Hey everyone, it's been 8 weeks since I last wrote but I have a good reason. The popular police television show COPS was riding with me and I figured I would let the show explain some of the wild moments we experienced. It'll air sometime in the Fall and I'll be sure to let you know when it does.
This week was something else. It was a four day week for me as I took Sunday off to enjoy time with some coworkers (especially after one was involved in an officer-involved shooting during a car chase just two days prior). It's always good to get out and enjoy non-cop stuff to free up your mind from all that we see.
Monday was a day of thin patience. My first call of the day came up as a dispute with a weapon call (my backup a little further away from me on this call). The call remarks said that a mother and daughter were in a dispute and the daughter pulled a knife on the mother. I get there and quickly find out that of course no weapon was involved. People often call 911 and say there's a weapon just to get us there faster (don't even start me on that). Apparently this whole argument started because the adult daughter ate the mother's can of beans.....Mother wanted daughter out of the house and I quickly established that daughter didn't live there so she had to go. Of course daughter wanted a supervisor to come out because I was making her leave. I had let the daughter tell me her entire side of the story without interruption and now I was listening to mom. Daughter kept interrupting and I warned her that if she kept interrupting her mom who let her tell her own side of the story that I would arrest her for disorderly conduct. Her response: a very sarcastic "oh wowwwwwwww". I walked over and grabbed her arm and ordered her to stand. She refused and I had to pull her to her feet and use a little force to get her into cuffs. Of course then mom (who originally called because daughter allegedly threatened her with a knife", wanted a supervisor too because she never wanted her daughter arrested. Some things you can't make up. Now this woman I arrested had very small wrists and I put the cuffs as tight as I could go but I could still move them all the way up to the woman's elbow. Her complaint: they were too tight. That was not the way I wanted to start off my work week....
Tuesday saw me welcome a new trainee who had recently been sworn in. This new officer had come Florida after being a track coach in high school. She seems to have a good head on her shoulders and she already is showing signs that she'll do well. We responded to suspicious behavior call at an apartment complex. A lady called saying that her front door was opened while she was asleep and someone had tried to enter her home but maintenance said it wasn't them. We arrive and there's no answer to the door. I had the dispatcher call them back and they told them they were coming to the door. We waited another five minutes when a car pulled up in the parking lot. I quickly told my trainee that this had to be the caller and that she probably didn't think we would show up so fast. The lady exits the car and immediately says "hey officer, I'm sorry, I didn't think you would show up this fast..." There was nothing we could really do in this situation and the caller herself said she left the door unlocked. I quickly gathered she was tired of living at the complex and was just looking for a police report to say she felt unsafe at the complex and wanted to break her lease. She wasn't getting that from me.
Wednesday saw me with a civilian ride along. Let's just say I think this individual walked away with a new found sense of what we go through on the job. Our first two calls were related to mentally ill people. My state in my opinion does not have a system in place to adequately deal with mental health. It's a long work in progress. The second call involved a man who walked to his friend's house and told him he wanted to kill himself. I talked with him and he was all for going to the hospital but then he thought I was going to take him in my police car and that meant he was going to jail. A mental health team from the local hospital system came out but he insisted nothing was wrong. They offered to set him up with an appointment he could go to on his own (his friend even offered to drive him) and he quickly agreed to go that route again.
Here is when things changed that day. It was time to head back to the precinct when a traffic stop came through from a traffic unit. Someone took off running from the stop and the officer requested help. I immediately said I was en route and we took off to help an officer in need. While en route I was explaining driving safety to my ride along. Whenever an officer needs help we typically drive faster than normal, I explained, but we have to do so safely. Not arriving at all is not helping anyone. Not even ten seconds later, an officer yells over the radio "I'm hit" followed by another officer saying there was an officer involved accident and they needed an ambulance for an officer who was trapped in the vehicle and not looking good. We re-directed to the accident and proceeded to block off highway on ramps to prepare for the escort of the ambulance.We typically do this for officers shot in the line of duty. I've done it before for an officer who didn't make it and it's always nervewracking when it happens. Thankfully three officers involved in the accident will go on to make a full recovery. The ride along definitely saw a night in which we as a police family bonded together.
Friday saw the end of my week rescuing a poor little dog. An off duty officer working as courtesy officer at a complex on my beat called stating that someone had recently been evicted from the complex and left a dog behind. I arrived and quickly found the apartment to be that of the gentleman I mentioned in a previous blog entry who impersonated a police officer. We draw our weapons just in case the dog decided to be unfriendly and clear the apartment. We found a brown pitbull cowering in a corner with its ribs clearly showing. The poor dog had been in the apartment alone for three days. It was so scared. Animal control showed up to the take the dog. Hopefully we can go after the guy who left it that way.
Well it was good to write again! Hope the weekend treats everyone well.
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