help take care of her and dress her for the day. She stated this was the only person who came in her apartment. I asked her when the last time she saw her jewelry was and she told me two months ago....I felt bad but this was more than likely a case of dementia and it was changed to a lost property call.
Wednesday, I responded to a call on my beat at the mall. A lady stated she received a phone call from someone claiming to be a magazine company. She gave them her name, date of birth, social security number, and telephone number. About an hour or two after giving her this information she started receiving text message alerts from the bank stating her account was being accessed. They people managed to take almost $300 out of her prepaid card account where her tax refund was put into. I would NEVER ever give personal information to anyone over the phone unless you initiate the call and know exactly who you're talking to. In today's day and age you just have to be smart about that stuff.
Thursday (my Friday for the week), I went to a call on my beat at the grocery store. An elderly man was in a heated verbal dispute with a younger gentleman. He told me he was sitting on a motorized scooter at the entrance to the store when the guy came up and started yelling at him that he didn't need to be on the scooter. The younger male tried to get the scooter away from the elderly male to use for his grandmother. The guy felt scared so he started calling 911. I talked to the security officer at the store who stated the elderly man blew the argument out of proportion and it was really a big deal over nothing.
Oh the things people call 911 for..... While finishing this up, I received information that A New York Police Officer shot in the head during a suspicious persons encounter on Saturday has died. He was 25 years old with 4 years and 10 months of service. Rest In Peace brother: Police Officer Brian Moore.
On Sunday, I backed up my partner on a dispute call at a gas station on her beat. We get there and this guy won $500 on a scratch off ticket. He was upset and could not understand that the gas station did not have $500 on hand to give him to claim his prize....so he called 911. This particular guy does nothing all day but drink beer and buy lotto tickets. We were able to talk and calm the guy down and let him know that if he came back in a few hours they would be able to pay him his money. I can guarantee this money will just go towards beer and lotto tickets. Oh the things I would do with $500 cash....
Monday I got a chance to put my child victim skills to use. We received a call about a 7 year old boy who was molested by his father. Typically in these types of calls we do not speak to the children as what they experience are traumatic events. It takes a trained person in my state to interview the child in a forensic interview where the environment is extremely child friendly. We arrive on scene and the mother is hysterical. We try to ask her what happened and she insists we talk to her son. I try to explain to her that we need her as the adult to explain to us what happened. She started to break down in tears as she stated she was in the room as the boy's father was groping and basically masturbating the son under the covers. We called for an ambulance who escorted the mother and her three kids to the hospital for evaluation and the interview with detectives. I asked the mother if I could go inside of the apartment to get pictures of the crime scene and she refused. I contacted the detective and told them the mother refused and I was told to secure the entrance of the apartment for a search warrant. I ended up waiting two hours before the detective told me I was ok.
Tuesday, I got sent to a late call a few minutes before I was supposed to go home. An elderly female at a senior high-rise called 911 to say over $4,000 worth of jewelry was stolen from her apartment. This particular female is wheelchair bound and has a nurse come in every day to help take care of her and dress her for the day. She stated this was the only person who came in her apartment. I asked her when the last time she saw her jewelry was and she told me two months ago....I felt bad but this was more than likely a case of dementia and it was changed to a lost property call.
Wednesday, I responded to a call on my beat at the mall. A lady stated she received a phone call from someone claiming to be a magazine company. She gave them her name, date of birth, social security number, and telephone number. About an hour or two after giving her this information she started receiving text message alerts from the bank stating her account was being accessed. They people managed to take almost $300 out of her prepaid card account where her tax refund was put into. I would NEVER ever give personal information to anyone over the phone unless you initiate the call and know exactly who you're talking to. In today's day and age you just have to be smart about that stuff.
Thursday (my Friday for the week), I went to a call on my beat at the grocery store. An elderly man was in a heated verbal dispute with a younger gentleman. He told me he was sitting on a motorized scooter at the entrance to the store when the guy came up and started yelling at him that he didn't need to be on the scooter. The younger male tried to get the scooter away from the elderly male to use for his grandmother. The guy felt scared so he started calling 911. I talked to the security officer at the store who stated the elderly man blew the argument out of proportion and it was really a big deal over nothing.
Oh the things people call 911 for..... While finishing this up, I received information that A New York Police Officer shot in the head during a suspicious persons encounter on Saturday has died. He was 25 years old with 4 years and 10 months of service. Rest In Peace brother: Police Officer Brian Moore.
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